Who will get to Mars first, USA or China?

[daedalus1]

I missed this poll first time round but I have to say, at this moment in time, I'd put my money on China. They have a solid plan, and they're well in to development already.
The US could beat them if they had the will and the funding, and have a less ambitious architecture.

What solid plan?

daedalus1

The notion is that China's announced timetable has achieved its expectations so far. It is a widely held notion that their future ambitions and any dates they have published will be met, based on history so far. For whatever reason, the government is supporting this with the necessary funds and staffing to achieve this.  If you want details, I've sent you the plans that China is following to achieve this. See your PM message from me.

Tony

Update: modified to remove the unnecessary personal remark at the end and clean up the thread.

'The plan' should be posted here for discussion in this group, not as a PM.
That said, there is no way China is sending astronauts to Mars only four windows away in 2033. The difficulty of such a dangerous trip is immense, a journey of at least two and a half years.

[Vultur]

IMO, if Starship works, then US (probably not as soon as Musk hopes).

If Starship doesn't work, and neither do potential Chinese efforts on the same model, then Mars is probably a long way away, and there's no guarantee the first to get there will be either US or China.

[AmigaClone]

IMO, if Starship works, then US (probably not as soon as Musk hopes).

If Starship doesn't work, and neither do potential Chinese efforts on the same model, then Mars is probably a long way away, and there's no guarantee the first to get there will be either US or China.

One timeline proposed by Musk back in September 2017 had the first crewed missions being launched in the 2024 window.

[RedLineTrain]

I voted USA originally, but am less optimistic now. If Isaacman's nomination hadn't been yanked, I think we'd still have a better than 50/50 chance of winning, but with probably at least another 6-12 months of having an acting administrator, I'm not sure the USA is the favorite for winning that race anymore. There absolutely are things a competent NASA Admin could do to improve the Pwin for the USA, but if we have to wait a year to get one, it may be too late.

~Jon

The US effort is not directly based on anything tha NASA is doing.  More or less, NASA is sidelined.

[jongoff]

I voted USA originally, but am less optimistic now. If Isaacman's nomination hadn't been yanked, I think we'd still have a better than 50/50 chance of winning, but with probably at least another 6-12 months of having an acting administrator, I'm not sure the USA is the favorite for winning that race anymore. There absolutely are things a competent NASA Admin could do to improve the Pwin for the USA, but if we have to wait a year to get one, it may be too late.

~Jon

The US effort is not directly based on anything tha NASA is doing.  More or less, NASA is sidelined.

I think that's an inaccurate view on things. I don't think SpaceX or Blue Origin would be actively working lunar lander hardware if it weren't for the HLS money. Now, in SpaceX's case, a subset of the technology needed for the Moon has strong Venn diagram overlap with what they want to build for Starlink and for Mars, but without NASA money, I think they'd only develop those pieces, and bypass the Moon entirely.

~Jon

[RedLineTrain]

I should have been more specific.  NASA is sidelined with respect to Mars, not the moon. As you say, there is also a Venn diagram of overlapping uses.  But the amount of NASA money contributed is becoming a much smaller proportion over time versus the amount SpaceX is contributing.

This is a good thing, but it means that NASA’s actions or wishes don’t mean much with regard to Mars.

[jongoff]

Oh bother, I misread the topic of the thread with my latest replies -- I thought it was talking about a return to the Moon. I agree that Mars is more open to the USA beating China to it. Humans to Mars isn't really even on China's radar yet. While I don't think it's guaranteed that SpaceX will succeed with using Starships to get humans to Mars, I think there's a decent chance (barring some economic or personal catastrophe taking SpaceX or Elon down first), and if it does succeed, it'll likely be a long time before China makes an attempt.

~Jon

[Kaputnik]

Oh bother, I misread the topic of the thread with my latest replies -- I thought it was talking about a return to the Moon. I agree that Mars is more open to the USA beating China to it. Humans to Mars isn't really even on China's radar yet. While I don't think it's guaranteed that SpaceX will succeed with using Starships to get humans to Mars, I think there's a decent chance (barring some economic or personal catastrophe taking SpaceX or Elon down first), and if it does succeed, it'll likely be a long time before China makes an attempt.

~Jon

I did the exact same thing.
China are proving very capable and are moving ever faster. But their space station is essentially Mir, 30yrs later than the original. Their moon plan is a modified Apollo. I struggle try see them pushing so far ahead that they reach Mars first.

[DanClemmensen]

Poll needs three separate choices: China, NASA, SpaceX.

[thespacecow]

There's no point separating NASA from SpaceX, without SpaceX NASA is going nowhere.

[Phil Stooke]

I thought the point of keeping them separate was that SpaceX might go alone, not with NASA.

[RedLineTrain]

The point is that NASA is not on the critical path.  Most of the funding is coming from or related to Starlink.

[volker2020]

Why bother? The race to the moon is over. The US won it!

Science wise, I assume that robots will be better suited to do any research on moon at this point.

So the only interesting question is, who can unlock the resources of the moon, for the benefit of earth, which most likely would require some settlement there.

I can see no clear contenders in that race, but Starship based lunar lander's clearly has a better outlook.

[daedalus1]

Why bother? The race to the moon is over. The US won it!

Science wise, I assume that robots will be better suited to do any research on moon at this point.

So the only interesting question is, who can unlock the resources of the moon, for the benefit of earth, which most likely would require some settlement there.

I can see no clear contenders in that race, but Starship based lunar lander's clearly has a better outlook.

The thread is Mars, not the Moon

[Tywin]

SpaceX is a US company!!

[DanClemmensen]

There's no point separating NASA from SpaceX, without SpaceX NASA is going nowhere.

SpaceX is a US company!!

NASA implements the policy of the US government. If a NASA-led program succeeds in landing on MARS, that would be "USA". SpaceX is a private company. If a SpaceX-led program succeeds, it's not an accomplishment of the US government.

In reality, it will not be that simple. In particular, If SpaceX succeeds, there will be enough involvement by NASA that everyone in NASA and the US congress and administration will claim it's a government-led success.   I guess we might arbitrarily use the affiliation of the crew as the differentiator: If they are NASA astronauts, it's a NASA success. If they are SpaceX employees, it's a SpaceX success.

[catdlr]

There's no point separating NASA from SpaceX, without SpaceX NASA is going nowhere.

SpaceX is a US company!!

NASA implements the policy of the US government. If a NASA-led program succeeds in landing on MARS, that would be "USA". SpaceX is a private company. If a SpaceX-led program succeeds, it's not an accomplishment of the US government.

In reality, it will not be that simple. In particular, If SpaceX succeeds, there will be enough involvement by NASA that everyone in NASA and the US congress and administration will claim it's a government-led success.   I guess we might arbitrarily use the affiliation of the crew as the differentiator: If they are NASA astronauts, it's a NASA success. If they are SpaceX employees, it's a SpaceX success.

Then we could start a thread titled  "Who will get to Mars first, USA or SpaceX?"

[JulesVerneATV]

A bad moon rising — what if China beats US back to lunar surface?
https://www.thetimes.com/us/news-today/article/bad-moon-rising-china-ted-cruz-n0xp3ldvm

[eric z]

 I think it will wind up being an international mission, probably in the mid-40s time frame. If SpaceX still exists then I'm sure they will be in the middle of it, but who knows?

[Vultur]

I think it will wind up being an international mission, probably in the mid-40s time frame.

This scenario seems to imply something going very wrong with SpaceX's current plans. Even in a fairly pessimistic model where propellant transfer takes a while to get working, I can't see the plan stretching out more than 6 synods (~2037) unless the program is totally killed in some way.

(say 2026 nothing - no propellant transfer, 2028/29 initial tests, 2031 first cargo attempt - fails, 2033 second cargo attempt - partially successful, 2035 rest of needed cargo, 2037 humans).

So are you assuming a total program failure (propellant transfer can't be made to work even with multiple years of work, SpaceX ownership change & cancellation of Mars program, US government forbids SpaceX from sending Starship to Mars, something like that)?