China’s ambitions in space have seen a lot of progress as the country strives to rival NASA by placing robotic landers and astronauts on the moon and Mars.
The Chinese government is looking into growing the space sector to rival the U.S. companies like like Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin and Elon Musk's SpaceX, which is targeting March 30 for the latest launch of its Falcon 9 rocket.
The Chinese government is considering ways to direct spending that will push their tech companies toward innovations in downstream technologies.
These technologies include robotics, aerospace, artificial intelligence, big data analytics and other 21st-century technologies.
Xi's government has tripled the spending on space science. There are also emerging space start-ups that indicate that the Chinese government can already foresee the benefits in their investments in space technologies.
The commercial space companies in the U.S. and Europe and also NASA will be subjected to enormous pressure as China increases the flow of capital towards its state-run and private space-related tech companies. The precise amount that China is spending on its space programs remains a secret. However, many analysts say that its estimated to be around $3 billion annually.
The amount is just a fraction compared to the $19.3 billion that the U.S. allocated NASA in 2016. However, China has managed to achieve a lot with the small budget.
China’s space program started back in 1950s. Before the year 2003, China had not put an astronaut into orbit. However, this has drastically changed.
In the years after 2003, China has made a lot of progress that is almost close to Russia and the U.S.
China launched more Rockets than Russian in 2016 for the first time. The rockets were around 22. The missions included Shenzou 11, which carried two to dock with China's Tiangong-2 spacecraft, a temporary orbiting space habitat serving as a stepping stone for a larger, permanent Chinese space station in the early 2020s.
Dr. James Lewis, a senior vice president at the Center for Strategic and International Studies said that the missions that China is perusing are largely about prestige. The Chinese are striving to fight the domination of the U.S. and the West.
SOURCE: http://www.cnbc.com/2017/03/28/chinas-secret-plan-to-crush-spacex-and-the-us-space-program.html
