Rand Simberg has some interesting thoughts on the recent news of China's plans for lunar exploration.
He brings up the story of Zheng He, who took a fleet of hundreds of ships across the oceans from China. Some of these treasure ships were 400 feet long with ten masts. This happened 80 years before Columbus set out for the new world in three ships of much lesser size. And yet, after six voyages, the entire enterprise collapsed because -- according to Simberg -- it was fostered for the wrong reasons.
The Chinese suffered a failure of expansionary will 600 years ago because they were doing it for the wrong reasons. And I suspect that the current leadership is similar to Zheng He in their outlook. His missions were for national prestige [~] not the generation of wealth [~] as, apparently, are the current Chinese space plans.
As was America's Apollo program.
I had come across the basic story some time ago, but hadn't considered this slant on why the voyages didn't evolve into something larger and more long lasting.
For some more background on the Chinese voyages, go to this site. And for book-length coverage, try When China Ruled the Seas, by Louise Levathes.
12:57:41 PM 
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