China announces its planetary defense plan.

The China National Space Administration announced this plan on June 30—coinciding with International Asteroid Day—to commemorate the Tunguska event, when a piece of a comet or an asteroid (its exact nature remains unclear) exploded, devastating thousands of square kilometers of the Siberian forest.

China's plan involves building a coordinated early-warning system using both space-based and ground-based observatories to detect potentially dangerous near-Earth asteroids. From what we know so far, the plan is quite clever; it aims to address the "solar blind spot"—currently our biggest challenge in asteroid detection. If an asteroid approaches from the direction of the sun—hidden within the solar glare—it becomes invisible to ground-based telescopes, and by the time we detect it, it is often too late.

This is believed to be what happened with the Chelyabinsk meteor in Russia in 2013. It is not that asteroids have a special preference for Russia, of course, but rather that Russia is the largest country in the world. To resolve the blind spot issue, the Chinese plan entails placing space telescopes in strategic orbits—specifically, multiple telescopes rather than just one. One would be positioned at the L1 Lagrange point, located 1.5 million kilometers from Earth in the direction of the Sun. Another would be placed in a heliocentric orbit similar to that of Venus, facing outward to observe objects in silhouette; this vantage point would allow it to look back toward Earth and detect incoming asteroids that would otherwise be invisible from the ground.

They also plan to build ground-based and radar observatories, installing multiple large-aperture optical telescopes at selected locations. A long-range radar system will be used—including a massive project in Fuyan—specifically designed to scan and calculate the orbits of near-Earth asteroids. Currently, we know of over 95% of asteroids larger than 1 km in diameter—the kind that would cause a regional catastrophe; an asteroid of that size could devastate tens of thousands of square kilometers and wreak havoc across a territory the size of France. However, while we have located those 1-km-plus asteroids, none currently pose a threat to Earth for the next two or three centuries.

We are missing 5% of that group, and it is believed that these reside in the zone between the orbits of Mercury and Venus—close to the Sun—making them difficult to detect; the new observatories should improve our ability to spot them. However, regarding asteroids between 140 meters and 1 kilometer in size—objects large enough to wipe a major city off the map and devastate tens of thousands of square kilometers—it is estimated that around 100,000 are in Earth's vicinity, yet we only know of 45% of them. This means we are unaware of the whereabouts of the majority of asteroids in this size range (140 m, 200 m, 300 m). This is a significant problem because, as I mentioned, an asteroid of that size—140, 200, or 300 meters—can cause a major regional disaster, potentially destroying a city the size of Los Angeles or Paris.

There is a lack of global radar systems, and this Chinese project is set to fill the void left by—for instance—the legendary Arecibo radio telescope in Puerto Rico. It was allowed to collapse; I don't care if I get criticized for saying this, but I believe it was simply abandoned. The administration didn't pay enough attention to that radio telescope, nor did it develop an alternative project to build a new one, adapt it, modify it, refurbish it, or do anything to keep it operational—and it is an essential piece of equipment.

Radio telescopes are vital assets; it was left to fall into disrepair and eventually collapsed in 2020. Here we are in 2026, and still nothing has been done. Meanwhile, China is taking action. Look, it’s not that I’m a fan of China; I’m simply bringing up these current events to see if we can all get our act together—both in the United States and in Europe, which has its own issues to deal with.

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