NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman announced on May 26 a series of plans for creating what NASA is calling its MoonBase program. These include a series of rovers designed to determine a place on the lunar south pole in which they can eventually land humans. The target currently set for such a lunar landing is 2028, before President Trump leaves office.
While NASA has a ways to go to accomplish that task, given decades of neglect, Isaacman is on a “forced march” to achieve the goal before China, which has been conducting a decades-plus Long March to build an International Lunar Station. While putting rovers and other equipment on the Moon is far easier than landing humans there, achieving this will at least send the signal that the U.S. is on its way. Whether nature—not to speak of budget restrictions—will place obstacles in the way of the political calendar is yet to be seen, but the excitement is there, and the fact that this is seen as a race means that, short of nuclear war or a total financial collapse (neither of which is totally far-fetched), it is unlikely to be halted.
Since Isaacman’s proposed restructuring of the government space effort (building the NASA organization to 70% of the workforce and private companies to 30%, a reversal of the present 70-to-30 ratio in favor of private companies) has not yet happened, most of the equipment required for the various stages has to be produced and provided by private companies—on schedule and hopefully under budget.
Several robotic launches to the Moon are scheduled in 2026:
