The Artemis Accords, launched in 2020 by the U.S. and seven partner nations, have now reached 76 signatories after Albania, Croatia, Côte d'Ivoire, and San Marino joined. NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman framed the milestone as momentum toward "peaceful, responsible exploration," noting that nearly one-third of all signatories joined since the start of President Trump's second term. The numbers are real: roughly 40% of the world's nations and nearly two-thirds of countries that signed the foundational 1967 Outer Space Treaty now participate. What began as an informal coalition has formalized through the Signatories Group Method of Operations, adopted in 2024, which mandates twice-annual meetings — a technical workshop and a Principals' Meeting at the International Astronautical Congress — plus virtual sessions throughout the year. On paper, the governance architecture has substance. Signatories have advanced recommendations on noninterference, interoperability, scientific data sharing, and registration practices. Two major workshops this year focused on reviewing planned lunar landings and orbital missions, with hands-on sessions on open science and common data standards. The October 2025 Principals' Meeting in Antalya, Türkiye, co-chaired by NASA's Matt Anderson and Peru's Major General Roberto Melgar Sheen, will examine support for emerging space nations and lunar debris mitigation. The generative case is straightforward: NASA has invited every signatory to participate in its Moon Base program through scientific payloads, technology demonstrations, and CubeSats. This is genuine capability-sharing, giving smaller nations access to lunar infrastructure they could never build alone. The interoperability standards and data-sharing frameworks — if actually enforced — reduce duplication and create public goods. The extractive reading is also plain. The Accords are a U.S.-led framework, not a UN treaty. They establish norms that align with American commercial and strategic interests in cislunar space. Nations sign on to principles drafted in Washington, gaining access to American-led missions while implicitly endorsing a governance model that sidesteps the slower, more multilateral Outer Space Treaty process. The rapid signup pace — nearly a third since Trump's second term began — suggests diplomatic pressure accompanies the invitation. The structure creates a two-tier system: signatories who can contribute meaningful hardware or science, and smaller nations whose participation is largely symbolic but whose signature lends legitimacy. The press release's emphasis on speed ("most rapid expansion of international cooperation in civil space history") reveals the priority is breadth of coalition, not depth of capability. Countries like San Marino are not sending payloads to the Moon. The 20-year question is whether this framework hardens into genuine multilateral space governance or remains an instrument of American primacy that fragments when U.S. lunar ambitions shift. If the interoperability standards and data-sharing norms become self-sustaining — adopted independently of NASA leadership — this is genuinely generative. If they remain contingent on American goodwill and funding cycles, this is a diplomatic brand, not an institution.
