China Planning Military Outpost in Orbit

The first public appearance of China's military space station concept.
(Image from Spaceflight.now)

From Discovery News/Space:

China is speeding up plans to launch and operate a space station in Earth orbit and turning over the project to military control, according to reports from the official Chinese news agency Xinhua and SpaceflightNow.com.

The 8.5-ton laboratory, called Tiangong -- Chinese for "heavenly palace" -- is slated for launch before the end of next year. Its first crew would arrive in 2011.

"The People's Liberation Army's General Armament Department aims to finish systems for the Tiangong-1 mission this year," the Chinese government said in an official statement.

The design was unveiled during a nationally televised Chinese New Year broadcast, writes Spaceflightnow's Craig Covault.

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My Comment: So much for not militarizing space. This is an acceleration of a program that many thought was years from fruition.

Surprise, it is happening sooner than what was expected.