I'm John Batson with my colleagues, David Livingston, Dr. Space of the space show.

This is Hotel Mars Episode N. The military scenario, Rick Fisher of the International Assessment and Strategy

Center is here. Rick first brought to my understanding that the Taekonaut Corps Brigade

of the Chinese Space Program is fully educated in the idea that the military will be in space,

must be in space, and that the adversary relationship we maintain on Earth will continue

in geosynchronous orbit, in low Earth orbit, on the moon, in cis-l lunar space, and to Mars, Rick, is that correct? Do they, do the Chinese talk about

Mars? Oh, sure, yeah. I mean, they fully expect to occupy Mars. And in August of 2023, their largest space

company revealed that for the previous three years, they'd been

working on a 100-year plan to project Chinese presence throughout the solar system, manned and

unmanned. So as long as the Chinese Communist Party exists, there will be the opportunity for conflict with China out into the farther reaches of our solar system.

And they want to dominate the Lagrange points as well as the surface of the moon?

And what part of the surface of the moon?

The same thing we've always talked about, South Pole?

Yes, early, their early target is the South Pole.

For the same reason, it's America's target because that's where we believe assess most of the lunar water ice exists for later processing into useful things.

David, you read widely. I do not. I'm not on these matters. You've been a reader of

space news for years. Have you seen this developed fully? Or is it all fresh, David?

It's not all fresh, but I don't think it gets the publicity of the entrepreneurs, the

fundraising that they're so successful in, things like the Musk and SpaceX IPO, the rocket

engines of Starship or Blue. those things grab lots of headlines.

And it is interesting to point out China claims to have commercial entrepreneurial space

companies. And Rick has talked about that before. They're still maybe at the best quasi

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