Communication, navigation, and space telemetry: China reveals its cards in the battle for cis-lunar space
- Gabriele Iuvinale
- 8 minuti fa
- Tempo di lettura: 4 min
Amid the sidereal silence enveloping the competition between great powers, a recent document has made waves within circles of scientific diplomacy and space intelligence. In the latest issue of the Journal of Deep Space Exploration—a prestigious publication of the Beijing Institute of Technology—a technical analysis entitled Reflections on the Development of the Queqiao Integrated Navigation and Telemetry System has appeared, which reads like a programmatic manifesto. Signed by analysts from the China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation (CASC) and the Beijing Institute of Spacecraft System Engineering, the study offers an unprecedented and surprisingly honest X-ray of China's ambitions, but above all, of the delays Beijing must overcome to avoid ceding ground to an increasingly organized West in the new economic frontier of cislunar space.
The Western United Front and the Challenge of Interoperability
The analysis by the Chinese experts begins with a pragmatic observation devoid of triumphalist rhetoric: the international landscape is evolving at a speed that risks marginalizing Beijing's efforts, despite the historic successes of the Chang'e missions. The document clearly identifies China's main limitation compared to its rivals: the lack of a systemic approach comparable to that of the Western bloc. The United States is not moving alone; it has activated a powerful collaborative architecture centered on the LunaNet project, conceived by NASA not merely as a communication network, but as a true "solar internet" capable of providing standardized navigation and data exchange services.
What alarms CASC analysts most is not just American technology, but the level of integration with historic allies. The study explicitly cites the European Space Agency's Moonlight program and Japan's LNSS (Lunar Navigation Satellite System) as parts of a single forming ecosystem. Beijing’s concern crystallizes around a specific date: 2029. This is the year the US-led bloc plans to conduct joint in-orbit tests to verify the interoperability of their respective systems. This synergy between American industrial power, European technical sophistication, and Japanese engineering precision is perceived by the study's authors as an encircling maneuver designed to impose global technical standards before China can propose its own alternatives.
Resource Scarcity and the "First Mover" Advantage
The document highlights how this competition is not purely theoretical but involves the physical occupation of limited resources. The United States has already outlined a "National Cislunar Science and Technology Strategy" that elevates space infrastructure to a strategic priority, moving with bureaucratic assertiveness to register transmission frequencies and occupy the most stable orbits, such as Lagrange points or lunar frozen orbits.
China acknowledges it is lagging on this specific front. While NASA is already conducting advanced deep-space laser communication tests and experimenting with lunar GPS signals using commercial landers, Beijing has so far operated primarily through single, dedicated missions. China’s current infrastructure, based on the first and second-generation Queqiao satellites, is excellent for tactical support of robotic missions but lacks the capillarity and redundancy of the LunaNet network envisioned by Washington. The concrete risk outlined by the Beijing analysts is facing a fait accompli where the "information superhighways" between Earth and the Moon have already been mapped, regulated, and occupied by rivals.
Beijing's Response: Bridging the Technological Gap
To counter this trend and reverse the initial disadvantage, the study’s authors outline a future strategy that demands a radical change of pace. The absolute priority is transforming the "Queqiao" system from simple tactical support into a strategic "three-in-one" constellation capable of providing communication, navigation, and remote sensing on an industrial scale.
To realize this vision, the study prescribes an acceleration in specific technologies where the gap with the West is still perceptible. It is imperative for China to develop ultra-long-distance, high-speed laser communication systems to compete with the data flows anticipated by American and European networks. Furthermore, crucial emphasis is placed on onboard artificial intelligence and autonomous navigation; Chinese satellites and rovers must be able to calculate their own position and make operational decisions without depending on ground control, thus overcoming the communication latency limits that the West is seeking to mitigate with its own distributed networks.
The Geopolitical Move for a Global Alternative
Perhaps the most significant aspect of the study published in the Journal of Deep Space Exploration is the call to action on the diplomatic and normative level. The experts in Beijing urge the government not to limit itself to the physical construction of satellites but to simultaneously build a political architecture that challenges Western normative hegemony. China must urgently propose its own interoperability standards, offering the Queqiao network as the foundational infrastructure for the International Lunar Research Station (ILRS), the Chinese-led project positioning itself as an alternative to the Artemis program.
In this perspective, the Queqiao constellation becomes a formidable instrument of soft power, designed to create a pole of attraction for emerging nations and commercial partners who do not wish to align completely with standards defined by NASA and ESA. The message emerging from the laboratories of CASC and the Beijing Institute is unequivocal: the conquest of deep space will not be played out solely on the dusty surface of the Moon, but on the ability to define the "operating system" that will manage the traffic, data, and security of the future space economy.
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