Comparison of Asian national space programs to fuel future energy demands in Asia. All three main Asian space powers plan to send men to the Moon in the distant future and have already sent lunar probes. Japan was the first Asian country to launch a lunar probe. The Hiten (Japanese: "flying angel") spacecraft (known before the launch as MUSES-A), built by the Institute of Space and Astronautical Science of Japan, was launched on 24 January 1990. In many ways, the mission did not go as was planned. Kaguya, the second Japanese lunar orbiter spacecraft, was launched on 14 September 2007. China launched its first lunar probe,
European Lunar Explorer European Lunar Explorer The European Lunar Explorer (ELE) or European Lunar Lander (ELL) was a planned Romanian Lunar lander. It was being developed by ARCA, as an entrant for the Google Lunar X Prize, until it was cancelled in 2014. It was intended to have a mass of 400 kilograms when fully fueled, including two upper stages to propel it from low Earth orbit onto a trajectory towards the Moon. The lander itself had a monopropellant cold rocket engine, fuelled by hydrogen peroxide, which was to slow its descent towards the surface of the Moon. The target landing site was