EditWhose side of the moon are you on? Serbia signs the Artemis Accords, reigniting the lunar Cold War
Although Serbia has no signifigant space program, its accession to the Artemis Accords represents a win for the U.S. in its lunar Cold War with Russia and China
The United States scored a major diplomatic coup in the lunar Cold War on 16 July when Serbia, a partner on Russia and China’s International Lunar Research Station (ILRS) project, signed on to the Artemis Accords. Serbia’s accession is tied to its upcoming first-ever strategic dialogue with the United States and reflects the unusual coalitions emerging out of the Trump Administration’s transactional diplomacy, writes Emmitt Sklar.
Emmitt Sklar is a New York City based writer focused on the intersection of space exploration and geopolitics.
Serbia’s space program is still on the launch pad. The closest it has come to the moon was Neil Armstrong’s 1969 visit to Belgrade, which left a vial of lunar dust behind. Serbia has not gotten closer in the last half-century, either. They are still working on a delayed attempt to launch their first satellite into space, a microsatellite destined to conduct minor experiments and capture photos of Serbia from space.
Serbia will not be stepping on the moon anytime soon, but its Minister of Foreign Affairs Marko Đurić joined senior NASA officials on Wednesday to formally sign the Artemis Accords, an American-authored framework for lunar exploration, introduced in 2020.
The Artemis Accords guide the United States-led Artemis Program, which aims to bring humans back to the moon, and signing on is a precondition for “other countries that want to participate in the Artemis Program.”
Although Serbia is a small nation with no signifigant space program, its accession to the Artemis Accords represents a win for the United States in its lunar Cold War with Russia and China.
China and Russia are leading a competing program, the International Lunar Research Station (ILRS), which aims to build a permanent base on the moon within the next decade. It was not surprising when Serbia, historically a Russian ally, signed on in support of the project in 2024. But yesterday, Serbia become one of just three countries to sign the Artemis Accords after participating in the ILRS.
This represents a significant win for the United States in the ongoing lunar Cold War. The United States is competing with China and Russia to recruit partners to its program as part of the protracted fight to influence the rules of engagement in outer space. Chinese state media outlets criticized the Artemis Accords as an American attempt to assert control over the moon. The Diplomat reported that Chinese central state television called the Accords, “a step toward the enclosure of outer space by a self-interested United States.”
China’s primary gripe is that the United States peddled this framework as a series of bilateral agreements with partner nations instead of working multilaterally, including with Russia and China, to build a broad agreement for operations in space. Recruiting Serbia, a member of China and Russia’s space coalition, to the Artemis Accords is a signifigant diplomatic coup for the United States.
So, why did Serbia, which has close economic and political ties to Russia, show up at NASA’s D.C. headquarters yesterday?
The Accords may unlock opportunities for the country’s fledgling space sector, but Serbia’s glance to the heavens has more terrestrial goals – securing strategic talks with the United States.
Serbia announced that it would sign onto the Artemis Accords on the same day that the United States formally announced long-anticipated strategic dialogue sessions. These sessions, the first of which will occur just two days after Serbia signed the Accords, are a major boost to bilateral relations and Serbian ambitions. While the dialogue had been agreed upon in principle last year, no date had been set for the first session. Whether signing on to the Artemis Accords was merely a gesture of goodwill by Serbia or an explicit American demand for securing the dialogue, it is a price well worth paying for Serbia.
This unusual diplomatic victory will bring broad economic and political benefits to Serbia and its government. Foreign Minister Ðurić pointed to Hungary, saying it secured a “quantum leap in its economy when it obtained strategic partner status” with the United States. Serbian President Aleksander Vučić may also have hoped that closer ties to the United States would bolster his political standing as he faced widespread protests.
Serbia is particularly hopeful to unlock American investment in its energy sector, not space. Energy will be the main focus of these ongoing discussions. Most importantly, the two countries will attempt to resolve the status of Naftna Industrija Srbije (NIS), Serbia’s largest oil and gas company. Russian corporations currently own a controlling stake in the company. The Trump Administration has granted sanction waivers to NIS, but is putting immense pressure on Serbia to facilitate the sale of the Russians’ stake to the MOL Group, a Hungarian company.
This lucrative takeover would have benefited Trump’s strong personal ally, former Hungarian Prime Minister Victor Orban before he lost power, and MOL, which recently did the Trump Administration an immense favor when it agreed to buy 500 million tons of American oil.
These upcoming dialogues also represents a shift in the United States’s approach to Serbia. Traditionally, America emphasized values-based diplomacy, prioritizing human rights and democracy in Serbia as a precondition for more material partnerships. That relationship has transitioned to one that prioritizes strong personal relationships with the Trump Administration and support for the Trump family’s business interests.
Serbian President Vučić has cultivated the Trump Family, going on Breitbart, a right-wing American outlet, to praise Trump, and worked to facilitate a failed venture to build a $500 million hotel in Belgrade. This week, those relationships began to pay off.
The Trump Administration’s emphasis on transactional diplomacy allows states to straddle geopolitical divisions in ways long thought impossible. Serbia maintains strong ties with Russia even while it expands its partnership with the United States.
This new partnership between Serbia and the United States will likely mean very little for Serbia’s small space sector. But Serbia’s willingness to join the Artemis Accords is an important victory for the United States in the ongoing lunar Cold War.
The United States continues to recruit partners to the Artemis Accords and its quest to beat China and Russia above the Karman line. China has scored major technological advancements in recent months, successfully testing a reusable booster. Developments on Earth, however, show that the United States continues to lead the geopolitical struggle to win the renewed space race.
Caption: Illustrative photo. The June full moon, known as the Strawberry Moon, is visible over the Polish Tatra Mountains near Zakopane, southern Poland, early 30 June 2026. EPA/Grzegorz Momot
Updated: July 17, 2026 - 06:55
