Until today China lagged behind other nations with its space programme, its achievements decades behind those of the United States and Russia. Its first manned space flight was in 2003, compared to Yuri Gagarin’s journey for the USSR in 1961. It first landed a probe on the Moon in 2013, long after America’s giant step in 1969. No longer.

By becoming the first nation to send a lander to the far side of the Moon and send pictures back to Earth via a specially deployed satellite, China has entered uncharted territory.

“Humankind had never been there,” said Wu Weiren, chief engineer of China’s lunar exploration programme, on state television today after touchdown. “Now we are there, which in itself is a breakthrough.”

The mission shows…