U.S. News & World Report September 1, 2003
Beijing's Heavenly Debut
Astronauts and cosmonauts, get ready to meet your fellow space travelers: the taikonauts. After four unmanned test launches of the Shenzhou ("spirit vessel") spacecraft since 1999, the country that invented rockets a millennium ago appears ready to send its first space crew into orbit as early as October.
China has been launching satellites on its Changzeng ("Long March") rockets since 1970, but the upcoming liftoff will be China's first bid for what many still consider to be the true mark of a space power--human spaceflight. Known as Project 921, the Chinese effort to put a person in space began in the early 1990s, when prospective Chinese astronauts started training with cosmonauts in Russia. (The official term for a Chinese spacefarer is yuhangyuan, or cosmic explorer, but space fans prefer the term taikonaut--rhymes with "Tae Bo, not"--from the Chinese for outer space, plus the old seafaring suffix.) The three-module Shenzhou spaceships also have Soviet lineage, says Charles Vick, a space technology expert at GlobalSecurity.org. "The spacecraft is based on Russian Soyuz technology, which the Chinese bought and reworked for their own needs."
The Chinese government is mostly tight-lipped--and often contradictory--about the details of Project 921, so many questions remain unanswered. The launch will most likely take place after the early-October National Day celebrations; one, two, or three taikonauts could be aboard, and they may stay in orbit--high or low--for a day or a week before returning to Earth. Chinese officials have named a moon landing and a space station as long-term goals, but many think the real motivation is more down-to-earth. Vick says the primary goal might well be "regime legitimization" at home. "There's a real need for an authoritarian regime to demonstrate to their people that they are a world power," he says.
When the next Soyuz flight delivers an astronaut and a cosmonaut to the international space station on October 20, America and Russia may find they don't have space to themselves. "A Chinese person in space would certainly represent a challenge to us, though not necessarily a hostile one," says Dean Cheng, a space analyst at CNA Corp., a think tank. If nothing else, he says, the excitement over a Chinese launch "should remind us that the final frontier is still out there, waiting to be explored."
-Thomas Hayden
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