Because there are so many delays in the conquest of the moon, when one thing fails, another fails and the Artemis II mission that will put humans back on the surface of our natural satellite, and specifically Artemis II was postponed twice (first in February and then March), perhaps we should not rule that out because remember that for several decades we breathed a lot of lead, but there are other reasons that explain why the missions to the moon of the Apollo program were done quickly.
And many wonder why it is so difficult, even with current technology, to return to the Moon. In the 1960s there were very important reasons for the two dominant powers in the world to compete to reach the Moon first. On the one hand, each represented opposing political and economic ideologies. If the Soviet Union reached the Moon first, the message that the rest of the world was going to receive was that communism was the superior ideology with an economic system that allowed humanity to progress to the space frontier.
And if the United States arrived first, the message would be that capitalism was superior, so it was a race to gain the sympathy of other countries, as well as take away allies from the opposing power, but the United States was losing and ugly in the space race in each of its phases; the first artificial satellite in orbit, the first human in orbit, the first woman in orbit, the first spacewalk, the first probe to escape Earth's gravity, the first probe to reach the Moon; There was a lot of pressure for the United States to achieve the feat of arriving first and landing on the moon first, and on the other hand, reaching the moon first made it clear to the world and to the other power who had the best aerospace and therefore military technology.
If you are able to put three people on the surface of the Moon and come back alive and kicking, it means that for you to direct a rocket to cross half the world carrying a nuclear bomb to Red Square is no joke, the interest that the powers of that time had in going to the Moon does not compare with the one that the United States and China have now, at that time, the Apollo program and its Soviet counterpart were a real priority, the United States gave 4.41% of the federal budget to NASA, which was completely focused on the Apollo program, that's 12 to 15 times more money in proportion to the budget than NASA currently receives.
And one very important thing, the context of the Cold War caused a lot of paranoia in the government and the American people, so the goal of conquering the orbit of the Earth and later the Moon was maintained through several administrations, no matter which party it was, now, each recent administration has changed, reduced or modified the original plan proposed in 2004 with the name of the constellation, now Artemis, which ironically has increased its cost much more than if they had continued with the plan. original.
It also doesn't help that unlike 60 years ago, NASA now depends on a lot of suppliers to design and build the different parts of the rocket, the command and service module of the SLS, complying with safety standards that in the time of Apollo simply did not exist. This greatly complicates the coordination between the different companies that participate in the construction of the new vehicle and makes it difficult to carry out tests, which postpones the launches. In the Apollo program, shortcuts were taken, as many as possible.
Now there is no rush and the goal is enormous and long-term, to reliably and safely create the infrastructure that allows human presence on the Moon continuously, as it is now in Earth orbit with the international space station and the Chinese Tiangong station, it is more of a race of endurance than of speed and for that reason it is more susceptible to changes and delays with each administration, this on the American side.
It is known from China that there is also a plan to settle on the Moon permanently and its aerospace industry is growing faster than the rest of the world, developing reusable rockets that, at least on paper, would be cheaper and more efficient than NASA's SLS.
In conclusion, China and the United States want to settle on the Moon, but they are in no hurry. For none of them is a priority and at this moment they have their focus on other things such as the development of artificial intelligence and the manufacturing of the electronic components that make it possible, semiconductors and the raw materials to produce them, therefore, do not expect to see much progress in the lunar programs. That's going to come in dribs and drabs.
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