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" Houston, we have a problem . . . "Space
Our space programs have been drastically scaled back in favor of the war on terrorism. That is short sighted, irresponsible, and wrong. If anything, the war on terrorism makes space incentives MORE important. We need better satellites for surveillance. We need total control of the complete air space to operate uncontested in theaters of operation far from home. We need the technological innovations spurned by research in advanced space technologies. Ultimately, we need the forward looking, futuristic dreams that space has always held for Americans.
Agenda Items
There is great controversy within different areas of NASA over using robots versus men to explore space. Politics has no place in NASA. Different agencies have their specific missions and they should cooperate in the achievement thereof. Pound for pound you can't do better than a human astronaut on a complicated mission; whereas robots are ideal for certain kinds of missions as well. NASA should aggressively plan missions of both types, and all their resources should be available to both teams. So far this strife in the ranks has scored two wins for the robotics ~ the shuttle disaster and the Mars landings. Hooray for robots.
It is becoming increasingly important for America to have a secure, dependable source of energy. In the last few years alone, California's largest utility has gone bankrupt, Enron has folded - bringing trillions of American worker's retirement savings with them. The escalating war on terrorism threatens to envelope major oil exporters in the region. We need a secure energy source if we are to conduct the war against terrorists without the possibility of retaliation against our energy supplies. A major incentive is needed to study collecting solar energy from space, and transforming it into power in our utility grids.
Space can be made self-supporting, even profitable, by increasing government research into "power from space" incentives. One reasonable project is to build a collecting station on the moon and to transmit the energy to Earth. We have already put men and machines on the moon - it's time to use that technology to put power plants on the moon so America can have a secure and dependable energy future.
We need a new and improved shuttle fleet. The shuttle technology was a decade old when it was originally constructed twenty years ago. The shuttles are already far beyond their expected lifetime, and yet we are now making increasing demands upon them - to build and provision the International Space Station. They are fulfilling these escalating demands on lower budgets, less public support, and versus increasing problems in funding from Congress.
Given the importance of energy to the national defense, and NASA's proven ability to make optimal use of limited funds, the Space Commands of all the military services should be put under the direction of NASA. This will give them the additional funding, manpower, and resources they need to ensure a timely and safe completion of their current objectives.
Long term, we need a new goal. We need an American goal, not an international one. The U.S. space program has given our technology and expertise generously to virtually every other space program in the world. This generosity has not been rewarded in kind. Consequently, we should be more circumspect in sharing with other nations - as they have always been, and continue to be, with us. We need our own dream; and that dream should be a manned mission to Mars. We want heritage not hate in space.
This should be a joint venture with American corporations (and not international multinationals, either). They need the excitement of participating in a high tech venture; their employees need the opportunity to take part in something different and exciting; challenging and intellectually stimulating. We all need a big, bright, exciting new adventure to pull together and show the world what America is all about. We need to put men on Mars; and to thereafter keep them there in a permanent and expanding presence.
An enduring question in the early U.S. space program is why the Nixon Administration made NASA destroy all the design plans of the huge Apollo rockets used before the shuttle program was begun. Apparently they didn't want to have any competition for the shuttle. Yet the fact remains that those rockets were capable of putting a large payload in orbit very efficiently - they are sorely needed now to build and provision the International Space Station. Incidentally, the scientific community has recently established that the usefulness of the ISS is over ~ and it's not even complete yet. I suppose it's only useful purpose for them was to transfer all our technology to every nuclear weapon wannabe in the whole world.
Another compelling question is how the Russians were able to build a carbon copy (actually better than that - an upgrade version) of the U.S. space shuttle. Why aren't the Russians using his vehicle to help with the ISS project? Is NASA so transparent to foreign snooping that every iota of technology it creates is immediately available to everybody in the world? Is that how the British are able to launch their Mars probe from a brand new space program? The learning curve of every other space program in the whole world is a steep upward spiral; ours is a steep downward spiral.
Dozens of technical papers have been written exploring surveillance data of Mars for evidence of water. Yet the gravity of Mars is so low that water could never have existed. That is, when we settle Mars and create an artificial atmosphere, it will have to be constantly replenished because it constantly dissipates into space. If water ever existed on the surface it would quickly have evaporated and been lost to space.
The test that NASA did to "confirm" that a fluff of foam blew a huge hole in the shuttle wing is absurd. A hole that size would have destroyed the wing from friction as the shuttle escaped the atmosphere; at a very minimum, it would have caused a WHOLE lot of steerage while piloting the shuttle out of the atmosphere. The simulation NASA did was wrong too - if your going 100 MPH and you throw a heap of foam out the window and it hits a car right behind you, it's relative speed is not enough to cause much damage. NASA said the foam would be going much much faster because they started the foam at REST when in fact it's initial velocity is 100 MPH same as the vehicle it peeled off of. Don't try this yourself, especially not at 100 MPH.
© 2003 by bill clark
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