Last month, China delayed the launch of an ambitious robotic mission to the South Pole of the Moon, Chang’e 7, until early next year. The country did not provide a detailed explanation for the schedule slip, but it was welcomed by NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman. That’s because the high rims of the crater create permanently shadowed regions known as “cold traps,” where it’s thought that water (in the form of ice, of course) and other useful materials may have accumulated over billions of years.
In all of NASA’s and China’s plans for long-term settlement on the Moon, relatively few square miles at the South Pole of the Moon matter the most. It’s there that both countries believe they can establish an enduring presence that will help them learn techniques for expansion further into the Solar System. Isaacman and other US officials have started to express concerns that China could establish exclusion zones where robotic probes and then human missions go.
Chang’e 7 will bring considerable mobility to the Moon. Except it won’t be on the Moon, it’ll be on Mars.”
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