This Apollo 11 vs Chandrayaan 3 comparison emphasises how space exploration has shifted from a Cold War-era ideological and technological rivalry between superpowers to a more diverse and multipolar competition involving multiple nations striving for scientific and strategic dominance.
During the Cold War era, while the US and USSR attempted to compete with each other regarding military might, economic and technological superiority, and nuclear weapons, another sphere of fierce competition that emerged between the two in the 1960s was space. The period from 1957 to 1969 is therefore known as the era of the space race, where both the US and USSR competed to make their mark in space and on the Moon. This led to space missions such as the USA’s Apollo 11 in response to the Soviet Union’s Sputnik 1. This mission heralded the beginning of the space race and then beckoned countless missions from both the US and USSR, such as the USSR’s Vostok 1 Mission, the Luna and Voskhod Space programs, and the like.
Similarly, the US initiated its space program as NASA (National Aeronautics and Space Administration) was established in 1958, and the Mercury, Gemini, and Voyager space programs were set up.
Developments in the military domain also started, including the development of Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles (ICBMs) with their sub-orbital trajectory, spy satellites, and anti-satellite weapons; these technologies continued to play a significant role in maintaining deterrence during the Cold War. Fast forward to the 21st century, and the world is witnessing another space race, fundamentally similar to the 1960s but much more complex. This time around, more than two countries are part of that race: the US, Russia, China, India, and the European Union, with other emerging players such as South Korea and Japan wanting a share of the space glory as well. This article aims to compare and contrast the United States’ Apollo 11 Moon Mission of 1969 with India’s Chandrayaan 3 Moon Mission of 2023, examining the evolving dynamics of the space race from the 1960s to the 21st century. It also explores the geopolitical implications of the space race in both eras.
USA’s Apollo 11 Moon Mission: A National Goal
The discovery of foundational rocket science and understanding of orbital mechanics by Russian Scientist Konstantin Tsiolkovsky in the early 1900s paved the way for the Soviet Union’s space program. Moreover, the Russians studied German rocket systems after World War II, such as their V2 rocket system. Eventually, on 4th October 1957, the Soviet Union launched the world’s first artificial satellite into space, which was called the Sputnik 1. It was the first time that a human-made object was put into space. This satellite, which operated for 21 days in space before its batteries were exhausted, had five primary scientific objectives: to test a method of putting an artificial satellite into the Earth orbit, provide information on the density of the atmosphere by determining its orbital lifetime, test radio and optical methods of orbital tracking, determine the effects of radio wave propagation through the atmosphere and check principles of pressurization used on the satellites.
The Sputnik 1 mission proved successful but was met with heightened insecurity from the USA. The perception that the US was falling behind on scientific and technological innovation, coupled with the fact that Sputnik 1 had demonstrated that the Soviet Union could launch rockets into space, instigated fears that the Soviet Union could now use the same rockets for Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles (ICBMs) that capable of delivering nuclear warheads. This apparent loss of prestige and fear of a missile gap led the then US President John F. Kennedy to set a national goal of ‘landing a man on the Moon and returning him safely to Earth by the end of the 1960s’.
Moreover, NASA, which had been set up in 1958, was tasked with centralizing and coordinating space research and exploration efforts. Kennedy’s goal was realized by the NASA-led Apollo missions program, which, despite numerous challenges, succeeded with the Apollo 11 mission on 20th July 1969 when astronauts Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin became the first humans to ever set foot on the Moon with Micheal Collins orbiting above in the Columbia Command Module. During their two-hour Moon Walk, Armstrong and Aldrin set up devices to measure solar wind, receive laser beams to calculate the Earth-Moon distance, and monitor moonquakes and meteor impacts. They also collected 23 kg of rock and soil samples, took numerous photographs, and maintained communication with mission control.
After 21 hours and 38 minutes on the surface of the moon, they docked their Lunar Module named Eagle with the Command Module Colombia that Collins commanded and began their journey back to Earth. This successful Apollo 11 Mission was then reciprocated in the shape of the Soviet Union’s Luna program- which was a series of unmanned missions to explore the Moon leading to several firsts, including the first imprint on the Moon (Luna 2), the first photographs of the far side of the Moon (Luna 3) and the first soft landing on the Moon (Luna 9). The US and USSR also invested heavily in launching their space stations for space exploration. This included the launch of the Soviet Mir Space Station in 1986, which was later decommissioned in 2001. Moreover, the launch of the International Space Station (ISS) in 1998, which is a multinational partnership involving NASA, Roscosmos (Russian space agency), JAXA (Japanese space agency), ESA (European Space Agency), and the CSA (Canadian space agency) was also made possible courtesy of the space race that had been initiated in the 1960s.
India’s Chandrayaan 3 Mission: Exploring the Lunar Surface
As mentioned earlier, the 21st century has heralded a new space race, with multiple countries vying for space domination, including new actors such as China, India, and the European Union (EU). This era also includes private companies like Elon Musk’s SpaceX and Jeff Bezos’s Blue Origin competing for leadership in space exploration, lunar missions, and resource exploitation in space. As part of the 21st-century race for space domination, China initiated its Chang’e Lunar Missions, aimed at landing on the far side of the Moon and planning for future lunar bases on the Moon. Therefore, as part of the Chang’e series, China launched its Chang’e 5 mission in 2020, which landed on the northwest corner of the Moon.
It was the first mission to return lunar samples to the Earth since the Soviet Union’s Luna 24 mission in 1976. Chang’e 5 brought back moon rock and soil samples that are approximately 2 billion years old, placing China in the spotlight as a serious competitor in the field of lunar exploration. In response, India, too, not wanting to appear scientifically or technologically inferior, launched its Chandrayaan 3 Moon mission in 2023 to ensure its space capabilities were on par with its regional rival China. The goal of Chandrayaan 3, a program of the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO), was to conduct a soft touchdown on the lunar south pole of the Moon (an area of interest because of its ice deposits), land a rover, carry out in situ scientific experiments and demonstrate end to end landing and roving capabilities.
After the failure of Chandrayaan-2 in 2019, in August 2023, the Chandrayaan 3 mission successfully landed near the south pole of the Moon after taking 40 days to reach the Moon. This success marked a turning point for India since it allowed India to reassert its position in the space race, showcase its scientific and technological prowess, and keep up its ambition to keep pace with China’s growing space capabilities.
A Space Mission Analysis: Apollo 11 Vs Chandrayaan 3 Comparison
Apollo 11 and Chandrayaan 3 were launched in response to the insecurity that the USA and later India felt from the space missions of the USSR and China, respectively. The US launched its Apollo 11 program because it had become a matter of prestige. The country did not want to appear technologically and ideologically inferior to its communist rival, the USSR. Similarly, in the 21st century, as both China and India compete for dominance in the Asian region (China is competing for dominance with the US globally as well, but when it comes to its competition with India, that is more region-oriented), when China launched its Chang’e missions, India initiated its own Chandrayaan 3 to demonstrate its advancements in space exploration and enhance its status as a global space power. Therefore, both Apollo 11 and the Chandrayaan 3 were intended to be symbols of national pride and power.
Moreover, both missions involved cutting-edge technologies such as navigation systems, life support systems, and scientific instruments, thus contributing to space science. The two missions also involved collaboration from international entities. While Apollo 11 saw collaboration with the European Space Agency (ESA), India’s Chandrayaan 3 benefited from international collaboration with Russia, which assisted in launch support.
However, it is also important to note that when it comes to Apollo 11, the mission was framed within Cold War rivalry between the US and the Soviet Union; this is because the space race was a zero-sum competition between two superpowers, and space exploration was seen as a direct extension of this geopolitical conflict. Therefore, the success of Apollo 11 was not only a technological achievement but also a political statement about the supremacy of capitalism over communism. India’s Chandrayaan 3, on the other hand, does not involve India competing for global dominance like the US did during the Cold War; India wants to demonstrate its technological prowess and relevance to compete regionally with China. Therefore, in the context of India, the space race does not involve motivations for global power acquisition but rather regional power ambitions. Chandrayaan 3 was more technologically focused, and India wanted to showcase its technological prowess and not its ideological superiority over its rival, as the US did through its Apollo 11 mission.
Moreover, generally speaking, as a whole, the space race of the 1960s and that of the 21st century both have military aspects to them. In the 1960s, the main goal was to explore the dual use of space technologies; for example, the launch of satellites like Sputnik had direct military applications for spy satellites, ballistic missile defense systems, and facilitation of communication between military arms through geostationary satellites.
The issue of space-based nuclear weapons was also of concern during the 20th century as both competing powers explored the potential for using space as a platform for military advantage. Although the idea of such space-based nuclear weapons did not exist mainly due to technical challenges, safety concerns, and logistics, it did give way to the introduction of the Outer Space Treaty in 1967. The main aim of the Outer Space Treaty was to prevent the militarization of space, reserve space for peaceful purposes only, and ban any nuclear weapons in space. Today, space is considered an important strategic domain. While there has been more importance given to advancing civilian space capabilities, countries like the US, China, and Russia are also increasingly focusing on space-based military assets, including the development of anti-satellite weapons (such as China’s KE-ASAT test in 2007 or India’s mission Shakti ASAT test in 2019), space-based missile defense systems and cyber capabilities to carry out cyber-attacks on space-based assets such as satellites which could hinder civilian communication but also hinder military communication between command and control systems and military units in times of combat.
There are concerns that space could become a new front for warfare, leading to the materialization of space-based nuclear weapons, and resulting in kinetic (anti-satellite missiles) and non-kinetic (cyber-attacks) methods of attack with consequences for both space infrastructure and terrestrial military operations. Any such attack on dual-use space technology, such as satellites, could also lead to nuclear entanglement between nuclear weapon states, where an attack on an early warning satellite could be misperceived as a signal to blunt defenses in the face of an incoming nuclear strike from the rival. Since such an attack would also degrade the country in question’s ability to detect incoming nuclear strikes, it might wrongly prompt the country to use nuclear weapons in response, resulting in escalation.
21st Century Space Race: Where does Pakistan Stand?
When it comes to Pakistan, the country falls behind both in civilian and military space technology. In the civilian domain, while Pakistan has made strides in satellite development, such as the launch of Badr A or PakSat-1 satellite courtesy of efforts by SUPARCO and assistance in launch by China, it has yet to develop its space launch vehicles essential for space exploration and scientific research. Pakistan falls far behind when it comes to space-based R&D. Militarily, too, Pakistan lacks early warning satellite systems capable of detecting missile launches or threats from space; it relies more on ground-based surveillance and radar systems.
Moreover, unlike India, Pakistan does not possess any Anti-Satellite capabilities, placing it at a significant strategic disadvantage when it comes to India. Additionally, while the US, China, Russia, and India have their military space programs in the shape of the US Space Force (USSF) established in 2019, the Chinese Strategic Support Force (SSF) established in 2015, Russia’s Space Force (RSF) established in 2011 and India’s Defense Space Agency established in 2019 to coordinate military space assets, Pakistan has neither a military space agency nor a military space doctrine. Therefore, it is important for Pakistan to advance its space program both in the civilian and military domain to compete with the advanced space capabilities of countries like India, China, Russia, and the like.
Conclusion
In conclusion, the Apollo 11 and Chandrayaan 3 missions have similarities and dissimilarities as explored. Still, it is important to note that the space race in the 21st century, which is looking as far as exploring and inhabiting Mars, is very different from that of the 20th century. With countries making significant strides to advance their space capabilities, conduct space-based scientific research, and develop space-based military assets, it is essential that Pakistan reassesses its strategic goals and further develops its space program to remain relevant on the world stage.
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The views and opinions expressed in this article/paper are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect the editorial position of Paradigm Shift.
The author is currently pursuing a Bachelor's degree in Strategic Studies at National Defence University (NDU), Islamabad. Her research interests focus on Asian geopolitics, nuclear security, and the military applications of emerging technologies.