As China readies its first robotic Moon lander and plots out a large space station for the early 2020s, U.S. space policy experts see a window for space collaboration, but one that is tempered by national security concerns and issues of global space leadership. "There is a certain inevitability about the United States and China finding areas for space cooperation," said John Logsdon, professor emeritus of political science and international affairs at the George Washington University's Space Policy Institute in Washington. "To have leading space countries going their separate paths does not make sense in today's world," Logsdon told SpaceNews. "The process of learning how to work together may be slow, but it seems to me that it is in both countries' interests to start down that path, while recognizing that there are areas of competition as well as cooperation."
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