"Each new milestone they reach--landing a rover on the moon, launching a space station--magnifies this point. Once they send human beings to the Moon they will use that as a claim of technical superiority over the west. We saw a glimpse of this when they landed a rover on the Moon, a feat the USA never did on the Moon specifically. To partner with any other nation would be to diminish or perhaps even eliminate entirely the propaganda value to the party."

Your point here can be easily proven false by simple facts like these below

> China’s Chang’e-4 lander is running on a LEON2-FT microprocessor core, especially designed for space missions by European industry with close ESA support and sold commercially by the Microchip company – marketed as the AT697.

https://www.esa.int/ESA_Multimedia/Images/2019/07/Chang_e-4_...

> Lunar lander
> Lunar Lander Neutrons and Dosimetry (LND), a neutron dosimeter developed by Kiel University in Germany

> Lunar rover
> Advanced Small Analyzer for Neutrals (ASAN), is an energetic neutral atom analyzer provided by the Swedish Institute of Space Physics (IRF)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chang%27e_4

> Note the logos of the European (ESA), French (CNES), Argentine (CONAE) and Austrian (FFG) space agencies in addition to that of the China National Space Agency (CNSA).

https://www.space.com/china-mars-mission-tianwen-1-internati...

"The one thing uniquely positive I have to say about about the Chinese space program leads to the final point to be made: profit."

Is this sincere discussion or sarcasm?

"Whereas every other human space program is science and/or prestige based, China's is run by a country looking for an exploitative edge over major world powers, and bureaucrats within the party looking for ways to get internal leverage themselves. It turns out that the Moon and near-Earth asteroids are an abundant source of minerals and metals rare on Earth and can be mined for far less than you might naïvely think"

It's fairly clear that the difficulties, hazards and costs of space mining make it impossible - let alone economical - with our current technological capability.

"So there are young turks within the party who are advocating for a cislunar economic exclusion zone. They are talking about violating the Outer Space Treaty of 1967's prohibition against claims of sovereignty over celestial bodies. The official plan is to construct a lunar base and perform resource exploration, WITHOUT international cooperation."

"There are serious talks about a Chinese cislunar economic exclusion zone explicitly compared to the South China Sea, and estimated to be worth $10 trillion dollars by 2050 (crazy optimistic numbers, but that is the claim"

These are extraordinary claims. What's your source?

"Regarding Belt and Road, I'm not sure what unique opinions I can offer. It's what most commentators have described it as recently: a debt trap to capture the best ports and enter into lucrative markets with the same sort of unequal treaties the europeans used against China in the 19th century."

Since this is getting into the realm of geopolitics and propaganda. I will leave you and other readers with this

> But a number of us academics who have studied China’s practices in detail have found scant evidence of a pattern indicating that Chinese banks, acting at the government’s behest, are deliberately over-lending or funding loss-making projects to secure strategic advantages for China.

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/26/opinion/china-belt-road-i...

Also the first hand experiences of a fellow HN reader

> West African American here (Ghanaian - American).
> ...
> Speaking furthermore, I do find it highly concerning just how much of an echo chamber this place is in regards to this notion of "Chinese colonialism" and Chinese "debt - traps". Most African countries still owe far more to the IMF/World Bank than they due to China. Of the 54 African countries, only four are in severe debt to the Chinese (Ethiopia, Kenya, Djibouti, Zambia), and of those four countries China has gone the distance in terms of reviving moribund national rail systems and helping to set up industrial zones, which is in part why East Africa boasts the highest growth rates on the continent.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18762399