Tag: U.S. space program

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Apollo 11 and American Pride

In the annals of human history, the success of Apollo 11, the first landing on a surface other than Earth, ranks among the greatest achievements. For patriotic Americans, it is a particular source of pride.

Neil Armstrong, Ed “Buzz” Aldrin, Mike Collins and the exploits of the Mercury, Gemini and Apollo astronauts, scientists and technicians are sterling examples of mankind at its best. Many have failed, however, to comprehend the vital significance of their achievement.  Our species is a young one. The first modern beings emerged from Africa just a little over 70,000 years ago. We learned to fly a mere one hundred and six years ago. For the rest of humanity’s (hopefully) long history, the dawn of spaceflight will be seen as pivotal as the invention of fire and the wheel.

More than technological challenges needed to be overcome to bring about the landing of The Eagle, the Lunar Excursion Module which, after separating from Columbia, the command spacecraft, brought Armstrong and Aldrin to the lunar surface while Collins remained in orbit.  It took the vision and optimism of a young president and the support of the American people as well.

It was an optimism that seemed natural at the time, a continuation of the success of a people who fought and won their independence against all odds, settled a vast continent, and defeated dire threats from totalitarian regimes. It is not a coincidence that the space program dwindled down to less lofty goals at the same time that America’s overall confidence fell, as scandals and harsh internal dissent preoccupied the headlines.

The Space Shuttle program allowed NASA to build a new infrastructure and revive dreams of future accomplishments.  In 1984, I had the unique opportunity, while at the White House, to hear, first hand, President Reagan’s dreams of an America soaring ahead to explore and exploit space as the pioneers had done a mere century ago in the Western Frontier. It was not a universally shared dream.

The Space Shuttle era was ended prematurely during the Obama Administration. The 44th president also killed what was to be There are many online pharmacies and generic viagra germany you can only buy the medicine after talking to the doctor. Our brain (in cost of viagra canada our heads) performs complex computations and rational thinking. You cialis without prescription must pick the protected search before each new search on every new engine you use. You will be able to achieve an erection and smoking hampers the blood supply to your heart, cialis vs viagra check out for source brain, and other parts of your body. the successor to it, the Constellation program, and massively slashed funding for all other manned space flight development, leaving American astronauts earthbound and embarrassingly dependent on Russia to gain access to the very space station that the Space Shuttle program had built.

Fifty years after Apollo 11, the commercial promise of space technology has become a reality.  But there is a vast potential of even greater economic and technological accomplishments if the nation regains the vision and optimism of those incredibly short years between Alan Shepard’s first American manned space flight aboard a small Mercury spacecraft and those first footsteps on the lunar surface.  It is not far fetched to say that the future survival of our species may depend on moving ahead.  Establishing human outposts on the Moon, Mars and elsewhere, as well as monitoring the heavens for potentially planet-killing asteroids are vital endeavors.

However, just as in the Apollo era, accomplishing those goals requires more than science, technology, and cash. It requires that same level of optimism and confidence President Kennedy exhibited when he stated on September 12, 1962, “We choose to go to the moon. We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard, because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win…”

A half-century later, President Trump seeks to follow in Kennedy’s footsteps. I covered his inauguration, and heard him promise a return to space glory for the United States.  He has pursued that goal by placing the necessary funds in his budgets, and establishing a goal of returning to the Moon, this time to stay, within the next decade.

To achieve that will require a return of pride, patriotism, pragmatism and confidence that far too many in Washington now lack.

Photo: NASA

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White House Sets New Space Strategy

The Trump Administration has provided more details of its plan to restore NASA to its original priorities. Mr. Obama had mandated NASA’s attention be redirected to efforts intended to assist a climate change agenda. President Trump has reset the space agency, emphasizing manned exploration beyond Earth orbit.  The President even included a reference to space travel in his inaugural address.

Obama prematurely ended the Space Shuttle program, and effectively cancelled the next-wave human piloted spacecraft, the Constellation project.

One mission apparently advocated by the Trump Administration is a relatively quick return to the Moon. According to the Wall Street Journal the Trump White House will seek to expand public-private partnerships for NASA, including, according to White House documents, “a rapid and affordable” return to the lunar surface.

President Trump’s signing of the NASA Transition Authorization Act of 2017, the first comprehensive NASA authorization passed by Congress in more than six years, indicated again the White House emphasis on manned space flight, including a return to the moon and human exploration of Mars by 2033, and deep space exploration by robotics as well.

NASA/private sector partnerships should move quickly ahead. The space agency reports that “NASA and industry partners, Boeing and SpaceX, are targeting the return of human spaceflight from Florida’s Space Coast in 2018. Both companies are scheduled to begin flight tests to prove the space systems meet NASA’s requirements for certification in the coming year. Since NASA awarded contracts to Boeing and SpaceX, the companies have matured space system designs and now have substantial spacecraft and launch vehicle hardware in development and testing in preparation for the test flights. The goal of the Commercial Crew Program is safe, reliable and cost-effective transportation to and from the International Space Station from the United States through a public-private approach. NASA, Boeing and SpaceX have significant testing underway, which will ultimately lead to test missions when the systems are ready and meet safety requirements.”

A White House release outlines its new “National Space Strategy:”

AMERICA FIRST AMONG THE STARS: President Trump’s National Space Strategy works within his broader national security policy by putting America’s interests first.

  • The Trump administration’s National Space Strategy prioritizes American interests first and foremost, ensuring a strategy that will make America strong, competitive, and great.
  • The new strategy emphasizes dynamic and cooperative interplay between the national security, commercial, and civil space sectors.
    • The United States will partner with the commercial sector to ensure that American companies remain world leaders in space technology.

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  • The new strategy ensures that international agreements put the interests of American people, workers, and businesses first.
  • The National Space Strategy prioritizes regulatory reforms that will unshackle American industry and ensure we remain the leading global provider of space services and technology.

SPACE PREEMINENCE THROUGH THE AMERICAN SPIRIT: President Trump’s National Space Strategy harnesses the American spirit and continues the American tradition of pioneering and exploration.

  • The President’s National Space Strategy builds on America’s pioneering, spacefaring tradition, laying the groundwork for the next generation of American exploration in space.
  • The National Space Strategy establishes forthrightly that securing the scientific, commercial, and national security benefits of space is a top priority for this Administration.
    • The United States will continue to lead in the creation and maintenance of the crucial space systems that are essential to our prosperity, security, and way of life.
  • The Strategy puts forward a reinvigorated approach to ensuring U.S. leadership and success in space.

PEACE THROUGH STRENGTH: President Trump’s space strategy builds on the National Security Strategy emphasizing peace through strength in the space domain.

  • The National Space Strategy protects our vital interest in space – to ensure unfettered access to, and freedom to operate in space, in order to advance America’s security, economic prosperity, and scientific knowledge.
    • Accordingly, the Administration’s new strategy calls for strengthening the safety, stability, and sustainability of our space activities.
  • The strategy affirms that any harmful interference with or attack upon critical components of our space architecture that directly affects this vital interest will be met with a deliberate response at a time, place, manner, and domain of our choosing.
  • President Trump’s National Space Strategy recognizes that our competitors and adversaries have turned space into a warfighting domain.
    • While the United States would prefer that the space domain remain free of conflict, we will prepare to meet and overcome any challenges that arise.
  • Under the President’s new strategy, the United States will seek to deter, counter, and defeat threats in the space domain that are hostile to the national interests of the United States and our allies.

FOUR PILLARS FOR A UNIFIED APPROACH: President Donald J. Trump’s new National Space Strategy drives a whole-of-government approach to United States leadership in space, in close partnership with the private sector and our allies, and is based on four essential pillars:

  • Transform to more resilient space architectures:  We will accelerate the transformation of our space architecture to enhance resiliency, defenses, and our ability to reconstitute impaired capabilities.
  • Strengthen deterrence and warfighting options:  We will strengthen U.S. and allied options to deter potential adversaries from extending conflict into space and, if deterrence fails, to counter threats used by adversaries for hostile purposes.
  • Improve foundational capabilities, structures, and processes:  We will ensure effective space operations through improved situational awareness, intelligence, and acquisition processes.
  • Foster conducive domestic and international environments:  We will streamline regulatory frameworks, policies, and processes to better leverage and support U.S. commercial industry, and we will pursue bilateral and multilateral engagements to enable human exploration, promote burden sharing and marshal cooperative threat responses.

A NEW DIRECTION FOR U.S. SPACE: President Trump has already taken significant steps to reorient American space policy and set it on the right path for the future.

  • On June 30, 2017, the President revived the National Space Council for the first time in 24 years.
  • On December 11, 2017, President Trump once again set America’s sights toward the stars by signing Space Policy Directive – 1, which instructed the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) to return American astronauts to the moon for long-term exploration and utilization, followed by human missions to Mars and other destinations.
    • In signing the directive, the President ordered action to work with commercial and international partners to enable human expansion across the solar system.

ORION spacecraft (NASA illustration)

 

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America’s future is being defunded

There is a general misconception that funding for the National Aeronautics & Space Administration, (NASA) is a luxury, even though it consumes a mere one-half of one percent of the federal budget.  The fact is, for America’s economy, its national security, and the health of the planetary environment, space is absolutely essential. There is, perhaps, even more at stake. Stephen Hawking emphasizes that “the long term future of the human race must be space… it represents an important life insurance for our future survival…”

Whether NASA gets the funding it needs remains an open question. Space News notes that  “NASA is currently spending money on its key exploration programs at a rate that assumes Congress will approve a budget increase in the next month, a move that could delay some efforts should the additional funds not materialize.”

At risk is whether the space agency will be able to resume its human space flight program any time in the near future.  Recent estimates indicate that the earliest a NASA-designed crewed spacecraft will carry astronauts into orbit will be well into the next decade.  President Obama prematurely cancelled the Space Shuttle program, then defunded what had been planned to be its immediate manned spacecraft replacement, the Constellation system. The Orion system is the next on the list, if funding for that effort continues at an adequate pace.

It’s an open disgrace that America must pay exorbitant amounts to Russia for American astronauts to hitchhike on their spacecraft to reach the space station that was largely built by NASA.

The Council on Foreign Relations  (CFR) reports that “Space policy experts agree that NASA faces short- and long-term challenges, including new budget pressures, aging infrastructure, the rise of competing spacefaring nations, and the lack of a strong national vision for human spaceflight. An independent assessment conducted by the National Research Council in 2012 questioned plans for not pursuing a return to the moon: “[The] lack of national and international consensus … undermines NASA’s ability to establish a comprehensive, consistent strategic direction.” The report also noted that a crewed mission to Mars “has never received sufficient funding to advance beyond the rhetoric stage.”

CFR warns that “Space policymakers must clarify NASA’s purpose, missions, and methods. How should NASA balance the goals of driving scientific discovery, promoting U.S. prestige, enhancing national security, and developing innovations with commercial benefits? What role should the private sector play? How much should NASA be a vehicle for international cooperation and diplomacy? How should U.S. space exploration inspire the next generation of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics students?
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Most experts advocate sustaining U.S. leadership in space. “I’m convinced that in this century the nations that lead in the world are going to be those that create new knowledge. And one of the places where you have a huge opportunity to create new knowledge will be exploration of the universe, exploration of the solar system, and the building of technology that allows you to do that,” said former congressman and aerospace expert Robert Walker at a CFR meeting on space policy in 2013.”

While Washington dithers, other nations are moving ahead at full speed. Yahoo reports  that Russia’s space agency is planning to build a permanent, manned moon base. Many other nations, noting the vital economic and military needs for space prowess, are moving quickly ahead as well.

CNN reports that “China by virtue of the ambition of its space program stands out. Already, it has managed to land a rover on the Moon and to return an unmanned spacecraft from orbiting the Moon as part of its preparation for an eventual manned landing. It also aims to have a manned space station operational by 2020.”

It’s not just nations traditionally thought of as great military or economic superpowers that are serious about advanced space activities.  The Diplomat reports that   “India recently made history, when its Mars Orbiter Mission successfully entered the Martian orbit. In doing so, it became the first country to enter Mars’ orbit on its first attempt and also the first Asian country to reach the red planet…India is among a handful of countries to have carried out deep space missions, and it was on its first such mission in 2008 that its spacecraft Chandrayaan entered the moon’s orbit. It was on this mission too that water was detected on the lunar surface. It has the biggest remote sensing satellite network in the world. It is also among a select group of countries that provide commercial satellite launch services – putting into space 67 satellites, including 40 foreign satellites from 19 countries…”

While other powers move ahead, NASA continues to face a future clouded by uncertainty and a profound lack of support by the current White House. Technology expert Aaron Andre   reasoned three years ago that “for about the cost of two weeks of the Olympic Games we could have sent over another five rovers to Mars. In fact, the amount of money needed to fund the Olympic Games could fund NASA for nearly an entire year.”