In only its fourth manned mission to space, China achieved a significant milestone on Monday when its Shenzhou-9 spacecraft docked with China’s Tiangong-1 space lab. Only the United States and Russia have demonstrated such technological prowess, highlighting China’s growing capabilities in space at a time when the United States no longer has the means to send astronauts into orbit after the retirement of the Space Shuttle. Should Washington be worried that China is supplanting the United States in space? LIGNET takes a closer look.

China’s docking achievement is important largely because of its symbolic and propaganda value, but tells us little about how close it is to matching American technological prowess. The first American space docking of this kind occurred in 1966 – a long-ago achievement that makes China’s docking seem of minor importance. Any future contest for the control of space will depend not on astronauts, but rather on the sophistication of rockets and satellites. China’s docking tells us little about how they currently compare to those of the United States.