Opinion

China cowboys up

Making space safe for the commies

By Anthony Laplume

Posted on Oct. 20, 2003, at 12:00 a.m.

As you may or may not have noticed, we’ve just been “Punk’d” by the commies. I’m talking about the space race, which you probably thought was over – wrong. You were probably always told that the competition was between the United States and the Soviet Union – wrong. China was still making up its mind between basic human rights and sending up a lucky bastard into orbit.

As you may or may not recall, those crazy Russians were our cold war friends. They were communists at the time of the space race too – not so much anymore. What they’re also not so much anymore is active in space. Not to fear, citizen! China has now taken hold of this valued role, having sent up what’s being called a “taikonaut” this past Thursday in an aircraft called Shenzhou five. Lt. Col. Yang Liwei, a fighter pilot in the Peoples Liberation Army, joined the hallowed ranks of cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin and astronaut Alan Shepard as the first of their kind.

There’s nothing inherently wrong in this. In fact, there seems to be everything right in it. What harm could another nation do in achieving this? The conspiracy theorists would have you believe that China is planning nothing more than global domination with this diabolical move. By the way, “conspiracy theorist” is sometimes justifiably synonymous with “nut.” But in the end, this is good news for China, and potentially good news for us in the United States.

Why, you ask? Ever since the Columbia tragedy in February, the grumbling here has been to question whether the NASA program should be continued. After all, it “wastes” a lot of money on projects that at best have peripheral benefits to the ordinary man, who critics believe would best profit from the money currently going into the agency’s coffers. Why fund something that has such potential for disaster? This is the kind of roadblock experimental science has always faced. There’s no way we should let a setback stop us.

Alas, there’s another country in the mix. With this latest space milestone arriving at a time when our own efforts appear vulnerable, I think it’s as good a time as any to reignite the old drive – the initiative that landed Neil Armstrong on the moon in 1969. There’s never been another successful mission there, and talk about dropping in on Mars has been on the horizon forever. The best we’ve got right now is the International Space Station, not to mention the various probes, satellites, and telescopes. The ISS at least signifies progress thanks to the cooperative effort that sees us working hand in hand with the Russians, who were once our rivals.

China’s achievement will hopefully reinvigorate the space race. It won’t be the same, of course, beyond the fact that there’s once more a country looking to make space safe for commies. So let’s get the show back on the road here already. Next stop will hopefully be the final frontier. You know what I’m talking about: Uranus.

Anthony Laplume is a senior English major.

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