At 9:10 p.m. on Oct. 14, China became the third nation in history to put a man in orbit around the earth.
The Shenzhou 5 circled the planet 14 times carrying a single Chinese astronaut, Yang Liwei.
The craft returned to earth 21 hours later, landing safely at a predetermined site in Mainland China.
Reactions to the mission have been mixed.
Editorials in the Financial Times and the Times of India downplayed the event, calling it "a joke" and saying it was "of no immediate... significance."
The Boston Globe called for increased cooperation with the Chinese space program, while the Wall Street Journal Asia suggested that Washington take a harder line with the fledgling program until its mother country changes its military policies in the Asian sphere.
The best response I came across appeared in the Apple Daily, a Hong Kong newspaper.
This paper celebrated the launch as a sign of "a pioneering and adventurous spirit [that] is precisely what Chinese culture has routinely lacked," and asserted that this new direction for China presents an opportunity for the development of humanity as a whole.
Anyone with actual knowledge about the Chinese space program is probably considering me a cockeyed optimist about now.
It's an open secret that the space program is under the control of the Chinese military.
The Pentagon rightly considers China's expanding access to space a potential security risk.
Shen Zhongchang, a captain in the Chinese navy, believes "mastery of outer space will be a requisite for military victory...becoming the new commanding heights for combat."
We must not let the potential danger of China's space program blind us to the opportunities it creates.
Cooperating with the Chinese and including them in projects like the International Space Station will only increase international goodwill and help extend the sense of pride the Chinese already feel over their tremendous achievement.
The Chinese will continue their program with or without our support. We should use this opportunity to win support on the international scene and strengthen our influence with China.
Although China's emergence as an astronautical power threatens to increase international tensions in the short term, ultimately it can benefit the community of nations.
As space gains importance both economically and militarily, we will invest more in its technological development.
The existence of a new competitor in the space race will help to advance new ideas in space exploitation and exploration.
With our shuttles grounded and the American space program increasingly listless in the absence of positive press coverage, it is important that space exploration once again be given credit as the phenomenal endeavor that it is.
The flight of the Shenzhou brings new relevance to an old dream, of a human race capable of traveling across the solar system and one day even to other stars.
-- Fletcher Christensen is a psychology and mathematics senior. His column appears every other Tuesday. He can be reached at dailyopinion@ou.edu.
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