http://www.space.com/12647-china-spa...-1-launch.html

It's not really a space station, more a pressurised bathroom-sized room
in space. My guess is that the Chinese are practicing docking to
assemble a large spaceship in space with which they'll do a manned
flyby of Mars or even a landing on Phobos. It's the logical thing to do
and would leapfrog the U.S. manned Moon landings. In addition, to
upstage the Chinese the U.S. would be forced to perform a manned Mars
landing which would be extremely expensive and dangerous. Chances are
that the Chinese would therefore keep their space crown for quite a few
years, maybe decades.

If I were the U.S. I'd start planning for a manned Mars flyby soon...