For years, Mars has been the great horizon of space exploration: the inevitable destination to which, sooner rather than later, humanity had to head. Earlier this year, Elon Musk, one of the main drivers of that narrative, assured that The United States could land on the red planet within a period of between five and ten years. In parallel, in China, different voices from its aerospace sector They located the first manned mission Mars around 2033. The message was clear: the race for Mars was already underway.
On paper, deadlines are as stimulating as they are challenging. Because sending humans to Mars is not a simple evolution of what has already been achieved, but rather a leap in scale. NASA itself has detailed the enormous technical complexity involved in a mission of this type: from entry, descent and landing systems capable of landing heavy loads in an extremely tenuous atmosphere, to infrastructure that guarantees energy, communications and life support during prolonged stays. Depositing a one-ton rover is not the same as lowering dozens of tons of habitable modules and critical equipment.
The race no longer looks at Mars, it looks at the lunar south pole
However, while Mars made headlines, the real strategy has been taking another direction. As the NASA Artemis Program and the Chinese Lunar Exploration Program have consolidated calendars, investments and technological milestones, the focus has shifted to a more immediate and pragmatic objective: the Moon. Everything seems to indicate that It’s not about giving up Marsbut to assume that the most sensible path goes through intermediate stages. In both cases, the satellite is emerging as a technological test bed, logistics platform and operational experience before facing a journey of months and millions of kilometers.
The new space race, therefore, is not being fought, at least for the moment, at tens of millions of kilometers, but at a few 400,000 kilometers away. This proximity changes the equation: it reduces transit times, facilitates the shipment of supplies and allows us to react to unforeseen events with reasonable margins. But, above all, it opens the door to something that is beginning to take shape: the birth of a lunar economy. Permanent bases, scientific experiments, transportation contracts and infrastructure development could make the Moon not only a destination, but a key node of human expansion in space.
The epicenter of this new phase is not just any place, but the environment of the Shackleton craterat the lunar south pole. A permanent darkness, as we can see in the photo that accompanies this article, has fueled the hypothesis that in its shadow areas it could keep water ice. This possibility explains why both the United States and China are targeting this region in their next landings, with the stated objective of studying and, eventually, taking advantage of these resources. In practical terms, we talk about water for consumption, generation of oxygen and production of hydrogen and oxygen as a propellant, whenever technology and economic viability allow it.
Illuminated rim and shadowed interior of Shackleton Crater
The question, then, is not just what is at the south pole, but what changes if those resources are confirmed as usable. In this scenario, the Moon would cease to be solely a scientific destination and would become a functional piece within space architecture. We are not yet talking about industrial exploitation, but about something more basic: reducing absolute dependence on the Earth in each mission. This nuance introduces a real economic dimension to the lunar race, because it alters the logic of costs, transportation and planning of future operations.
This is where the notion of an Earth-Moon supply chain stops sounding futuristic and starts to fit into concrete timetables. Although the lunar economy, with its own supply chainmay seem like a distant concept, its foundations are beginning to be built. On the American side, that architecture is beginning to take shape with very specific missions. Firefly Aerospace launched its Blue Ghost 1 module on January 15integrated into the initiative NASA Commercial Lunar Payload Services. This is a mission that aims to demonstrate what a cargo delivery system would look like for our satellite when it lands on the moon on March 2.
In parallel to these cargo missions, Blue Origin is preparing its own movement towards the lunar south pole. The company founded by Jeff Bezos is working on the first demonstration flight of its cargo module Blue Moon Mark 1known as MK1, scheduled for early 2026. The eight-meter-high lander will take off aboard the rocket New Glenn and will need to validate key systems before any more ambitious operations. It should be noted that the mission does not involve resource extraction, but it is a necessary step to operate in the environment where expectations about the ice are concentrated.
Render of a multidome base under construction on the Moon
The good news is that the MK1 has been tested at NASA’s Johnson Space Center, including thermal vacuum chamber simulations to replicate the extreme conditions of space and the lunar surface. If it passes this phase and the final integration with the launcher, the ship could become a relevant asset for future missions to the south pole. Another important fact is that the US agency you have already selected this module for transport the VIPER rover in 2027whose task will be to search for volatiles such as water ice in permanently shadowed regions.
On the Chinese side, the centerpiece is the mission Chang’e 7conceived as a more complex deployment than a simple lander. The mission is targeting August aboard a Long March 5 rocket and will include an orbiter, a lander, a rover and a small jump probe. The set aims to operate in the vicinity of the lunar south pole, where experiments aimed at studying the surface and searching for signs of ice in permanently shadowed regions will be concentrated.
Render of Blue Origin’s Blue Moon Mark 1 lander and VIPER
If the schedule holds, China could make these measurements before the American VIPER rover reaches the ground in 2027. That would give Beijing advantage in obtaining direct data about the most coveted resource in the region. Now, this does not imply sovereign control over the area, something that the Outer Space Treaty prohibits, but an initial position to define operational practices and accumulate experience in the field.
That first movement, in economic terms, does not imply a flag or a border, but it does imply accumulated experience, its own technical standards and contractual relationships that can set the course of subsequent activity. In an environment where there is still no consolidated lunar market, the definition of procedures, technologies and protocols acquires strategic weight. The race, therefore, is not only played on the surface, but also in the ability to establish the de facto rules of an activity that is just beginning.
That first movement, in economic terms, does not imply a flag or a border, but it does imply accumulated experience.
If water sets the immediate agenda, helium-3 occupies a much more uncertain plane. The European Space Agency reminds that the Moon has been bombarded for billions of years by the solar wind and that, unlike the Earth, It lacks a magnetosphere to deflect these particles. This potential accumulation in the regolith has fueled the idea of using this isotope as fuel in fusion reactors. However, the agency itself emphasizes that until now it has not been possible to generate a helium fusion reaction with net energy production. Helium-3 thus appears as a long-term expectation rather than an operational objective of this decade.
The economic dimension of the moon race is not limited to the exploitation of resources, but encompasses the entire service architecture that makes it possible. NASA has opted for a model in which private companies assume part of the transportation and logistics, generating an ecosystem of contracts that mobilizes investment and technological development. China, for its part, integrates its missions within a broader state strategy, with the south pole as a priority scenario to consolidate its own capabilities.
Mars continues to be the destination that fuels ambitious speeches and calendars, but the operational logic of this decade points elsewhere. Before sending crews millions of miles, the United States and China need to demonstrate that they can land accurately, operate with continuity and sustain infrastructures in a real environment. The Moon offers this laboratory on a scale, with distances that allow errors to be corrected and with resources whose usefulness can be verified on the ground. In this transition between Martian ambition and technical reality is where the true priority is being defined.
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