La conquête de l'espace : enjeux géopolitiques | Géopoliticus | Lumni

More episodes of Géopoliticus 👉 https://cutt.ly/gAoLAF9 The challenges of space exploration and conquest are numerous: scientific, technological, economic, access to resources (minerals, water, energy), informational, military, and security. Space is therefore coveted by states to assert their power. Géopoliticus explains the situation 👇. After World War II, the USSR and the United States competed in a race to conquer space and, in 1957 (Sputnik 1, the first satellite in history) and 1958 (Explorer 1, the first American satellite), became the first states to launch their spacecraft into space. During the second half of the 20th century, other states also succeeded: the United Kingdom in 1962, France in 1965, China and Japan in 1970, and India in 1975. Later, and through smaller space programs, Israel in 1988 and South Korea in 1992 followed. North Korea in 1998 and Iran in 2009 also succeeded in launching their own satellites. Which countries are competing with the United States in space exploration today? While the United States is currently the world's leading space power, other countries are developing their capabilities and competing with them. • Russia's influence in this sector has weakened since the fall of the USSR in 1991. • China, for its part, has invested heavily and is experiencing significant technological advances. It is launching ambitious programs to explore the Moon and Mars (by 2030), Jupiter and Uranus (after 2030), and is establishing itself as the United States' main rival. • European states (through the European Space Agency) and Japan are positioning themselves as scientific and exploration space powers. • India is planning its first manned flight to the Moon in 2025. • Other states, such as Argentina, the United Arab Emirates, and Indonesia, have been able to send their satellites into space thanks to private companies. In this space race, the New Space movement developed in the United States in the 2000s. The country has thus fostered the creation of private companies, the best known of which are Jeff Bezos's Blue Origin and Elon Musk's SpaceX, which specialize in manufacturing launchers and satellites. They are developing their own satellite constellations: Kuiper and Starlink. Thus, and in the absence of regulation, between 2019 and 2024, the number of satellites in space will increase fivefold. In this space competition, the United States currently enjoys a clear lead: with more than 8,700 satellites, it owns nearly 70% of the satellites in orbit. China, for its part, has just over 700. But Chinese ambitions, with large-scale constellation projects such as the Guo Wang and G60, will increase geostrategic rivalries over control of space. ► The conquest of space remains more than ever a geopolitical issue. 👉 Discover all the videos in the Geopoliticus series.