“am I missing something???”
I think you are grossly underestimating China. Come 2010 the Shuttle will be retired and the US will be left without a heavy lift capability. Obama has canceled our moon program and there aren’t any private companies to come in and fill the void. The Russians will be launching supply runs to the ISS.
China has the industrial infrastructure, manpower and money to launch a major space exploration effort. We don’t.
China could easily be on the moon by 2020. We’ll be sitting here looking at them with telescopes.
I’m not.. I know a lot of people here are.. My fear is that our future is going to be like Firefly....