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The conversation
Who owns the moon? A space lawyer responds
Edwin E. ‘Buzz’ Aldrin Jr. poses for a photo next to the American flag deployed on the moon during the Apollo 11 mission on July 20, 1969. Neil A. Armstrong / NASA / AP Photo of a flag never taken: Buzz Aldrin standing next to the first American flag planted on the moon. For those who knew their world history, that also sounded the alarm. Less than a century ago, back on Earth, planting a national flag in another part of the world still amounted to claiming this territory for the homeland. Did the stars and stripes on the moon signify the establishment of an American colony? When people first hear that I am a lawyer practicing and teaching something called “space law,” the question they most often ask themselves, often with a big smile or a twinkle in them. in the eyes, is, “So tell me, who owns the moon?” Of course, claiming new national territories was a very European habit, applied to non-European parts of the world. In particular, the Portuguese, the Spaniards, the Dutch, French and English created huge colonial empires. But while their attitude was very focused on Europe, the legal notion that planting a flag was an act of establishing sovereignty quickly grew. imposed and accepted around the world as an integral part of the law of nations. Obviously, astronauts had more important things in mind than thinking about legal significance and con footage of this flag being planted, but luckily the matter had been settled before the mission. Since the start of the space race, the United States knew that for many people around the world, the sight of an American flag on the moon would raise major political issues. Any suggestion that the moon might become, legally speaking, part of America’s backwaters could fuel such concerns, and possibly give rise to international disputes damaging both the U.S. space program and U.S. interests as a whole. In 1969, decolonization may have destroyed any notion that non-European parts of the world, although populated, were not civilized and therefore rightly subject to European sovereignty – however, there was no one only person living on the moon; even life itself was absent. Yet the simple answer to the question of whether Armstrong and Aldrin through their little ceremony turned the moon, or at least a large part of it, into American territory turns out to be “no.” They, neither NASA, nor the American government wanted the American flag to have this effect. NASA’s first lunar sample return container with lunar soil on display in a vault at NASA’s Johnson Space Center. OptoMechEngineer, CC BY-SA More importantly, this answer was enshrined in the 1967 Outer Space Treaty, to which the United States and the Soviet Union as well as all other space nations had become parties. The two superpowers agreed that “colonization” on Earth had been responsible for enormous human suffering and many of the armed conflicts that had raged over the past centuries. They were determined not to repeat this mistake of the former European colonial powers when it came to deciding the legal status of the moon; at least the possibility of a “land grab” in outer space giving rise to another world war had to be avoided. As a result, the moon has become a kind of “global common good” legally accessible to all countries – two years before the first manned moon landing. Businessman Rajzeev V. Baagree, who bought five acres of land on the moon for 1,400 rupees (the equivalent of the US in 2005) an acre, poses next to evidence documents at his home in Hyderabad, India. It turns out he got ripped off. Mustafa Quraishi / AP Photo Thus, the American flag was not a manifestation of claiming sovereignty, but of honoring the American taxpayers and engineers who made the mission of Armstrong, Aldrin and third astronaut Michael Collins possible. Both men carried a plaque stating that they “came in peace for all mankind” and, of course, Neil’s famous words echoed the same sentiment: his “small step for man” was not. a “giant leap” for the United States, but “for humanity.” In addition, the United States and NASA have kept their pledge by sharing moon rocks and other soil samples from the lunar surface with the rest of the world, whether giving them to foreign governments or allowing scientists around the world to access them for scientific analysis and discussion. In the midst of the Cold War, this even included scientists from around the world. Soviet Union. Case closed, no more need for space lawyers then? I don’t need to prepare space law students at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln for new discussions and disputes over lunar law , right? No space lawyer needed? Not so fast. f the legal status of the Moon as a “global common good” accessible to all countries participating in peaceful missions has not met with resistance or substantial challenge, the Outer Space Treaty has failed. other details pending. Contrary to very optimistic assumptions made at the time, until now, humanity has not returned to the Moon since 1972, which makes lunar land rights largely theoretical. This 1964 file photo from the World’s Fair in New York’s Queens borough shows a view of a lunar colony in the Futurama 2 merry-go-round set up by General Motors. AP Photo That is to say until a few years ago, when several new plans were made to return to the moon. In addition, at least two US companies, Planetary Resources and Deep Space Industries, which enjoy significant financial backing, have started targeting asteroids with the aim of exploiting their mineral resources. Geek Note: Under the aforementioned Outer Space Treaty, the moon and other celestial bodies such as asteroids, legally speaking, belong to the same basket. None of them can become the “territory” of one sovereign state or another. The very basic prohibition under the Outer Space Treaty on acquiring new state territory, by planting a flag or by any other means, did not correspond to the commercial exploitation of natural resources on the moon and other celestial bodies. This is a major debate that is currently raging within the international community, with no unequivocally accepted solution for the moment. Basically, two general interpretations are possible. So you wanna mine an asteroid? Countries like the United States and Luxembourg (as the gateway to the European Union) agree that the moon and asteroids are “global commons”, meaning that each country allows its private entrepreneurs, as long as they’re properly licensed and in accordance with other space law rules, to go out there and mine what they can, to try and make money with it. It’s a bit like the law of the high seas, which is not under the control of an individual country, but completely open to duly authorized and law-abiding fishing operations by citizens and businesses of the United States. any country. Then, once the fish are in their nets, it is legally up to them to sell it. OSIRIS-REx will travel to a near-Earth asteroid called Bennu and bring a small sample back to Earth for study. The mission was launched on September 8, 2016 from Cape Canaveral Air Force Base. As expected, the spacecraft will reach Bennu in 2018 and return a sample to Earth in 2023. NASA / Goddard Space Flight Center / ASSOCIATED PRESS On the other hand, countries like Russia and somewhat less explicitly Brazil and Belgium are supporting that the moon and the asteroids belong to humanity as a whole. And therefore, the potential benefits of commercial exploitation should somehow benefit humanity as a whole – or at least be subject to a presumably rigorous international regime to secure benefits at scale. of humanity. It’s a bit like the regime originally established to harvest mineral resources from the deep seabed. Here, an international licensing regime was created as well as an international company, which was to exploit these resources and generally share the benefits among all countries. While in my opinion the old position would certainly make more sense, both legally and practically, the legal battle is by no means over. Meanwhile, interest in the moon has also been renewed – at least China, India and Japan are seriously considering returning, raising the stakes even further. Therefore, at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, we will have to teach these matters to our students for many years to come. While it is ultimately for the community of states to determine whether a common agreement can be reached on either of the two positions or perhaps somewhere in between, it is of crucial importance. that an agreement can be found one way or another. Such activities developing without any generally applicable and accepted law would be the worst case scenario. Although it is no longer colonization, it can all have the same detrimental results. This article is republished from The Conversation, a nonprofit news site dedicated to sharing ideas from academic experts. Read more: If Earth falls, will interstellar space travel be our salvation? Harnessing the moon for rocket fuel to bring us to Mars New telescope will scan the sky for asteroids on a collision course with Earth Frans von der Dunk has a consultancy dealing with space law and politics .
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