Why are the Chinese doing this?
Propaganda. To show the world that China # 1.
That's the only reason to go to the moon. It's like climbing Mount Everest. Pointless, but impressive.
It's why Israel sent a craft to the moon a few years ago. To show the world that the Jewish state is among the world's leaders.
It's why India, and whoever else, is planning to go to the moon.
It's why NASA is planning to send women and men of color to the moon. So that women and black people can say, "One of ours walked on the moon! See what we did!"
Have you ever tried to develop a national space program?
You don't make the jump from airplanes, to interplanetary travel, and all the civil and military systems associated with it, in one go.
“A rat done bit my sister Nell....”
“It’s pointless to go to the moon.”
This means that as the sun ages, it gets steadily brighter. The dinosaurs knew a dimmer sun than we see today, and in as little as a few hundred million years, Earth will get too hot to handle.
Our atmosphere will get stripped away. Our oceans will evaporate. For awhile, we’ll look something like Venus, locked in a choking, carbon dioxide atmosphere.
And then it gets worse.
https://www.space.com/solar-system-fate-when-sun-dies
I can see China expanding its moon base(s) to all the BRICS countries. Imagine a low G laboratory on the moon. China would suddenly be the leader of all space tech.