NASA chief Bill Nelson in an interview with POLITICO expressed confidence that the United States can win the lunar race. But he warned that there was no time to waste.

Nelson warned that Beijing could gain a foothold on the moon and try to dominate the most resource-rich areas of the lunar surface, or even keep the US out.. The moon race between the United States and China is getting tighter, and the next two years could determine who comes out on top.

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Nelson's hawkish comments follow NASA's 26-day Artemis I mission, which saw the uncrewed Orion space capsule circle the moon.. Considered a success by many, this mission was the first big step in NASA's plan to land astronauts on the moon's surface to begin building a facility for a more permanent human presence, which could happen as early as 2025..

Optimism came as Congress passed NASA's full-year budget. The agency did not receive all the requested funds, but Nelson insists that the necessary funds are not cut. This includes key components for the next two lunar missions, Artemis II and Artemis III..

But China's aggressive space program is gaining importance, including the recent opening of a new orbiting space station.. Beijing announces goal of landing taikonauts on the moon by the end of this decade.

In December, the Chinese government laid out its vision for more ambitious undertakings such as building infrastructure in space..

Any significant delays or disruptions in the US program, which relies on a number of new systems and equipment still under development, could risk falling behind the Chinese.. And NASA's moon landing dates have already been pushed back by a year due to the Trump administration..

Over the past few years, Beijing has launched a number of robotic rovers and rovers to collect lunar samples, including for the first time in history to the far side of the Moon, as well as an orbiter and rover that reached Mars..

The US military, which is also expressing growing concern about Beijing's development of space systems that could threaten US satellites, is sounding the alarm over the implications of Beijing's deep space mission..

Terry Wirths, former commander of the International Space Station and the Space Shuttle, and a retired Air Force colonel, says the competition has a political and security component..

According to him, they want to be the dominant power on Earth, so going to the moon is a way to show that their system works.. If they beat us to the moon, it will show that they are better than us.. But there are also practical threats that a Chinese foothold on the moon could pose..

“If they create infrastructure there, they can potentially, for example, block communications,” Wirts suggested..

The fourth Chinese station " She landed in the Karman crater on January 3, 2019 at 04:26 Kyiv time. At 18:22, the Yutu lunar rover left it, equipped with a panoramic camera, a radar, a spectrometer for studying the composition of the soil and the exosphere of the Moon, and an analyzer of neutral atoms.