Opinion: Why It Is Time For U.S.-China Civil Space Cooperation

“Why should man’s first flight to the Moon be a matter of national competition? . . . Surely, we should explore whether the scientists and astronauts of our two countries—indeed of all the world—cannot work together in the conquest of space, sending someday in this decade to the Moon not the representatives of a single nation, but the representatives of all of our countries.”

So said then-U.S. President John F. Kennedy during a September 1963 address to the United Nations General Assembly, proposing a joint mission to the Moon with the Soviet Union. Kennedy’s outreach to America’s Cold War rival may surprise many today. Modern views have been shaped by decades of commentary about Kennedy and the great space race, but a race was not his preferred option.

Kennedy’s final U.N. speech—two months before he was assassinated—was not his first overture to the Soviets: Eighteen months earlier, he sent a letter to then-Soviet Chairman Nikita Khrushchev outlining a broad list of possibilities for joint space activities. He then sent NASA’s deputy administrator to Moscow for direct talks, all part of a campaign to ignite a positive dialog. What is astounding is that this was all taking place during a foreboding time of intense conflict. The U.S. and Soviets had both been detonating nuclear bombs in space, and in the midst of Kennedy’s proposals, the Cuban Missile Crisis put the world on the verge of nuclear war.

Kennedy recognized an opportunity in the global fascination with space exploration and its boundless possibilities. Like his predecessor in the White House, Dwight D. Eisenhower, Kennedy saw space as a fertile ground for diplomacy, and he had the savvy to position the U.S. as the nation paving the way in space for all of humanity. By doing so, he created a compelling vision of American leadership for the entire international community, boosting U.S. prestige and soft power. Kennedy’s attempts at space detente, and similar outreach from subsequent administrations, led to the 1967 Outer Space Treaty, the joint Apollo-Soyuz mission in 1975 and, ultimately, the International Space Station.

Today, the U.S. and China have entered a new space race, a cold war is looming, and rhetoric abounds. The risk of war in space has become a common topic, and reports of space weapons, satellite jamming and mysterious coorbital maneuvers are frequent. Leaders in both countries have begun to cast, as an existential imperative, the need to land their astronauts on the Moon next to assure they are not subjugated by the other’s rules of lunar conduct or territorial rights.

In this environment of fear and mistrust, our leaders should reflect on lessons from the start of the space age and take a page from Kennedy’s playbook. The U.S. Space Force has the responsibility to defend and protect the nation’s interests in space and, if necessary, engage in armed conflict, but NASA has a very different role. NASA’s mission is space science, exploration and, perhaps most important, space diplomacy. In the current discourse, the diplomatic potential of NASA is being underutilized.

There is almost no detectable civil space dialog between the U.S. and China, the two largest space powers. Both Washington and Beijing appear satisfied with space as a point of competition and conflict threatened by military escalation. In fact, U.S. law, in the form of the Wolf Amendment, precludes NASA from entering into even minor agreements with China without special certifications to Congress, and Beijing’s space programs remain largely opaque.

This unhealthy status quo must change. With the number of satellites growing exponentially and the risk of miscalculations and collisions rising, there is growing urgency for the two nations to come to agreement, along with others, on the management of space traffic. Lunar and planetary exploration abound with opportunities for collaboration, such as operationalizing mutual astronaut rescue, establishing science agreements and exchanging services in deep space. A bilateral initiative to explore these possibilities, sponsored at the presidential level, should be started without delay. As Kennedy asked, why should the Americans and the Soviet Union “in preparing for such expeditions become involved in immense duplications of research, construction and expenditure?”

While cooperation in space exploration will not solve our terrestrial conflicts, it has often served as a powerful symbol of our shared humanity. As then-President Lyndon B. Johnson wrote to the Senate in 1967, “Men who have worked together to reach the stars are not likely to descend together into the depths of war and desolation.”

Dan Hart is a senior fellow with the Atlantic Council.