What happens if the next race to the Moon is not about flags and footprints, but about rules, resources, and who gets to enforce them? A new Mitchell Institute paper says the U.S. should be ready for that possibility by building a military human spaceflight program that could eventually put active-duty Space Force personnel on the Moon and in orbit.
The argument lands at a fraught moment. China has already completed its Tiangong space station and kept a continuous human presence in low-Earth orbit, while also pushing toward a crewed lunar landing by 2030. The U.S. is still operating under a legal framework that bans military activity on celestial bodies, but the report treats that as a guardrail to respect, not a guarantee that everyone else will.
Why the report is pushing Guardians into space
The paper, written by retired Space Force Colonel Kyle Pumroy, says China’s lunar ambitions and space habitation plans create a national security problem for the U.S. It argues that Washington’s space efforts have suffered from uneven policy and funding, giving Beijing time to build momentum and shape the coming rules of lunar activity.
That is a familiar script in strategic competition: get there first, write the standards, and make everyone else adapt. The difference here is that the battleground is 384,400 kilometers away and, unlike the South China Sea or cyberspace, it is still governed by a treaty from 1967 that was never built for settlements, supply chains, or a lunar economy.
China’s Moon plans are the spark
Pumroy says the U.S. should not assume the Moon will remain a purely cooperative zone if resources and territory become contested. Chinese officials continue to frame their space program as peaceful and inclusive, but the report points to what it describes as a consistent willingness to use force and pressure to assert dominance.
China’s recent crewed mission to Tiangong included a three-astronaut team, and one crew member is expected to remain aboard for a year for the first time. That kind of long-duration mission is more than a flex; it is rehearsal for the logistics, endurance, and command structure needed for a lunar base.
A military spaceflight program would change the mission
The report says the Space Force should move beyond launch tracking, GPS support, and orbital surveillance and develop the ability to send trained Guardians into space under Title 10 authorities. In plain English, that would mean turning a service built to support military operations into one capable of carrying out its own missions beyond Earth.
Space is already crowded with military hardware, just not the cinematic kind. Surveillance, reconnaissance, navigation, and communications satellites are deeply embedded in modern warfare, and a real orbital conflict would spray debris across the most useful orbits, making the consequences ugly fast.
- Space Force created: 2019
- Outer Space Treaty: 1967
- China’s crewed lunar goal: 2030
The awkward part nobody can ignore
The report is not saying war in space is inevitable, but it is arguing that the U.S. should plan as if competition could harden into something much less polite. That is a pretty stark ask for a domain still sold to the public as the final frontier, and it suggests the next lunar breakthrough may be less about science fiction than about deterrence.
If lunar habitats become real, the more interesting question is not whether countries can cooperate, but who gets to define ”normal” behavior first. The Mitchell Institute wants the U.S. to be ready for that fight before anyone starts pretending the Moon is neutral territory in practice, not just in treaty language.