Hey there!
While this week is opening with an early morning champagne toast at Firefly Aerospace Headquarters in Cedar Park, Texas, to celebrate the company’s achievement of landing on the moon, many in and outside the United States are wondering just what will be the Trump Administration’s policy for space domain security and whether the U.S is still aiming for a permanent human presence on the moon.
Firefly’s Blue Ghost moon-lander aced a nail-biting touchdown on the moon’s near-side at 2:34 a.m. local, Central Standard Time, Sunday. This soft landing inside the ancient crater Mare Crisium opens 14 days of surface operations that include 10 NASA scientific experiments. The data from these payloads should be used for future human missions to the moon… If President Donald Trump stays the course.
There is concern that Elon Musk, the founder, CEO, and largest shareholder of SpaceX, which is privately owned, has convinced Trump to redirect the goals, and therefore federal capital investment, of the Artemis Program away from the moon to send humans to and plant a flag on Mars instead.
In his inaugural speech, delivered on January 20, Trump said, “The United States will once again consider itself a growing nation — one that increases our wealth, expands our territory, builds our cities, raises our expectations, and carries our flag into new and beautiful horizons. And we will pursue our manifest destiny into the stars, launching American astronauts to plant the Stars and Stripes on the planet Mars.”
There is anticipation that during Trump’s speech to a joint session of Congress, scheduled for Tuesday evening, clues about his intentions for NASA; the mostly space-based missile shield project known as Iron Dome for America - but recently renamed “Golden Dome”; and the security alliances that extend into the space domain will be revealed.
Sunday’s landing is a direct result of Trump’s first term in office, when he blessed NASA’s Artemis program and the Artemis Accords, a non-binding agreement regarding best practices and norms of responsible behavior for space exploration and resource utilization.
Understanding what resources are available on the lunar surface, is the job of a novel vacuuming and sorting machine aboard Blue Ghost, called the Lunar Planet Vac. This machine, developed by Honeybee Robotics, uses a vacuum to suck up and then test lunar samples on the moon, sending the resulting data to earth.
The Firefly mission, called Ghost Riders in the Sky, is part of NASA’s Commercial Lunar Payload Services initiative, to rely on commercial service providers to at once reduce the space agency’s costs and support efforts to create a U.S.-based space economy.
Firefly has achieved the fourth and most successful attempt made by a commercial entity to land on the moon. The Japanese company iSpace became the first to attempt the feat by launching the HAKUTO-R Mission 1 in December of 2022, only to see it crash into the surface the following April.
While all prior moon missions attempted by space companies have ended in failure, each one has contributed data and designs to the next. According to Newsweek, Firefly’s CEO Jason Kim said, "Our team, of course, did the logical thing and looked at all the missions before us, but our design was unique to Firefly. It's a successful design, and you look at past designs and past designs that were successful, (they) look very similar—short and squatty."
Last year in February, Intuitive Machine’s Nova-C class Odysseus lander, standing at 4.3 meters, achieved the feat of a soft landing only to tip over. Firefly’s Blue Ghost lander is 2 meters tall. The Apollo 11 Lunar module-lander, which carried humans, had a height of 7 meters.
Last week on Wednesday, February 26, Intuitive Machines launched its IM-2 mission to the moon, using a Nova-C class lunar lander called Athena, aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket. The company is sending the Athena lander, including 10 payloads, to the Mons Mouton region in the polar south for a March 6 touchdown. The landing site is one of nine potential Artemis III destinations.
Also en route is iSpace’s Mission 2, which launched aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket on January 15. iSpace is aiming to ease its RESILIENCE lander, carrying six payloads, down to a site in Mare Frigoris in late May or early June.
All of this activity points to a healthy amount of commercial interest, albeit with U.S. and Japanese taxpayer dollars, in keeping the moon as the short-term target, before moving on to Mars. The question is: Does the U.S. president agree?
What’s in this episode
Following the successful landing of one U.S.-built lunar lander, with another destined to land this week, on Tuesday the Trump Administration is poised to slap tariffs on goods from Canada, Mexico, and China, and the president will deliver a speech to a joint session of congress. What’s the view from the Indo-Pacific of Trump’s policies?
Who’s in this episode
Namrata Goswami - An independent scholar on space policy and great power politics and co-author of the book “Scramble for the Skies: The Great Power Competition to Control the Resources of Outer Space”
Malcolm Davis - A Senior Policy Analyst at the Australian Strategic Policy Institute focusing on space policy, security, strategy, and capability development.
Reading/Viewing
“China to train Pakistani astronaut for Tiangong space station mission” - Andrew Jones, Space News, February 28, 2025
“Ancient beach on Mars discovered by China's Mars rover: 'This strengthens the case for past habitability'“ - Kiona Smith, SPace.com, February 25, 2025
“No More Female 4-Stars: Franchetti Firing Leaves Top Ranks Filled by Men” - Konstantin Toropin and Steve Beynon, Military Times, February 27, 2025
“NOAA Hit Hard by DOGE Layoffs” - Marcia Smith, SpacePolicyOnline.com. February 28, 2025
“Trump layoffs hit key 'air traffic control for space' unit” - Joey Roulette and Valerie Volcovici, Reuters, March 1, 2025
“Judge blocks Trump administration’s mass firings of federal workers” - Salvador Rizzo, Washington Post, February 27, 2025
“Demonstrators block traffic in front of DC SpaceX office” - Walter Morris, NBC4, February 19, 2025
““Iron Dome” Becomes “Golden Dome”” - Marcia Smith, SpacePolicyOnline.com. February 25, 2025
“Laser Communications: Space Development Agency Should Create Links Between Development Phases” - GAO report, February 26, 2025
Ad Astra,
Laura
