As Artemis II is celebrated, the world faces hard questions about US leadership in space
- Written by: Art Cotterell, Postdoctoral Fellow, Faculty of Law & Justice, UNSW Sydney
The successful Artemis II trip around the Moon was a historic achievement – the first crewed lunar fly-by in more than 50 years, and the greatest distance yet travelled by humans from our “pale blue dot”.
The mission was marked by engineering, scientific and technical feats, by the astronauts and team at NASA and beyond, who got the crew there and back safely.
With the technical achievement came symbolic firsts, too. The first woman and the first person of colour to orbit the Moon. As astronaut Victor Glover put it, “people need to be able to see themselves in the things that they dream about”.
Artemis II deserves celebration. But the celebration should not crowd out political scrutiny.
Power and resources on the Moon
Artemis II is one mission in a broader US program to start establishing a permanent Moon base by 2030.
This is about more than exploration. As US President Donald Trump has said, it is about asserting “American space superiority”, establishing a “sustained American presence” and developing a lunar economy. The US colonial thinking of a “manifest destiny to the stars” returns.
The bigger picture is that the US sees itself in a “space race” with what NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman has called its “geopolitical adversary”, China.
One point of conflict is access to finite, valuable resources at the lunar south pole, where water ice could sustain life and provide rocket fuel for missions to Mars. More speculative, profit-driven visions also play a part, from mining helium-3 to extracting resources from asteroids and bringing them to Earth.
Global rules – beyond the globe
International space treaties, largely forged during the 20th century Cold War, have little to say about appropriating resources off-Earth.
The US wants to shape the rules, and the US-led Artemis Accords are part of that effort. They are non-binding principles, but consequential.
Grounded in the Outer Space Treaty of 1967, they offer a “blueprint” for how resource activities, and other unsettled topics, may be governed.
Many observers see the Artemis Accords as more transparent and open than China’s counterpart, the International Lunar Research Station. However, critics argue the Artemis Accords undermine multilateral, consensus-based processes.
Sixty-one countries have signed the Artemis Accords. Only nine new signatories have joined since Trump’s return as US president, versus 19 in the year prior. It remains to be seen if the trend continues.
Why US leadership in space demands scrutiny
US leadership in space is often discussed only in contrast to China. This binary view can help the US escape scrutiny, especially in allied nations.
Consider America’s recent actions here on Earth. As Artemis II drew our gaze skyward, the US–Israel war on Iran was intensifying.
In an expletive-filled post on Truth Social, Trump hinted at a nuclear attack with a threat that “a whole civilization will die tonight” unless Tehran reopened the Strait of Hormuz.
The US also threatened to target civilian infrastructure, after one strike hit a school, reportedly killing more than 150 people.
All of this occurred amid the ongoing crisis and civilian casualties in Gaza, where Trump’s “Board of Peace” has faced criticism for seeking to function as an “alternative UN”.
Trump has also revived territorial ambitions toward Greenland, saying: “We need it”. He floated annexing Canada as the fifty-first US state. He spoke of the “honour of taking Cuba”. He declared he would “run” Venezuela.
All of these places have natural resources that would give the US strategic advantages, including in critical minerals and oil.
This conduct has raised concerns from international lawyers and international organisations. Even US allies have spoken up, whom Trump criticised for not joining the Iran war.
Hard questions about a US-led future in space
A disregard for international law on Earth leads us to question how the US will ultimately act in space.
Scholars from the Global South, notably law professor Antony Anghie, have long argued that the US uses international law selectively and in line with its own interests. This is not new with Trump, even if the pattern has now become more visible and more intense. What may be changing is that more of the world is taking notice, including states that once benefited from that status quo.
At the World Economic Forum in Davos this year, Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney described the “rules-based order” as “partially false”, in which “international law applied with varying rigour depending on the identity of the accused or the victim”. He was not speaking about space – but his point applies here too.
This puts question marks over US leadership in space – and whether it will abide by agreed rules when control over lunar resources is no longer just a hypothetical question. Even America’s own Artemis Accords principles may prove optional if they stop being convenient to US interests.
That question is worth considering, given Trump has already justified withdrawing from many international instruments and organisations for this reason. Even NATO may be next.
No superpower should be immune from scrutiny – on Earth or beyond.
Authors: Art Cotterell, Postdoctoral Fellow, Faculty of Law & Justice, UNSW Sydney
