Strategy? Strategy?! We Don't Need No Stinkin' Strategy

Author Gaetano Marano says the Augustine Commission only provided options that were already well known and that what's missing is a clear strategy for the future of U.S. manned spaceflight.

What can I say?  When the man's right, he's right.

Lawmakers Criticize Obama Space Panel

The Augustine Commission, the group of government and industry space-experienced folks who have been studying America’s manned space flight plans and found them lacking, have come under Congressional criticism.

The commission feels NASA can’t get to the moon by 2020 with their shuttle replacement rocket, and that other plans need to be pursued. NASA is out of airspeed, altitude, ideas, and is short on cash. The Commission says they need another $3 billion per year to fulfill their charter. However, there are few-to-no shovel-ready ideas immediately available.

Representative Gabrielle Giffords said the options the commission provided were cartoon-like.

Panel chair Norm Augustine, former CEO of Lockheed-Martin shot back with the line of the day to Giffords, saying “I respect your feelings; I must question your facts.”

Mystery Explained: Glow in Night Sky Was Astronaut Urine

Just one of those things that space-faring nations do.

Bring Your Questions for Buzz Aldrin

Certainly an interesting man who has lived an interesting life. He's an Air Force guy, so you gotta dig him.

Start-Ups Are Poised For Latest Space Race

Andy Pasztor of the WSJ reports the administration is "leaning towards outsourcing major components of its space program." This would mean some competition (or even cancellation!) for the planned NASA-sponsored Ares programs which (in six to eight years) will be used to resupply the International Space Station with materials and astronauts. To paraphrase Emil Faber, "Competition is good."


The Air Force would like the Evolved Expendable Launch Vehicle to get man-rated. That would allow them to have some of the cost-burden of that program, which was supposed to provide cost savings of at least 25 percent on USAF launches (cue Bob Euker sound-bite: "Just a bit outside") to other users. Likewise, commercial providers like Orbital Sciences, and SpaceX will be in the mix, too. However, don't expect the Ares programs to go down without a fight.


Also, while the President "has confirmed his commitment to human space exploration," the next part of the challenge will be to understand exactly what the President means by 'human space exploration.'


We are already at the point where human space exploration--currently defined by orbiting the earth in the ISS--fails to satisfy. One manned trip to the Moon may satisfy for a short while, but after that...

"Manned space" needs to provide a vision of space travel that is not completely disconnected with reality. Space tourism may be the start. Perhaps the lessons learned in space tourism and the technologies developed in that aspect of the space economy will be applied to the space domain in general. I think it is space's best hope.

Exploration plan doesn't fit in current budget, panel says

NASA is underfunded. They need an extra $50 billion or so across the next ten years to do what they're supposed to do.

Given the anticipated national-level direction and funding trend for this sort of discretionary endeavor, NASA should expect to be riding on a man-rated version of the Delta IV and cancel their Ares programs.

There will be little Congressional consensus towards plussing NASA up to perform their "program of record."

And let's consider the ISS as a point of comparison. As Taylor Dinerman reports, the ISS went from an $8 billion program estimate in 1984 to an actual program costing about $100 billion as we speak. So that $50 billion estimate the Augustine panel has come up might well end up being much more than they've anticipated.

Someone Left The Space Out In The Rain

This article first appeared in Air University's The Wright Stuff.

While there are a number of truly awful songs in the inventory of the mind, one of the worst-ever all-timers has to be Richard Harris’ 1968 version of MacArthur Park. In MacArthur Park, Harris evokes the spirit of the true karaoke B-teamer; not nearly as bad as William Hung, but certainly not good, and perhaps more reminiscent of William Shatner’s later-arriving spoken-word version of Rocket Man. While MacArthur Park remains an interesting piece of work musically, the lyrical content is particularly, uh…unusual, especially the semi-famous stanza “MacArthur Park is melting in the dark, oh the sweet green icing flowing down. Someone left the cake out in the rain. I don’t think that I can take it, ‘cause it took so long to make it, and I’ll never have the recipe again.” So what do these bad lyrics have to do with today’s state of affairs? The last line, “I’ll never have the recipe again,” particularly brings to mind two recent events. The first is the 40th anniversary of the Apollo 11 moon walk.

There are no doubt plenty of space advocates who wonder if the U.S. still has the “recipe” to ever achieve another manned lunar landing. There are others who will claim in no uncertain terms that we still have that recipe, but this compellingly brings up the follow-on question:“why?” While there is a lot of hand-wringing about the retirement of the space shuttle, it has done remarkably little to enhance U.S. space leadership. Generally our manned space program has been constrained to providing things like tune-ups for the aged Hubble Space Telescope or more likely, a ride to the International Space Station. The ISS itself is a low-value (but not low-cost) piece of space debris in search of a meaningful mission. Even consider the moniker the International Space Station. As Dennis Miller used to opine, this is similar to adding International in front of the otherwise unsexy yet functionally descriptive House of Pancakes. But I digress--the slide rule generation has left the building--who, if anyone, will be interested in taking their places?

The second “loss of recipe” regards an essential national security topic, in this case, nuclear weapons. Several months ago the GSA reported that the manufacturing know-how for a product called Fogbank, made at the Y-12 complex in Oak Ridge, Tennessee had been lost. Fogbank was made from 1975 until 1989 and is alleged to be a necessary part of the W76 nuclear weapon which rides on the Navy’s Trident II sea-launched ballistic missiles. In the case of Fogbank, it seems the recipe was literally lost (or thrown away). Recapturing that knowledge cost close to $100 million and was no doubt a daunting challenge for today’s scientists and engineers who chances are, had to seek some gray-beard support.

Even the Russians are not immune to losing their recipe mojo. A test of their sub-launched Bulava ICBM failed again earlier this month. This is the sixth acknowledged failure in eleven launch attempts and it occurred about 28 seconds into launch. By the way, the Russians hate our missile defense programs. This is first because they work and might one day be capable of totally neutering their ICBMs, but also because they seem to motivate Russia to try and recapture their past-superpower glories – unfortunately and embarrassingly to demonstrate their catastrophic ineptness. The Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff has stated he has a 90-percent plus confidence in the U.S. missile defense system. The Russians are now estimated to be spending about one-quarter of their defense budget--money they don’t have--on nuclear weapon and nuclear-delivery systems. Reset, anyone?

While some are concerned about China and India as they are diligently working to create robust manned space programs, there is no way we can stop them, nor should we. For the U.S., our manned space flight program has proven to be a particularly poor investment--essentially a “stunt” program--which was always all about looking good in the shower vis-à-vis the USSR versus providing productive capabilities. While flowery manned space flight language like “to inspire current and future generations” sounded great and served a purpose in its time, future manned space exploration must have a better purpose.

Manned space flight has traditionally lacked an “in order to” imperative. This is because robotic space exploration, with satellites that don’t need air, water, food, or space toilets seem to be doing the job cheaper, faster, and better. Additionally, while finding out about the universe or looking for alien life forms is no doubt fascinating --creating a large intellectual sand-box for scientists to play in--again, it should be accomplished for a purpose. You don’t run diagnostics on your car, computer, or even your body for fun, you do it for a purpose, normally to make it work better. Unmanned space, however--using satellites--provides weather, communications, surveillance, and positioning, navigation, and timing. Look at GPS; unmanned space has proven itself highly valuable in making things work better; manned space has not.

Axis-of-evil states like North Korea and Iran now have space programs--they’re called missiles--with North Korea already having tested nuclear weapons and Iran well on the way. So tell me again how anyone can not be for missile defense? It sure beats MacArthur Park melting in the dark.

MacArthur Park, penned by composer Jimmy Webb, was dramatically improved with Donna Summers’ 1978 cover, resulting in a massive move forward in listenability. The Summers’ version itself follows a common-to-life pattern: over time, things normally get better…but only with effort. Songs, materials, and services like missile defense generally improve, and sometimes the music does as well, provided you keep the recipe well within reach. In music, as in life, if you don’t use it you lose it.

Mark Stout is a researcher at Air University’s National Space Studies Center. The opinions expressed here are the author’s alone and may not reflect the views and policies of the US Air Force or the Department of Defense.

Celebrity Culture vs. The Right Stuff

WSJ's Bret Stephens uses the 4oth anniversary of the Apollo 11 moonwalk as a springboard into the topic of American celebrity culture.

While I'm not sold on the utility of manned spaceflight, there is no denying the teamwork, courage, and honor America's men-in-space displayed. They did things that made space real for us in an era when the high-value products space provided were not even acknowledged as "national technical means."

The space culture values composure under pressure. The celebrity culture values decomposure under pressure. Reality TV in 1969 was Apollo 11. Reality TV today is an oxymoron.

Space Program Struggles for Direction

Struggles for direction is an apt characterization, but it the article should be titled "Manned Space Program Struggles for Direction." The next article in the series could then be Military Space Program Struggles With Affordability.

Just a thought.

Time to Boldly Go Once More

Former astronaut Buzz Aldrin makes an emotional plea for U.S. space leadership with a goal of establishing an American colony on Mars.

The major shortfall in his plea is why we should do this. While Aldrin uses traditional space advocate language like "galvanize public support," "inspire America's young students," and "renew our space industry," that agreement is as vacuous as the self-licking ice cream cone. If he said "to make life on earth better for Americans by providing revolutionary improvements in energy" (for example) it would be quite a bit easier to get behind.

Additionally, the Outer Space Treaty appears unsupportive of an American colony on Mars, as it says "outer space, including the Moon and other celestial bodies, is not subject to national appropriation by claim of sovereignty, by means of use or occupation, or by any other means." Is an American colony on Mars "use or occupation"?

A better offer would be to create a new Outer Space Treaty which would allow for the creation of property rights and sovereignty claims in order to incentivize private citizens, industry, and consortiums to explore space for a purpose other than...exploring it.

Finally, as with many of his era, Mr. Aldrin proposes we explore space as part of an international coalition and for the benefit of all mankind. That is little more than code for U.S. taxpayers providing for free-riders to benefit from space. China holds about $2 trillion in U.S. currency--if they want to play, let 'em pay.

I think Mr. Aldrin perhaps stands a little too close to the issue.