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After the triumph of Artemis II, now comes the hard part

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by Mark R. Whittington, opinion contributor - 05/17/26 10:00 AM ET

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by Mark R. Whittington, opinion contributor - 05/17/26 10:00 AM ET

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NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman speaks during a press conference after the Artemis II moon rocket launched from pad 39B at Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Fla., Wednesday, April 1, 2026. (AP Photo/Terry Renna)

The afterglow of Artemis II’s triumph has barely faded, and NASA is already setting about placing the first footprints on the moon in over 50 years. However, all the things that the space agency and its partners have to do makes sending four human beings around the moon seem like a weekend excursion by comparison.

Artemis III was originally supposed to be the first human moon landing since Apollo 17 over 50 years ago. But NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman wisely decided that there needed to be an intermediate step between Artemis II, the first crewed deep space mission of the 21st century, and the next moon landing, which will now be designated as Artemis IV.

Artemis III will now take place in low Earth orbit. The plan is to launch an Orion spacecraft with four astronauts. Instead of heading to the moon, it is to dock with either a SpaceX Starship, a Blue Origin Blue Moon or both of the planned Human Landing Systems intended to take astronauts to the lunar surface.

Originally, Artemis III was planned for mid-2027. As many as two crewed lunar landings, designated as Artemis IV and Artemis V, were to take place in 2028. But the mission may have already slipped to late 2027. The issue seems to be whether the Starship and the Blue Moon will be available in time. Isaacman has denied that the schedule is slipping or that the Human Landing Systems will not be ready.

The second thing that NASA intends to do is to ramp up the Commercial Lunar Payload Services program to a launch a month to start building up the infrastructure for the lunar base. So far, the program has been spotty at best, with the Firefly Blue Ghost lander being the only one to entirely successfully touch down on the lunar surface. The participating companies are clearly going to have to do better if NASA is going to have a lunar base sooner rather than later.

Uncrewed landing tests of the Starship and Blue Moon Human Landing Systems will likely be folded into this process. NASA will not trust a crew to ride either of these vehicles to the lunar surface before the vehicles prove themselves. Of course, they might as well take cargo to the moon while they’re at it.

One of the good things that has happened as a result of NASA’s plan for a lunar base is that a whole new commercial sector has arisen to help build and maintain it.

Companies such as Astrobotic, Intuitive Machines, Blue Origin and Firefly are developing cargo landers, among other things. Redwire, Lunar Outpost and Astrolab are working on rovers and other infrastructure. Astroport Space Technologies is working on robotic tools to build the lunar infrastructure using lunar regolith as a construction material. And SpaceX wants to create a manufacturing facility and a mass driver on the moon to build and launch its planned orbiting data centers. How that plan meshes with NASA’s planned lunar base is yet to be determined.

Increasingly, the question is not whether NASA and its international and commercial partners will return to the moon, but when it will happen.

President Trump would like to cap off his presidency with a crewed lunar landing — the better to “make America great again” and enhance his own legacy. The visuals are the stuff political dreams are made of: Trump watching the mission of Artemis IV lift off from the Kennedy Space Center, talking with the astronauts as they traverse the lunar surface, as President Nixon did with the crew of Apollo 11, and then greeting them when they return from the moon.

Imagine Trump’s disappointment if, Isaacman’s reassurance notwithstanding, the next moon landing slips to 2029. He would be a former president, and would have to take a back seat to his successor. His ire would be even keener if the Chinese were to steal a march and get to the moon first. The loss of prestige and the finger-pointing that would follow would be incandescent.

Isaacman knows both the stakes of the new race to the moon and his assignment. His mandate is not to make the “impossible late,” to coin a phrase often used by SpaceX’s Elon Musk. His task is to bring about the next moon landing with all due speed while preparing the first permanent lunar base.

Failure is not an option.

Mark R. Whittington, who writes frequently about space policy, has published a political study of space exploration entitled “Why is It S