The launch of China’s Shenzhou-20 is the next step in a tense race between NASA and China to create bases on the moon, and from there, lift off to Mars.
The far side of the moon is an increasingly popular destination.
In 2023, India celebrated as its Chandrayaan-3 became the first spacecraft to land on the lunar south pole.
NASA intends to make history by sending the first humans near the lunar south pole in 2026 with its Artemis mission.
And China has said it wants to get there in 2030.
But NASA’s administrator Bill Nelson last year said it was “incumbent” to get there first.
He told the House Committee on Appropriations that China could claim parts of outer space as its own territory if it were to land on the moon first.
“We believe that a lot of their so-called civilian space programme is a military programme,” he said.
“China has made extraordinary strides, especially in the last 10 years, but they are very, very secretive.”
Asked by the committee’s chairman Hal Rogers about China’s “very significant investments” in their space programmes and how NASA would maintain its “edge” over China, Nelson replied: “We are in a race.”
He added: “The latest date they’ve said they’re going to land [on the moon] is 2030 but that keeps moving up.
“It is incumbent on us to get there first and to utilise our research efforts for peaceful purposes.”
You can read more about the 21st-century China/US space race in this Sky News investigation from earlier this year…