China reports that the national space station “Tiangong” will be open for business after the completion of construction. But it is quite possible that this is just an element of a hybrid war in space.
PRC will make “Tiangong” an open station
After the construction of the Tiangong space station is completed, it will be opened for commercial projects. This was announced by the head of the manned space flight program of PRC Zhou Jianping. According to him, this will happen after the launch of the Mentian and Wentian modules into space this year.
The Chinese official believes that this will create new opportunities. In recent years, private space in the Celestial Empire has been developing rapidly. Many competitive companies have appeared, and Jianping hopes that there will be even more of them. However, as always, it is not reported how truly independent these companies are from the government.
In addition, China has announced that its new orbital outpost will be open to visiting astronauts from other countries. However, representatives of the Celestial Empire do not say which countries they will be. They do not pronounce the word “russia” once again, but there are great suspicions that it is about it.
Liberalization or Hybrid Warfare?
At the first glance, Jianping’s statements suggest China’s liberalization and greater openness in space programs. However, recent trends in this field make us doubt such a positive interpretation.
The US Space Command has been actively involved the commercial companies in defense projects for some time. It is believed that they have much more resources and a more flexible structure than government organizations. Due to this, it is planned to get completely new opportunities in the field of intelligence and data transmission.
The aggressor’s invasion in Ukraine unexpectedly confirmed the correctness of these arguments. Business cooperation with the military in space has become the main trend in the defense sector in 2022. The European Union, the aggressor country, China, and India have realized this.
But the United States has a huge head start: they have the greatest number of private space companies, and they started developing this direction earlier than others. It is quite possible that now, in order to overtake NATO, China will have to combine its efforts not only with its own business, but also with a terrorist state, and possibly with India.
According to Spacenews.com
