Space race: China launched top-secret military aircraft into orbit

China successfully launched its top-secret unmanned spacecraft on Thursday evening, which the head of the US Space Force said was “no coincidence.”

As he writes Daily Mailthe Americans planned to launch their “spy” plan last Wednesday, but the mission was suspended due to technical problems.

“It’s probably not a coincidence that they’re trying to match us in terms of timing and sequence of actions,” American General Chance Saltzman, chief of space operations for the Air Force, said of the Chinese launch.

An announcement in the Chinese press described the spaceplane’s purpose as providing “technical support for the peaceful uses of space,” but China kept details secret, as did American officials about its craft.

“These are the two most watched objects in orbit while they’re in orbit,” Saltzman told reporters Wednesday after problems with a SpaceX rocket derailed Monday’s planned X-37B launch.

Speaking at the Space Force Association’s Spacepower conference in Orlando, General Salzman emphasized the sophistication of these unmanned and reusable orbital reconnaissance vehicles, which can provide greater operational security than spy satellites.

“Being able to put something into orbit, do some things, bring it back home and see the results is powerful,” Saltzman said.

“It’s not surprising that the Chinese are extremely interested in our space plane,” he said. “And we are extremely interested in their progress.”

However, despite years of promotional photos of the American X-37B spacecraft developed by Boeing, not a single image of its Chinese competitor has been leaked to the public, the Daily Mail notes.

The closest media has seen the craft, dubbed the China Experimental Shutable Space Shuttle, or CSSHQ, was likely in footage of an exhibition at Henan Jiyuan No. 1 Middle School in China in August 2022.

Aerospace industry watchers have posted footage of an outdoor exhibit showing the crashed Long March 2F rocket responsible for launching CSSHQ into orbit, searching for clues about its expendable secret spycraft payload.

Images of Long March 2F debris recovered from CSSHQ’s second launch fueled rumors that the rocket’s payload capacity of nearly eight metric tons indicates that CSSHQ is similar in size to the X-37B, SpaceNews reported.

The video appeared first on Chinese social media site Sina Weibo, then on TikTok, YouTube and X. CSSHQ’s launch this Thursday comes hot on the heels of its last secret mission seven months ago: a lengthy 276-day operation that began on August 4, 2022. By comparison, CSSHQ’s first launch in September 2020 lasted only two days.

According to China’s Xinhua News Agency, this third launch aims to conduct “verification of reuse technologies” and “experiments in space science” as part of “technical support for the peaceful use of space.”

The launch of the CSSHQ, encased in a Long March 2F rocket, took place at the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center, located in northwest China, the Daily Mail notes.

The original purpose of the Long March 2F was to transport crews of Chinese astronauts heading to Earth orbit, but the rocket was modified to carry a Chinese unmanned robotic spaceplane as its payload.

The X-37B was due to be launched by SpaceX on a secret mission on Monday, but it was forced to stop just minutes before takeoff.

Elon Musk’s SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket carrying the covert spacecraft was scheduled to take off at 8:14 pm ET from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida. But a report of a “ground problem” led to the mission being suspended at the eleventh hour. “Today’s Falcon Heavy launch has been canceled due to a ground issue,” SpaceX said in a statement. “The vehicle and payload remain operational. The team is preparing for the next launch of the USSF-52 mission, which will not take place until tomorrow evening.”

Monday’s mission would have been the seventh for the secretive X-37B since its debut in 2010, and most of the ship’s payload is classified.

According to the Daily Mail, the X-37B could theoretically deliver weapons into space, possibly to protect US satellites from anti-satellite weapons.

While China and Russia have accused the US of using the craft as a bomber, other experts have suggested that the Space Force craft is being used for spy missions: monitoring Chinese space operations or testing US intelligence systems.