As the world watches the push for crewed lunar missions, it is tempting to frame the unfolding dynamic between the United States and China as a modern-day space race, with the lunar surface as the stage for a sovereignty contest. But equating the moon with contested maritime zones like the South China Sea, as a recent SpaceNews opinion article did, is a flawed analogy — one that risks importing Earth’s territorial rivalries into a domain meant to transcend them.
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