Hindu(29-06-2006)
http://www.hindu.com/2006/06/29/stories/2006062903841100.htm

The sky is no more the limit

Pallavi Aiyar

For China, its space programme is a source of national pride and international prestige, conferring a status that transcends price tags.  

 
IN AN ELITE CLUB: On October 15, 2003, China became the third country to successfully launch a manned spacecraft, the Shenzhou-V.

LOCATED ON the outer fringe of the north-western past of the capital, Beijing's "aerospace city" does not on first sight appear to be the gleaming testament to space-age technological prowess, one might imagine. But inside the blocks of unassuming white-tiled buildings, one of the world's most sophisticated space programmes is being developed.

Bang in the middle of the aerospace city is the highly secretive Beijing Aerospace Command and Control Center (BACCC) — the commanding, decision-making nerve-centre of the country's space flight testing. When Defence Minister Pranab Mukherjee was taken on a brief tour of the centre during his visit to China at the end of May, it was projected as a major confidence building measure on China's part.

As a norm, the BACCC is strictly off limits to the media. A special trip to the centre organised for foreign correspondents based in Beijing thus gave a rare opportunity for a glimpse into China's space development efforts that have been in the international limelight ever since Yang Li Wei became the first Chinese astronaut to travel in space aboard the Shenzhou-V spacecraft in 2003.

The Spaceflight Command and Control Room is an enormous two galleried area that would be the perfect movie set for a Hollywood extravaganza like Apollo 13 were it not in fact the real thing. Four large, luminous split-screens dominate the room. The two screens in the centre display a map of the world against which the trajectory of a spacecraft is tracked after it is launched. The others present a snapshot of the inside of any spacecraft that may be in orbit.

It is from this room that all the Shenzhou spaceships were tracked and controlled with the help of four "Yuanwang" aerospace survey ships stationed in the Atlantic, Pacific, and Indian Oceans.

Rows of monitors with shiny multi-coloured buttons adorn the consoles from where a tense ground control crew observe the entire journey of the craft from lift-off to touchdown. It is a bit disconcerting to feel as if an accidental touch by an uncoordinated journalist might end up launching something. Luckily, with all the journalists on their best behaviour, the visit passes without incident.

Zhang Shegyuan, the deputy director of the BACCC, tells us that the first six Shenzhou spacecraft have cost a total of 19 billion yuan ($2.3 billion). Even though this is only a fraction of what a country like the United States spends on its space programme every year (NASA has a proposed budget of $7 billion for 2007 alone), there has been criticism that developing such a programme is a luxury for a developing country like China.

Mr. Zhang insists that $2.3 billion is a modest sum. For China the space programme is a source of national pride and international prestige, conferring on the country a status that transcends price tags.

Following the launch of the Shenzhou-V space mission in October 2003, China became only the third country in the world to successfully send a manned spacecraft into orbit. When congratulating the staff of the BACCC after the hitch-free launch and return of the Shenzhou-VI mission on October 2005, Wu Banguao, Chairman of the Chinese National People's Congress, said: "The successful mission is of great significance for elevating China's prestige in the world and promoting China's economic, scientific and national defence capabilities as well as its national cohesiveness."

Underscoring the techno-nationalism that imbues the space programme, Mr. Zhang attributes the success of the six Shenzhou missions thus far to the fact that the astronauts and other members of the mission teams are "patriotic to their motherland."

Yang Liwei, the astronaut who is today one of the country's biggest celebrities, was also at hand to answer questions at the aerospace city's "Astronaut Research and Training Centre." Framed by a gigantic spacecraft simulator, Mr. Yang said space research was "the common task of humanity" and highlighted the fact that he had carried a United Nations flag with him on board the Shenzhou-V.

U.S. suspicions

But despite China's calls for greater international cooperation in space development and insistence that its own programme is intended for peaceful, scientific research, some countries, notably the U.S., remain suspicious that the country's space capabilities are intended for military purposes.

Thus, although China has expressed an interest in joining the International Space Station, which involves Russia, Europe, Canada and Japan, the Pentagon has opposed cooperation with Beijing, claiming that China's space programme is a potential threat to the U.S. satellite system which underpins American military power.

Regardless of U.S. suspicions, China says it is on track to achieve its future goals of a spacewalk by 2008, docking of flight vehicles in orbit by 2012, and a manned space station not long after that.

Chinese media recently reported that the country's first lunar orbiter, named Chang'e I, is on schedule for launch in 2007. The moon orbiting project is the first step in the mainland's larger lunar exploration programme that went into operation in 2004. The orbiter is expected to be followed by a remote-controlled lunar rover that will perform experiments and send data back to Earth.

In the third phase, a module will drill out a chunk of the moon and bring it back home for analysis.

The professed aim is to have all three phases complete by 2017, when a manned lunar probe mission will be considered.

It is an ambitious programme, but China is not alone in thinking big on space. In the immediate neighbourhood both India and Japan are also planning an eventful decade of space exploration. India will be launching Chandrayaan-I, a robotic spaceship headed for the moon, by 2008. In Japan, a robotic probe SELENE is also slated to visit the moon before 2010.

What is clear is that space exploration in the future is certain to expand beyond the exclusive club of countries that has dominated it thus far. In the "space race" of the 1960s when U.S. rocket scientist Wernher von Braun was asked what he expected to find on the moon he jokingly replied: "Russians."

Today his answer would probably have been: "Chinese, Indians, and Japanese."