Customer Reviews

The New Space Race: China vs. USA (Springer Praxis Books / Space Exploration)

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Erik Seedhouse writes enjoyable space-related books. I have purchased most and enjoy his works including The New Space Race: China vs. the United States. I do recommend the purchase and reading of this book for those who are interested in the Chinese space program. There are too few books on the important topic of Sino-America space exploration or space military applications. This book is an important addition.

Dr. Seedhouse provides a good overview of the Chinese and American space programs (civil and military). The recent changes to the American civil space program by President Obama has perhaps dated some of the material published only earlier this year. Yet many aspects of the NASA Constellation program may be retained with a grand Congressional compromise with the White House - so I do not object.

But Dr. Seedhouse clearly is a conservative hawk suggesting that there is no room for a space weapons treaty; no way to cooperate with China in space; no way to invite them to participate in the International Space Station; and, no way to stop an arms race in space with the Chinese. I do respect this book and the Seedhouse view for American national security reasons. He serves reader by taking NOTICE of the PLA's role in space along with the strategic military implications. Yet, the book must be balanced by other China-related readings such as "When China Rules the World" by Martin Jacques (Nov. 2009) and the slightly older book - "Chinese Space Policy: A Study in Domestic and International Politics" (2007) by Roger Handberg and Zhen Li.

Bottomline: Get the Seedhouse book and enjoy it but with the realization that is has a right-leaning political tilt with a 'hawkish' view that is far from concealed. Nonetheless, the last section of the book causes pause to make one think of the possible longer-term policy implications in both China and the United States over the next quarter-of-a-century.

Once again Seedhouse has written an insightful and thoughtful popular science book, this time on the subject of the new race to the Moon and beyond. With Obama's decision to set a new course for NASA, restricting it to low Earth orbit for another generation of astronauts, the Chinese are now free to go to the Moon, collect the flag planted by Neil Armstrong and display it in a Beijing museum. Furthermore, with an inevitable escalation of tension between the US and China that will occur as a result of the Taiwan issue, the stage is set for the first true space war. Seedhouse deals with these issues effortlessly and provides plenty of material to support his arguments. A must read for any space enthusiast or military analyst.

I've read almost all the astronaut books. Bought this book by accident and was going to return it but at the last minute kept it as I had no books on China and the US on the upcoming space race. Glad I did.

Dr. Erik Seedhouse gives some past information about the different US missions (3 star...there are many books better). However he does explain the US superiority in military space, manned and robotic plus our 50 years experience. We see the US military now has the "high ground" and much of our military might response is tied into military surveillance satellites. He shows we clobbered the Iraqi army with the help of space based technology. He shows that the US is far far ahead in all aspects of space exploring,communication,weather, GPS and military satellites but China is coming on strong. China has launched men in space and is planning its own space station and Moon manned landing. China is able to progress in space technology because it is able to buy a lot of equipment from the Russians and copy but improve on their lifters and spacecraft. Also China is able to get a lot of free information directly from US universities and Internet sites as much US space information is freely given out. Unfortunately Erik shows that China's space program is a closed military system with little information freely given out.

We see the space treaty and the non use of space weapons especially no nuclear arms in space. However China did carelessly launch a missile and destroy one of its LOE satellites. It showed the world it is now capable of knocking out some satellites. Unfortunately they never did tell the world they were going to do this and made a big mess of over 40,000 pieces of debris of satellite/missile remains in LOE and now the world has a slight navigational mess to launch around their junk. The world now knows they are not a responsible space player. Plus Erik shows China's dismal lack of human rights policies.

Dr. Seedhouse explains the US military stance on keeping the high ground in space and will not let any country take that away from them. Also Erik tells us China is not going to be intimidated by the superior space forces of the US and is rapidly increasing its space military presence and developing weapons for possible use in space ( knocking down satellites) and hopefully crippling the US eyes in space. He says China may want to militarily take Taiwan but releases it will first have to take out the US surveillance space system before they launch a direct attack on Taiwan. Erik says if the US is attacked in space it will retaliate.

Erik shows our vast space might is very vulnerable to various methods of attack. He then explains each method the Chinese could use. He explains the US has many magnitudes of expensive satellites and equipment in space than China has and the US has much more to lose in a major space conflict. He shows the US is trying to harden its defenses against space attack.

A scary scenario is shown. If a nuclear blast is air burst over middle US the EMP could put the US back decades because much of our computers and nationwide electronic equipment could be knocked out.

He further says that China releases our economy is linked to theirs and may not want a shoot out with us but wants to buy us out.

I does seem Erik is taking the US side and is hawkish but I believe it is realistic because no way will the US let any country take the "high ground" in space since the US military now is so entrenched with space surveillance. It seems the US will continue by treaty to let all nations explore space and have communications, weather satellites, GPS, etc. as long as they are perceived as peaceful intentions. However if US security is to be lessened by space attack the US is more than prepared to fight.

Because of China wanting to expand its military space presence and the US planning to keep the space "high ground" a space race maybe inevitable. A good 4 star book with some good pictures that gets you thinking of a real near future space race to the Moon and beyond. Thanks Erik Seedhouse for a good book with new information on China's space program and the US plans for keeping the space "high ground".

Because this book was published prior to Obama canceling America's manned space program (and a manned return to the moon) some of the connections made to our return to the moon are hollow.

NASA was implementing plans to return to the moon until President Obama canceled the Constellation program and America's return to the moon.

Good Book. If we are nice to China, maybe we can go on there ship?

Dr. Erik Seedhouse's book The New Space Race: China vs. the United States (Springer-Praxis, 2010) is useful, but suffers from major flaws including bizarre contradictions and the author's anti-China feelings.

Most of the book, contrary to what might be expected from the title, is not about the manned and unmanned space exploration programs, but instead to military uses of space and the possibility of a space war between China and the US. To a point this focus is legitimate because the Chinese space industry is indeed an arm of the People's Liberation Army, and Taiwan remains a potential flashpoint between the two governments. This military parallel between the Chinese space program today and the old Soviet space program is striking. If you were expecting the book instead to concentrate on exploration goals and the possibility that Chinese taikonauts (astronauts) might set foot on Mars first, Dr. Seedhouse does cover these topics well, but his first emphasis is military.

That is where the contradictions surface. "China's rapid military modernization and its goal of challenging the US for space control are a potentially serious threat" (p. 105). "Often taken for granted, US space dominance is now threatened by Chinese space-denial programs, exceeding those by Moscow at the peak of the Cold War in both diversity and depth" (p. 113). Contrasting the first US spacewalk, after five orbital missions over 3.5 years, and the Soviet equivalent, after seven missions over four years: "China took five years and did it in just three missions! It is a pace of development that seems likely to continue, as China now plans to establish a space station" (p. 183). His comments indicate a robust, expanding Chinese space program. This seems close to the truth.

But then he says: "[T]he US...is, militarily, disproportionately more capable than the Chinese. While Beijing's capacity to develop counterspace and counter-counterspace capabilities will undoubtedly increase, many of the programs it initiates will falter, others will be stillborn, and many will prove unsuccessful" (p. 120). That assessment applies to any country, including the US, whose record on technological initiatives is just as mixed. "But can a country like China, a neophyte in the world of manned spaceflight, hope to compete with the US...?" (pp. 183-184). "...[I]t can be argued that many aspects of China's economic and military progress are exaggerated" (p. 226). So is the US in a race with China for dominance with space or not?

Dr. Seedhouse falls into the caveman-like attitude of "United States good, China bad", and it shows in frequent cheerleading for American military and technological capabilities and programs, while trashing China's and the Chinese government. "The Chinese Government may be one of the most corrupt, repressive, and tyrannical regimes on Earth, but it isn't stupid" (p. 120). Well, that's a relief. Of course, its massive holdings of US debt might prove that last part of the sentence wrong. The problem is that the US government's antics and policies have left a lot to be desired for others in many parts of the world, like it or not. Pot, meet kettle. He makes little attempt to understand Chinese culture, which has always emphasized collective efforts and gradual, patient progress to benefit the country, not individuals or enterprises.

In particular, he--quite justifiably--criticizes China's antisatellite (ASAT) test of 11 January 2007, which destroyed the old weather satellite Fengyun-1C and left clouds of debris in low Earth orbit posing a danger to other spacecraft. (A factual error creeps in here on this very topic: while correctly identifying the original purpose of the destroyed satellite, he later calls the Fengyun-3A launched in 2008 China's "first meterological satellite" (p. 96) in a discussion of environmental monitoring systems that the US and China militaries use. Was this a first such military satellite for China? No, he notes that the Fengyun is a civilian satellite. A sharp editor should have caught that misstatement.) However, then he glosses over the US military's destruction of a reentering spy satellite on 21 February 2008 and previous American ASAT tests dating back 25 years. Okay if the US does it, but not if China does it? Says who? The United States? How convenient.

A real howler occurs in his discussion of US space policy, in which he mentions a "projected shortfall in the US's science and engineering workforce and commensurate rise in science and engineering degrees among China's citizens... In 1980, the US and China each graduated a similar number of engineers, but, by 2000, Chinese engineering graduates had increased 161% while US graduates had declined 20%. Since 2000, the trend has deteriorated further--a development that may seriously impede the competitiveness of the US in the race to the Moon" (pp. 26-27).

Dr. Seedhouse didn't do his homework. There is absolutely no shortage of American engineers and scientists. Many are out of work and have been for years. The decline of our manufacturing base and companies' high-tech downsizing, outsourcing, and offshoring sent their jobs overseas or to lower-paid foreigners brought to the US on special visas. Paul Craig Roberts, formerly with the Reagan administration, has repeatedly analyzed US labor figures and shown that no job market exists for most US technical graduates. More and more young people sense this, so in their minds they are making a rational choice not to spend $100,000 on an increasingly worthless engineering degree. The claim about equivalent Chinese degrees has been repeatedly debunked in studies, as Dr. Norm Matloff at the University of California at Davis and others have noted: their graduate figures include what we would call "technicians", such as auto or computer mechanics. Not by any stretch of the imagination are these engineers, but Chinese stats lump them all together.

Finally, Dr. Seedhouse casts a jaundiced eye on the prospect of space cooperation between the US and China and concludes that the US would risk too much for too little gain, especially given the nature of the Chinese government--though the US cooperated with the Soviet Union, another Communist regime, for the Apollo-Soyuz mission. The US should go it alone or with existing allies, he thinks. He might be correct. Unfortunately, events have made his glowing assessment of NASA's plans to return to the moon and go on to Mars obsolete, as President Obama's administration has scuttled them for lack of money. We might be forced into some sort of cooperation, not just with Russia as at present but also with China, to be able to keep flying astronauts once the shuttle is retired. And that will be soon.

A spaceflight race, as the President correctly has forestalled, would be expensive and unhealthy. No matter what we would like to think, we are not on any moral high ground to stop China from developing military capabilities in space similar to ours, so confrontation should be off the table. That leaves cooperation. With cooperation could come moderation and benign purpose. Will we have the fortitude to acknowledge a growing space power and seek to work with it for the common good of humanity? The New Space Race leaves this last question answered, by implication, with no. Perhaps that is its greatest flaw.

Balancing all this is its very good narrative of historical events, useful charts and descriptions, and assessments of American plans and policies. Dr. Seedhouse is a fellow with the British Interplanetary Society, so in these areas there are no serious factual errors--simply some questionable views and analysis. Overall, if you are interested in the nascent Chinese space program, its future plans, and how these compare with US efforts, this book is worth a read. Just keep its author's prejudices in mind as you do so.