If Joe Biden is elected president, he will have a decision to make concerning a new international agreement governing space exploration. NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine announced that eight nations have signed the Artemis Accords, an agreement that covers relevant areas of space exploration ranging from the use of resources to space debris removal. The agreement is meant to complement the Outer Space Treaty of 1967.
The initial signatories of the Artemis Accords are Australia, Canada, Italy, Japan, Luxembourg, the United Arab Emirates, the United Kingdom, and the United States.
No doubt, other countries will sign the accords in short order, including possibly Israel, India, and a number of European countries. Russia and China were conspicuous by their absence. Russia has expressed some reluctance to join the Artemis Accords, according to a piece in Ars Technica, with Roscosmos chief Dmitry Rogozin dismissing the agreement as a space version of NATO. Relations between China and the rest of the world remain decidedly chilly in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic. Besides, the Wolf Amendment heavily restricts space cooperation between the U.S. and China.
Russia and China seem intent on forming their own rival space alliance, setting up the possibility of a space race on steroids between two rival coalitions. The prospect contains some danger of conflict but also the promise of progress that often comes from competition.
Some find it ironic that the signing of the Artemis Accords occurred so close to a U.S. presidential election and the potential change of administrations. If President Trump wins a second term, the Artemis Alliance could become a world-historic document, governing an expansion of human civilization to the moon, Mars, and beyond. However, if Biden wins the election, the significance of the accords becomes less certain.
The Artemis Accords do not have the power of a formal treaty. A potential Biden administration could take one look at the document and decide to withdraw from it, just as the Trump administration withdrew from the Iran nuclear deal and the Paris climate accords, finding neither to be in America’s interest. If a Biden White House decides that human space exploration is not relevant to its agenda, it could end the Artemis Accords just as summarily.
On the other hand, while Biden has not opened his mind about his approach to space policy, the Democratic Party Platform for 2020 pretty much includes an endorsement of the Artemis program to return to the moon and then go on to Mars. A Biden administration may well decide to adopt the Artemis program and the accords as its own, modifying it somewhat. President Bill Clinton adopted the space station program developed by his Republican predecessors with a design change and a name change (from Space Station Freedom to the International Space Station), ensuring that the project would be carried to its conclusion.
On the other hand, President Barack Obama summarily canceled President George W. Bush’s effort to return astronauts to the moon, Project Constellation. A Biden administration has both the Clinton and the Obama models to follow if it so chooses.
One factor that may stop a potential Biden administration from withdrawing from the Artemis Accords is that such a move would open it to accusations of hypocrisy. Democrats, especially those such as Biden, who were associated with the Obama administration, have excoriated Trump for bailing on the Iranian nuclear deal and the Paris climate accords. A withdrawal from the Artemis Accords would have a bad odor about it.
Besides, Bridenstine has been relentless in selling Artemis as a bipartisan undertaking. Democrats and Republicans in Congress support the project to return humans to the moon, albeit with certain disagreements on the details. Those people who may run a Biden space policy would also do well to remember the political firestorm that accompanied Obama’s cancellation of Constellation.
Besides, space exploration and the expansion of human civilization beyond the Earth have benefits that are not partisan but universal. Those benefits include the furtherance of science, commerce, and American soft political power. The Trump administration recognizes this truth. If Biden replaces him, he would do well to recognize it, too.
Mark Whittington, who writes frequently about space and politics, has published a political study of space exploration entitled Why is It So Hard to Go Back to the Moon? as well as The Moon, Mars and Beyond. He blogs at Curmudgeons Corner.
