China Manned Luna program

As of 2022 in response to the USA led Artemis accord to return the USA to the Moon in 2025/6 China are accelerating their own Moon Manned program before the end of the decade of landing two people on the Moon. Also including its ILRS plans to build a Lunar outpost at the Lunar South pole with Russian help. Also they have accelerated their plans to land humans on Mars mainly due to the private initiative by Elon Musk and his company SpaceX goal to land humans on Mars in 2029., although China manned Mars initiative is still looking to a human landing on Mars in 2035'

Inb 2021 Officially the Chinese have a mixed response about its Manned Luna program.

Even though there has been officials claiming there is no manned ambitions for the Moon at present more items of information keep emerging. The International Lunar Research Station (ILRS) is a joint project with Russia that is looking into a complex set of experimental research facilities to be created on the surface and/or in the orbit of the Moon.

Various Chinese officials have repeatedly stated that human lunar missions may eventually be in their future, but that the government will likely not to make any decisions about that until after the multi-segment space station is operational, meaning sometime in the 2020s.

China's Circumlunar Spacecraft

China has slowly trickled out details on this mission.

In 2015, China plan to send a spacecraft out to the Moon, then return it to Earth. The uncrewed vehicle will fly around the far side of the Moon and use the Moon's gravity to slingshot it back to Earth. As it approaches the home planet, the spacecraft will release a capsule that will parachute to a soft landing.

China Luna Capsule (Sept 2019)

Officially, the mission is designed to test a re-entry capsule to be used in a future robotic lunar-sample return mission. In this analyst's opinion, the mission is also designed to prepare for a future Chinese astronaut launch to the Moon.

China has disclosed that the main module of the spacecraft is based on the same design as the Chang'e-1 and 2 lunar orbiters. This is a boxy structure that is itself derived from a Chinese communications satellite design. Using this basic structure again makes sense. It has a proven track record on two previous lunar missions.

China has also released photographs of the re-entry capsule. It's a small scale-model of the Shenzhou re-entry module used to launch and return China's astronauts.

far larger than necessary to carry a few kilos of lunar dust and rocks.

Large New Rocket (Mega Rocket)

As of 2016 China is planning to start using a huge carrier rocket powerful enough for manned lunar missions before 2031. The new rocket will measure over a hundred meters in length and nearly 10 meters in diameter under the current design (the new Long March 5 heavy rocket is 5 meters in diameter), according to a statement issued on Friday by the China Academy of Launch Vehicle Technologies (CALT), developer of the country's Long March rocket series