A Crowded Outer Space Calls for New Rules
In recent years, there have been frequent activities in the global aerospace and aeronautics field. Major space-exploring countries have increased their investment for improved competitiveness in their space activities. Sovereign nations have made considerable progress in the fields of manned spaceflight, military strategy, space economy, space exploration and space infrastructure. At the same time, private commercial forces are also constantly participating in space activities, becoming an indispensable player in the field. With the further development of Mars and lunar exploration activities, human exploration of outer space has taken another step forward. As far as international rules are concerned, major spacefaring countries continue to exploit the ambiguity and loopholes in the existing system, relying on scientific and technological strength to exploit outer space. This process is leading to an arms race. The world needs continuous international cooperation that promotes the peaceful use of space to produce fairer and clearer rules for space activities in the future.
Safety Guarantee to Prevent Militarisation
Since the space age began in the middle of the last century, sovereign countries' space activities have been heavily militarized. Early satellite launches were themselves based on the need for military intelligence; beginning in the 21st century, countries have further intensified the use and investment of satellites in the military field, with the purpose of further integrating space into the overall military strategy and improving space combat and overall national defense capabilities.
The European and American space countries have been regularly releasing their space strategies and constantly adjusting and transforming their strategy. The Trump administration has released several national documents on space strategy and restarted the National Space Council during his term.
In June 2020, the department of defense published for the first time the outline of National Space Strategy, establishing the U.S. Space Force as the new branch of the military and unifying the U.S. space command as a singular operation. These steps have made significant reform in the defense procurement and paved the way for the U.S Space Force to develop a clear strategic path.
In December 2021, the White House released the United States Space Priorities Framework, which further discussed how the United States can build and maintain a stable and responsible space force and to enhance the sustainability of the United States in space. At this point, the SPACE strategy system of the U.S. government and military has been initially established, aiming to solidify its influence over international space rule-making and strengthen its military and non-military leadership in space.
The European Space Strategy, released by the European Union in 2016, mainly emphasizes the realization of the EU's space security and autonomy, global competitiveness and leadership, commercial and civil value, and the optimization of the space program management system.
In January 2022, NATO, issued the "overall space policy. This paper expounded the importance of outer-space to NATO’s security and prosperity, analyzed the related threat to space activities, and gathered intelligence on potential rivals. The paper argues that, given the advantages that outer-space provides in conflict, the development of the space capabilities and the promotion of consensus among Allies on the role of outer-space in crisis should be a priority.
Other space-faring countries have also formulated their own space strategies based on their own interests. Quite a number of countries have also formed special space military forces, opening a new form of arms race.
The 1967 Outer Space Treaty and the 1979 Moon Agreement provided broad guidelines for the space activities of sovereign states, but limited by the technological capabilities and perception of the time, countries did not provide more detailed and binding rules for the expansion in space. First, the Outer Space Treaty guarantees the freedom of all mankind to explore and use space, requiring that the moon and other celestial bodies to be exclusively used for peaceful purposes. But exploration of other types of space entities (such as asteroids) is not covered. In the event of a dispute, the treaty's preamble is too vague for interpretations of purposes, such as whether the act is intended to advance space exploration and use for peaceful purposes to advance mutual interest. Second, the treaty's requirement for “subjects conducting activities in space to take due account of the corresponding interests of all other parties to the treaty” is also vague. The treaty’s limitation on military expansion leaves room for countries to conduct unlawful military competition and even conflict. In view of the current lack of a comprehensive legal framework governing the space behavior of sovereign states, relevant issues can only be discussed on the basis of general principles of international law.
Although quite a number of space-faring countries have put emphasis on ensuring freedom of movement and security of space development in their rhetoric when formulating their space strategies, they have in fact increased factors of instability. On February 22, 2022, for example, the United States, Australia, Canada, France, Germany, New Zealand, and Britain signed the joint space operations vision 2031. The seven countries called for non-military national space activities and cooperations to prevent space conflicts. The treaty also outlined applicable international law for self-protection in events of hostile space activities. It is obvious that these countries intend to extend military confrontation into space. In addition, the United Nations Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space has been unable to effectively implement existing international treaties, further exacerbating the problem of lack of accordance and uniformity in relevant international rules on space.
The Economic Foundation of the Commercial use of space
The extensive development of space industry has brought more and more economic and commercial opportunities, making the needs for civil and commercial use of space more prominent. Euroconsult estimates that the global space economy, including government space investment and commercial space revenue, will total $370 billion in 2021. Governments are increasingly outsourcing the various aspects of space activities (launch, delivery, recovery and control) to private space companies, which will undoubtedly promote competition, gradually reduce costs and prices, and eventually drive the relevant technology into the civilian sector. Three U.S. companies — Virgin Galactic, Blue Origin, and SpaceX — have entered the space tourism market, and their offers have tapped broad demand.
In recent years, the power of private companies has been growing in space exploration, and they are working closely with the state to become an important driver of the expansion of space activities. In May 2020, SpaceX successfully sent two astronauts to the International Space Station using its manned Dragon spacecraft and Falcon 9 rocket. This is the first commercial manned space flight of the United States, and the first time the United States has independently launched astronauts into space since the retirement of the space shuttle in 2011. SpaceX also became the world's first commercial company with independent manned space flight capability. In 2021, SpaceX will develop and test the rapid propulsion Starship system for high-altitude flight tests.
Private participation in space exploration is not just a purely civilian activity, but it still has the hand of a sovereign state behind it. Its practice clearly compliments the relevant military endeavors of the sovereign nation. A more telling example is the launch and development of low-orbit small satellite constellations. In January 2015, Musk proposed the "Starlink" plan, which aims to launch 12,000 satellites into low Earth orbit between 2019 and 2024 to build a huge three-tier satellite network, which will eventually connect all satellites into a giant "constellation", providing high-speed and low-cost satellite Internet for the entire Earth (including the north and south Poles) all day and night.
Once completed, Starlink will greatly enhance the US military's broadband communications and precise navigation capabilities, help the US seize limited low orbits and spectrum resources, and improve its all-weather ground surveillance, reconnaissance, and space awareness. It will also lay the foundation for the next space offensive and defensive systems.
It should be noted that the degree and vision of space exploration of various countries have put forward higher requirements for the innovation and development of space technology, and the industrial chain needs to be constantly upgraded. Besides national finance, it is inevitable to introduce more social capital for joint development. Similar to information technology,, the application of aerospace technology will eventually be deeply integrated with different scenarios and practices, making the aerospace industry itself a fundamental field that can accommodate more applications from other industries and providing broad prospects for absorbing social capital.
Infrastructure: the Construction of Space Station
A relatively stable infrastructure is essential for effective exploration of outer space. The importance of the International Space Station has been recognized since the beginning of human space exploration and competition. As a permanent spacecraft in orbit, the International Space Station can meet the needs of astronauts to live and work in orbit and also provide a basis for continuous scientific experiments and research in space. According to a NASA announcement on December 31, 2021, the International Space Station will be retired in 2031 due to its aging systems.Russia is the first country to seek ways to extend the life of the International Space Station. However, after the leak of the STARS service module in 2019, Russia put forward a new plan to build an independent Russian space and a orbitual service station.
After the retirement of the International Space Station, the Tiangong space station under construction by China will become the only fully functional space station in orbit. The space station project will produce huge economic and social benefits. China has adopted a "three-step" implementation strategy. The first step is the stage of manned spacecraft, during which the development of manned spacecraft was completed and the goal of astronauts' trips to and from the earth was realized. The second stage is the space laboratory stage. During this stage, China not only initiated the extravehicular activities and mastered space rendezvous technologies, but also successfully completed the short to mid term stay of astronauts in space. It also successfully verified the in-orbit refueling technology of propellant, and completed cargo delivery and replenishment missions. The third step is the ongoing space station construction, in which China will build long-term manned space stations.
Space Governance: Capacity and Rules
Since the signing of the Outer Space Treaty, international law has begun to extend to new issues of how to exercise state sovereignty in outer space. Under the background of space competition between the United States and the Soviet Union in the 20th century, the United Nations successively issued "Rescue Agreement", "Liability Convention", "Registration Convention" and "Moon Agreement". The five conventions have established the basic system of norms governing the conduct of states in outer space. With the emergence of various actors, actions involving outer space are becoming more complex and more norms with different sources and less binding force are emerging. For example, NASA issued the Artemis Accord in May 2020, which refined and supplemented the aforementioned five convention systems and has been signed by 15 countries. From the perspective of international law, the rules governing the use of space have been extended to more than ten sub-fields, which have generated many disputes. At present, the two key areas are space situational awareness and traffic management, and the acquisition and utilization of space resources.
Representatives from Nigeria and Rwanda sighing the Artemis Accord, making them the first African nations to do so (Anadolu Agency AFRICA)
In the first area, space situational awareness, space traffic management and space debris mitigation are three interrelated issues. Similar to the encoding and authentication of social subjects and objects by the state in physical space, situational awareness refers to the ability to track and identify various objects in space, which is the foundation of space traffic management and space debris. Once a country has this capability, it can have more powerful and flexible freedom of movement in space, establishing a set of rules on behavior.
With the increasing number of satellites and other aircraft in extraterrestrial orbit, traffic management between satellites is becoming increasingly important. On September 2, 2019, the European Space Agency's Earth observation satellite Ares and SpaceX's Starlink 44 satellite were in low-Earth orbit at the same time when they narrowly missed each other. At the end of 2021, the Chinese Foreign Ministry notified the United Nations in accordance with Article 5 of the Outer Space Treaty that SpaceX's starlink satellites had twice dangerously approached the Chinese space station, threatening the lives and health of astronauts. For safety reasons, the space station assembly twice implemented preventive collision avoidance control, or emergency collision avoidance, for starlink satellites. Clearly, countries need to further coordinate the operation of satellites and clarify the rules of orbit traffic in the future.
Space debris mainly comes from routine space activities and accidental collisions of aircraft and also poses considerable risks to normal space activities. In response to the debris threat, major space-faring nations and private companies have developed a variety of removal technologies, including flynet capture, harpoon capture, towed sail de-orbit, high-energy laser burn, and "space fence" tracking. In January 2021, the White House released the National Orbital Debris Research and Development Program, which supports three main efforts: limiting the generation of debris by design, tracking and characterization of debris, and recovery or reuse of debris, and emphasizes global partnership building.
As for the second area, under the Outer Space Treaty, no country can claim sovereignty over the moon, asteroids or other celestial bodies, and outer space is open to all nations exploring it. However, the state-centric space law system developed in the mid-20th century is not suitable for commercial development prospects, nor can it restrain private actors in space exploration and access to space resources, so that the traditional legal and economic theories that establish the legitimacy of private property rights now prevail in space. Trump signed the executive order on “Encouraging International Support for the Recovery and Use of Space” to strengthen American private enterprises’ rights to space resources and urge the United States to seek cooperation from other countries through bilateral or multilateral agreement in support of the US space policy. At the same time, the United States believes that outer space is not the property of all nations, as a result, there is no need for broad international agreements, only cooperation agreements between the US and its Allies to affirm support for the US space agenda.
Space cooperation between Countries
Since the last century, more and more countries have joined in space launch activities, which has also continuously opened up space for cooperations between countries. For example, launching satellites into space orbit has become a relatively mature industry around the world. However, such co-operation between countries remains volatile. For example, Russia has always been the main service provider of space launches for various countries, but the "special military operation" of Russia against Ukraine in February 2022 has caused the interruption of cooperation among relevant parties. A subsidiary of Roscosmos, which produces soyuz carrier rockets, was placed on the EU's list of sanctioned entities; in response, Roscosmos suspended launching soyuz rockets from its Kourou launch site in French Guiana. In a related move, other European-Russian space exploration activities have also been suspended, and Russia has announced a suspension of deliveries of rocket engines to the United States.
The framework of international law, which originated in the last century, cannot provide stable expectations for current international cooperations. In this context, NASA released the Artemis Agreement in May 2020, hoping to create a "safe, peaceful and prosperous" space under the leadership of the United States. The agreement requires countries participating in the "Artemis" lunar exploration project to follow a series of principles and reach a variety of bilateral agreements. The Artemis Agreement sets out ten principles, including peaceful purposes, transparency, interoperability, emergency assistance, registration of space objects, release of scientific data, protection of outer space heritage, space resources, and conflict resolution of space activities and orbital debris. Relevant international law studies are also gradually focusing on these main topics.
Human exploration of outer space is similar to the development and construction of cyberspace: there exists the need to define "space", develop global infrastructure (e.g., the domain name system and its neutral operators), and set up areas of control according to the technical strength of sovereign states. On this basis, social capital is introduced to generate value-added services, promote innovation, and further create property rights and competition rules. Furthermore, countries should engage in extensive international cooperation to connect space and facilitate the free flow of resources based on agreements that ensure security. We may well witness a repeat of this process in outer space in the second half of the 21st century. However, since space explorations are naturally closely linked with national interests and military strategies, the question of cooperation between countries and private entities on the basis of transcending pure national interests will determine the success or failure of human space probes in the future.