In the movies, all the spacemen are Americans, but that's just because Hollywood makes the movies. In the real world, the United States is giving up on space, although it is trying hard to conceal its retreat.
Earlier this month, three Americans with a very special status — they have all commanded missions to the Moon — made their dismay public. In an open letter Neil Armstrong, the first human being to walk on the Moon, Jim Lovell, commander of Apollo 13, and Eugene Cernan, commander of Apollo 17, condemned President Barack Obama's plans for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) as the beginning of a "long downhill slide to mediocrity" for the U.S. The letter was timed to coincide with Obama's visit to Cape Canaveral to defend his new policy, which abandons the goal of returning to the Moon by 2020, or indeed ever.
Obama insists that this sacrifice will allow the U.S. to pursue a more ambitious goal, but his plan to send Americans to Mars by the late 2030s has the distinct political advantage of not needing really heavy investment while he is still in office — even if he wins a second term.