Relay station will eventually let teams on the ground talk to a lunar probe that China plans to launch this year in world-first mission 
 
 China aims to land on far side of moon via launch of 'Magpie Bridge' satellite 
 
 China is one step closer to being the first country to land on the far side of the moon. 
 
 At 5.28am on Monday, the Queqiao relay satellite was launched from Sichuan province, according to Chinese state media. With Queqiao in place, China will be able to send a lunar probe to the side of the moon that never faces the Earth. No space programme has ever reached that part of the lunar surface because of communications difficulties. 
 
 Tiangong-1 crash: Chinese space station comes down in Pacific Ocean Read more 
 
 In a few days Queqiao will enter the moon’s orbit, about 455,000km (282,000 miles) from Earth. Queqiao – which means “Magpie Bridge” and comes from a Chinese folk story in which an arc formed by birds reunites two lovers separated by the heavens – will then act as a bridge between ground stations and the lunar probe. 
 
 China plans to send its lunar lander and rover, Chang’e 4, to the far side of the moon by the end of this year. The lunar probe will carry seeds for growing potatoes and arabidopsis, a flowering plant related to cabbage, for a “lunar mini biosphere” experiment. 
 
 “The launch is a key step for China to realise its goal of being the first country to send a probe to soft-land and probe the far side of the moon,” said Zhang Lihua, manager of the relay satellite project, according to state news agency Xinhua. 
 
 A four-minute video of the assembling of the rocket and satellite, accompanied by dramatic background music, was posted by state media outlets on social media on Monday. “My country is awesome,” one internet user wrote on Weibo. “Our conquest is the sea of stars.” 
 
 For the past decade, China has embarked on a space programme aimed largely at catching up to space powers such as the US and Russia. In 2013, China became the third country to make a soft landing on the moon. 
 
 
 
 Chinese space officials aim to attempt a human landing in 15 years. The China National Space Administration released a video in April showcasing its planned outpost, a “lunar palace” on the far side of the moon, with cabins for scientists. 
 
 Queqiao will also carry a radio antennae that researchers will use to study the early universe, what astronomers call the “cosmic dark ages” after the big bang and before the first stars in the universe were formed. 
 
 Being in the shadow of the moon blocks electromagnetic interference from Earth, offering a better view of radio signals in the universe and enabling researchers to “listen” to the cosmos, according to Liu Tongjie, deputy director of China’s Lunar Exploration and Space Program Center. 
 
 • This article was amended on 22 May 2018 because an earlier version referred to the “dark side” of the moon, rather than the “far side”. 
 
 ||||| These crawls are part of an effort to archive pages as they are created and archive the pages that they refer to. That way, as the pages that are referenced are changed or taken from the web, a link to the version that was live when the page was written will be preserved.Then the Internet Archive hopes that references to these archived pages will be put in place of a link that would be otherwise be broken, or a companion link to allow people to see what was originally intended by a page's authors.The goal is to fix all broken links on the web . Crawls of supported "No More 404" sites. ||||| China's Queqiao relay satellite for the country's Chang'e 4 mission to the far side of the moon launched into space atop a Long March 4C rocket on Monday, May 21, 2018 Beijing Time (Sunday, May 20 EDT). 
 
 China just launched a spacecraft that will help pave the way for a historic mission to the moon's far side later this year. 
 
 The Queqiao relay satellite lifted off atop a Long March 4C rocket from Xichang Satellite Launch Center in Sichuan Province today (May 20) at 5:28 p.m. EDT (2100 GMT; 5:28 a.m. on May 21 local Xichang time). 
 
 Queqiao is now its way to the Earth-moon Lagrange point-2, a gravitationally stable spot about 40,000 miles (64,000 kilometers) beyond the lunar far side. The satellite will set up shop there and wait for China's robotic Chang'e 4 lander-rover spacecraft, which is expected to launch in November or December. [China's Moon Missions Explained (Infographic)] 
 
 If all goes according to plan, Chang'e 4 will become the first craft ever to touch down on the moon's far side, which forever faces away from Earth. (The moon is "tidally locked" to our planet, so we only ever see the near side.) Queqiao will relay commands and data between the Chang'e 4 lander and its handlers here on Earth — a job the lander and rover can't do for themselves, because all that moon rock would get in the way. 
 
 An artist's illustration of China's Queqiao relay satellite, which launched on May 20, 2018. The spacecraft will relay data between controllers on Earth and China's Chang'e 4 lander-rover pair on the moon's far side. Chang'e 4 is scheduled to launch in November or December. Credit: CNSA 
 
 Queqiao is also carrying a radio-astronomy package called the Netherlands-China Low-Frequency Explorer (NCLE), which will hunt for radio emissions from the universe's infancy, study space weather, characterize the radio environment of the Earth-moon system and make a range of other measurements. 
 
 NCLE is a pathfinder experiment; its observations should aid in the design and development of a future radio-science instrument that will study the heavens from a perch in space or on the moon, team members have said. 
 
 Also riding to space today with Queqiao were two microsatellites called Longjiang-1 and Longjiang-2, which will also do some radio-astronomy research. 
 
 Longjiang-1 and -2 were developed by the Harbin Institute of Technology. HIT is in China's Heilongjiang Province, which apparently explains the microsatellites' names. ("Heilongjiang" means "Black Dragon River;" it's the Chinese name for the river the Russians call the Amur, which forms part of the China-Russia border. "Longjiang" means "dragon river.") 
 
 While we're on the subject of names: "Queqiao" means "bridge of magpies" and is a nod to a Chinese folktale. In this story, "magpies form a bridge with their wings on the seventh night of the seventh month of the lunar calendar to enable Zhi Nu, the seventh daughter of the Goddess of Heaven, to cross and meet her beloved husband, separated from her by the Milky Way," China's state-run Xinhua news service explained. 
 
 "Chang'e," meanwhile, is the Chinese moon goddess. The robotic Chang'e program has been going strong for more than a decade, and it's been notching milestone after milestone. 
 
 The first two missions, Chang'e 1 and Chang'e 2, launched orbiters to the moon in 2007 and 2010, respectively. Chang'e 3 put a lander and a rover (called Yutu, "Jade Rabbit") on the lunar surface in December 2013. The next year, the Chang'e 5 T1 mission sent a small capsule around the moon and landed it back on Earth. This was prep work for the Chang'e 5 lunar sample-return mission, which China plans to launch in 2019. 
 
 Over the long haul, China aims to establish a permanent presence on the lunar surface, Pei Zhaoyu, deputy director of the China National Space Administration's Lunar Exploration and Space Program Center, said at a conference last month, according to Xinhua. 
 
 Pei "proposed an unmanned lunar research station in about 10 years to accumulate technical expertise, and a lunar research and development base around 2050," Xinhua reported. "The base would be operated by robots over the long term, and visited by humans, Pei envisioned." 
 
 Follow Mike Wall on Twitter @michaeldwall and Google+. Follow us @Spacedotcom, Facebook or Google+. Originally published on Space.com. ||||| Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin declined to confirm whether China had agreed to a specific commitment to reduce the U.S. trade deficit with the country by $200 billion. | Carolyn Kaster/AP Photo China trade war 'on hold' as Trump pauses tariffs 
 
 Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said Sunday that the Trump administration will hold off from imposing tariffs on China as leaders from both nations try to hammer out agreements on trade. 
 
 The administration had threatened $50 billion to $150 billion in tariffs on Chinese goods as a way to deter the theft of U.S. intellectual property and forced transfers of technology. Beijing countered by threatening tariffs on $50 billion worth of U.S. farm, chemical and other exports. 
 
 Story Continued Below 
 
 But Mnuchin said Sunday that the two sides agreed on a framework for reducing the U.S. trade deficit with China and addressing technology trade irritants during high-level talks on Thursday and Friday, although more meetings are required to finish the deal. 
 
 "We're putting the trade war on hold," Mnuchin said in an interview on "Fox News Sunday." "Right now, we have agreed to put tariffs on hold while we try to execute the framework." 
 
 The U.S. trade deficit with China totaled a record $375 billion in 2017, and the Trump administration asked the Chinese to commit to the goal of reducing it by $200 billion by 2020. 
 
 A joint U.S.-China statement released Saturday said "China will significantly increase purchases of United States goods and services," but did not specify how much more it would buy and how soon those sales would take place. 
 
 Mnuchin said he expected major purchases this year, particularly of U.S. agriculture and energy products. 
 
 "We are immediately going to follow this up with [Commerce Secretary Wilbur] Ross going there with very hard commitments in agriculture, where we expect to see a very big increase — 35-40 percent increases — in agriculture this year alone," Mnuchin said. "In energy, doubling the energy purchases. I think you could see $50 [billion], $60 billion a year of energy purchases over the next three to five years. And strategically, that's very important for us and very important for them." 
 
 Mnuchin declined to confirm whether China had agreed to a specific commitment to reduce the U.S. trade deficit with the country by $200 billion. 
 
 "We have specific targets," Mnuchin said. "I'm not going to publicly disclose what they are. They go industry by industry." 
 
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 President Donald Trump has repeatedly said China has taken advantage of trade deals, telling reporters on Thursday that the nation has become "very spoiled." On the campaign trail, he said tariffs would be necessary in some cases to show that the U.S. is not playing games anymore. 
 
 A senior administration official said Trump wants to keep the possibility of tariffs on China alive but is satisfied with the direction of talks thus far. So, he is inclined to tone down the threats and trade war rhetoric as the discussions continue, the official told POLITICO. 
 
 Economist Steve Moore, who is close to the Trump administration after serving as an economic adviser to the campaign, said the teeter-totter nature of the China talks was quintessential Trump, offering that the latest turn was part of his negotiating tactics. 
 
 “If there is minimal progress, I do think Trump will impose tariffs on China. It was a major campaign promise of his. And this is a guy who keeps his promises," Moore said. 
 
 “I don’t see him stepping back from his demand that China open up its markets,” Moore added. “Trump is obsessed with the trade deficits ... and there is going to have to be some kind of deal that brings down the China trade deficit." 
 
 U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer, one of the driving forces behind the intellectual property theft investigation that led Trump to threaten tariffs on $50 billion to $150 billion worth of Chinese goods, said in a statement that the two sides have "agreed on a framework to address the very serious issues raised" in that probe. That includes putting the tariffs on hold, but keeping them in reserve if needed. 
 
 Lighthizer also downplayed the importance of China reducing trade barriers and increasing purchases of U.S. goods compared to ending practices that threaten the United States' ability to maintain its technological edge. 
 
 "Getting China to open its market to more U.S. exports is significant, but the far more important issues revolve around forced technology transfers, cyber theft and the protection of our innovation," Lighthizer said. 
 
 “As this process continues, the United States may use all of its legal tools to protect our technology through tariffs, investment restrictions and export regulations. Real structural change is necessary. Nothing less than the future of tens of millions of American jobs is at stake," he said. 
 
 The tech industry welcomes the trade war cease-fire as a good step that will shield consumers from higher costs, said Dean Garfield, president and CEO of the Information Technology Industry Council, a lobby group for Amazon, Google and others. But China still needs to make changes to level the playing field for American firms, he said. 
 
 Meanwhile, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said Sunday that it is up to Trump's team not to "blow it" with China. 
 
 “There is nothing wrong with these talks but the proof of the pudding is in the eating," Schumer said in a statement. "If President Xi is going to escape meaningful punishment for ZTE and fail to take strong actions on intellectual property, cyber theft, and American companies having free access to sell goods in China, and instead simply provide a promise to buy goods for the next few years, we will have lost." 
 
 Schumer was referring to the Chinese technology company ZTE, which faces stiff penalties for violating U.S. sanctions against North Korea and Iran. Trump said last week that he would look into helping the company escape some of its harshest penalties. After talking with Chinese President Xi Jinping, Trump wrote on Twitter that he and Xi were working together to get ZTE back in business "fast." 
 
 On Sunday, Larry Kudlow, director of the White House National Economic Council, said ZTE would not get off "scot-free." 
 
 Kudlow also said Sunday that Trump has not completely abandoned the possibility of imposing tariffs on Chinese goods if Beijing doesn’t address U.S. concerns about intellectual property theft and forced technology transfers. 
 
 “Look, I don’t think we’re at that stage yet. … The details will be down the road. These things are not so precise. Macroeconomics plays a big role. But our view is China must open up. They must become fair traders,” Kudlow said. 
 
 Brent D. Griffiths and Christopher Cadelago contributed to this report. 
 

– While China and the US go back and forth on tariffs here on Earth, the former is forging ahead with a more celestial grand plan. In what it hopes will eventually nab it a world first, China on Monday launched its Queqiao (aka "Magpie Bridge") satellite, per state media, putting it one step closer to being the first country to land on the so-called dark side of the moon, the Guardian reports. So far, no probe has ever successfully made it to the part of the moon we never get to see, mainly because of communications issues: Signals from a probe on the dark side wouldn't make it all the way back to Earth due to interference from moon rock. By entering the moon's orbit about 282,000 miles from Earth, however, Queqiao will serve as a middleman between the Chang'e 4 lander-rover China plans to send to the dark side later this year and stations back on Earth, Space.com notes. Set to a rousing musical score, a video of Queqiao's assembly to its rocket, followed by its launch, was disseminated by state media on Monday. Two smaller satellites also went along for the ride, with a mission to collect radio astronomy data. This endeavor is a smaller part of China's larger initiative to make inroads in space exploration on the level of the US or Russia, who've long dominated the field. When Chang'e 4 heads to the moon at the end of 2018, it will be carrying seeds for potatoes and a cabbage-like plant for a "lunar mini biosphere" test, per the Guardian, which adds China has big plans to send humans to the moon within the next 15 years or so. (Some more on the "Moon Village" China wants to set up.)