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A Flexible Path requires vehicles to travel beyond LEO. There is nothing in the Obama budget that funds the development of such vehicles. Sure there’s money to test concepts, but no money to develop anything. So there is no Flexible Path.

And I still reject the notion that NASA should not have its own vehicles to access LEO and beyond. Why not! It doesn’t make any sense for the Russians and Chinese to have a government presence in space and the US to have none. Whose going to protect the interest of private US companies in the New Frontier? China and Russia?

There’s no way the US military is going to allow other nations to dominate the New Frontier. Pushing NASA out of the manned space flight pretty much guarantees that the US military will fill in the US government vacuum. And for the US military, NASA’s tiny manned space flight budget will look like chump change! The US military space program is already larger than NASA’s budget. And with NASA out of the manned spaceflight business, I predict the military’s space budget is only going to get a lot larger.

Comment by Marcel F. Williams — February 14, 2010 @ 11:15 pm

I just found this article on the cost of developing and operating a lunar base. Its very interesting:

http://csis.org/publication/costs-international-lunar-base

Comment by Marcel F. Williams — February 15, 2010 @ 3:48 am

Excellent article once again, Paul. You are the clearest thinker on these subjects.

Comment by Itokawa — February 15, 2010 @ 8:54 am

Paul, I can only half agree with you on this article, and your past musings on the new NASA budget. I totally agree that there hasn’t been nearly enough discussion of objectives and the “why” of space exploration. However, I feel you have artificially married the VSE with Constellation.

The following quotes from the article show what I mean perfectly. In one paragraph you state:

“Despite what many believe or have said, Project Constellation was not same thing as the Vision for Space Exploration (VSE). Constellation was the implementation that NASA chose to carry out that mission.”

Yes, the VSE is a set of objectives and Constellation is implementation. However, the *very next paragraph* you state the following:

“When they cancelled Project Constellation, the Vision was terminated as well.”

What? You kill the architecture and the objectives disappear too? How did that happen?

However noble and correct the objectives may be, a flawed and unsustainable implementation will get us nowhere. The ends do not justify the means.

Furthermore, as it is just a set of objectives, there is absolutely no reason why the VSE cannot be implemented with a better architecture. If you are so fond of the VSE, fight for that set of objectives under the new budget, by all means. But don’t cry for an architecture that was so over-budget and over-time that NASA was actively slashing other programs just to keep it afloat. It would not have been worth the price.

Comment by Andrew — February 16, 2010 @ 10:55 am

Andrew,

The VSE goals were not terminated accidentally by ending Project Constellation — they were eliminated deliberately, as an act of policy. I refer you to the statements of the NASA administrator to the effect that there was no need to go back to the Moon as “it already has six American flags on it.” The slides issued with the proposed budget discuss the Augustine committee’s Flexible Path destinations, including Lagrange Points, NEO’s and the moons of Mars. FP specifically eliminated the lunar surface because of the “expense” of developing a landing spacecraft. Conspicuously absent from all the FP discussion is any mention of purpose or objectives once we get to whatever destination is chosen, hence, this post.

Furthermore, as it is just a set of objectives, there is absolutely no reason why the VSE cannot be implemented with a better architecture

Agreed, which is exactly what I have been advocating since I started writing this blog. The problem is the current leadership of NASA, which has been, at best, lukewarm in its support of the goals of the VSE.

Comment by Paul D. Spudis — February 16, 2010 @ 11:34 am

Thank you so, so much, Dr Spudis. President Obama’s proposals really looks to SLAUGHTERING any ambitious NASA humna spaceflight. It really opens the door for cutting the glorious, vital centers in our world leading, education energizing national space heritage, to the DESTRUCTION OF THE GREAT CENTERS of ‘Cape Kennedy’ (KSC), Houston Mission Control, Johnson Space Center, etc. When our youth are slipping in education (and inspiration) and China is preparing to surge in technology, science & engineering, it seems insane of the Administration to bring such a proposal. If the President leaves our space program floundering, and with the space shuttle’s end, the way would be cleared for an oppressive, military government to lay seige to the world spotlight with CHINA’S IMMINENT FLIGHTS TO THE MOON and a likely landing thereafter. What kind of inspiration to our youth, our education and our world will it be to have the flags of an oppressive, military government unfurled across the moon? Lets tell Washington now…..Stop the Slaughter!!!! Restore & rebuild the Vision!!!!

Comment by J Hansen — February 16, 2010 @ 8:50 pm

Paul, you have highlighted much of what I feared would come to pass if Constellation program was cancelled with no alternate vision of architecture put forth by administration. Furthermore, judging from the reactions of upper NASA management and members of Congress the decision to cancel was made within a very small group of people as you pointed out.

As someone who has actively supported President Obama in his election campaign, I find this lack of open transparency within NASA and lack of communications between President’s administration and members of Congress, especially those whose district will be directly affected, regarding NASA’s future a direct contradiction to the promises Obama made during his campaign. What is even more disturbing is that the President himself has not spoken a word about these major policy changes that have been proposed.

Again, as you pointed out, the VSE and Constellation program had significant bipartisan support. So why go looking for a fight that wasn’t there? Especially in the light of so many other equally important issues facing our nations on which Congress and the public are sharply divided. NASA should have been a great opportunity for President Obama to display the spirit of bipartisanship and garner some support from crucial electoral states like Florida, Ohio, and Texas.

You and I disagree over the execution of VSE strategy. You seem favor an incremental approach through ISRU development of lunar resources to build a space-based launch and transportation infrastructure that can be developed within existing budget. You agree there needs to be some sort of heavy lift system or inspace fueling system to support transport of heavy upmass equipment and supplies.

Whereas, I support an overall largescale program for beyond LEO exploration. The high visibility of such a program serves both the parochial interests of Congressional legislators and creating economic activity while providing a format for space development. Granted this may not be the most efficient way to develop spaceflight and would waste greater resources. But this visibility and large economic impact is how the space shuttle program and the ISS were able to survive multiple attempts to cut these programs. The valuable lesson that the ISS has provided, and Mir space station before that, was establishing a permanent outpost in LEO created a new market for human spaceflight that thus far the Russians have been able to capitalize. This new market has created new interests in developing commercial spaceflight here in the US and resulted in greater commercial investments by the private sector. Thus, establishing permanent facilities in a new, uninhabitated area with no market can create new markets that will generate revenue to support greater development efforts. As long as the Constellation programs objectives could have been refined to focus greater resources on lunar development and establishing a permanent facility, then the goals of the VSE could have been achieved.

So the question becomes, outside of ISS, what market exist that can support spaceflight development to LEO and beyond LEO based on what the administration has proposed so far? People talk about potential markets, but as one friend of mine pointed out that potential markets are equivalent to inside straights. Most investors are not going put major money up on those kind of odds.

Finally, I am a big supporter of SpaceX and want very badly for the Falcon 9 to have a successful launch. However, the new FY2011 proposal has create a schism within me. In light of SpaceX initial launch failures with Falcon 1, there is a strong chance that the Falcon 9 could fail. How will such failure impact commercial space development? What will a successful Falcon 9 launch mean for NASA? Should Falcon 9 fail, such result could hamstring further commercial spaceflight development for many years. The government funds for commercial spaceflight could dry up or worse be eliminated altogether. If Falcon 9 succeeds, such success could damage NASA and its overall mission to extending human spaceflight beyond LEO leaving a void where no markets exist to serve commercial spaceflight thus hurting commercial development. Under the new proposal, success or failure could be a catch-22.

Gary Miles

Comment by Gary Miles — February 17, 2010 @ 2:08 pm

Hi Gary,

So the question becomes, outside of ISS, what market exist that can support spaceflight development to LEO and beyond LEO based on what the administration has proposed so far?

This problem has vexed the space business from the beginning. It’s a chicken-or-egg situation: you need a market for space products and services but you don’t yet have any products or services to offer. How do markets emerge from that?

The VSE was a way for government (NASA) to take on risk by answering the questions: Can the Moon and cislunar space be industrialized? Can lunar resources be used to make a product that has commercial value? We suspect that the answer to these questions is “yes” but we don’t know it. That’s why it’s perfect for NASA to tackle.

But they never understood this. Or if they did understand, they did not want to find the answers. So here we are…..

Comment by Paul D. Spudis — February 17, 2010 @ 2:48 pm

Paul, you have provided the perfect icon for Obama’s space program, the ‘truckster’. So, I would like to nominate the Talking Head’s song “Road to Nowhere” as the theme song.

Comment by John G. — February 18, 2010 @ 12:54 pm

Paul,

I completely agree with your original blog on this topic, and moreover, especially concur with the comments of Gary Miles in his fifth paragraph. For some two decades, I have argued that manned space exploration beyond LEO must be large scale, if not immense, and the emphasis must not be on optimization of efficiency. Rather, such a program must become a matter of national policy, not just space policy, let alone selection of an architecture or its implementation.

Unless and until it can be shown that human space exploration delivers broader tangible and relatively near-term socioeconomic benefits to the country, I do not believe there will ever be wide public support for human exploration of the Moon or Mars. Such a program most seek to address fundamental societal issues such as increasing unemployment and underemployment in the face of globalization and productivy improvements from technological advances. And such benefits can not wait for decades following achievement of the exploration objectives.

I call this the Parakeet Paradox. I once asked a room of space enthusiasts how many owned a parakeet or some such talking bird. To my amazement, nobody raised their hand. Yet there may well be more parakeet owners in this country than space enthusiasts. (An uncle has such a bird and is definately not a space enthusiast.) Benefits of a large-scale exploration and settlement must appeal to non-space enthusiasts, extending beyond the usual advantages held dear by space enthusiasts such as exploration excitement, science, education, and technology spin-offs as valid as all these may be. They must substantively accrue during the prolonged development phase of such a program.

I still believe it was the beknighted, overbloated Space Exploration Initiative of the first President Bush that elicited the greater excitement in non-aerospace industry than did its more recent avatars. Government space advocates who are constanty subjected to the parochial political interests cited by Gary Miles, and space entrepreneurs who often still refuse to recognize the iron law of their own philosophy: are both needed, even if each side may hold its nose at the thought of the other. But is the non-aerospace segment of business that needs to be attracted.

Alas, I do not think the present atmosphere of political partisanship and economic doldrums is not conducive to examining this alternative, from which space program objectives would be derived, with any seriousness. Thus, short of national prestige or military necessity I doubt there will be serious human exploration of the Moon or Mars in my lifetime.

Comment by Robert E. Becker — February 18, 2010 @ 4:30 pm

Robert,

Thanks for your thoughtful comments.

Benefits of a large-scale exploration and settlement must appeal to non-space enthusiasts, extending beyond the usual advantages held dear by space enthusiasts such as exploration excitement, science, education, and technology spin-offs as valid as all these may be.

I am in full agreement with this, but only to a point. I think that moderate agreement from the public is all you really need, if you can keep the rate of expenditure below a certain level. My claim is that the VSE does that; it assumes that the NASA budget will stay at its current level plus inflation indefinitely. Thus, the problem becomes one of crafting an architectural approach that allows you to go to the Moon and establish a foothold there under such a fiscal environment.

Unlike Augustine, I think this is possible, if approached correctly. The key is to understand your mission — in this case, to create a reusable, extensible cislunar transportation system based on the use of lunar manufactured propellant. Build up lunar surface capability with robotic presence, extend human missions beyond LEO incrementally, and end with a lunar outpost that serves as a logistics depot for the cislunar transportation system. A clear mission, an incremental path, an extensible and flexible result.

So of course, they don’t see it.

I doubt there will be serious human exploration of the Moon or Mars in my lifetime.

I gave up on that a decade ago. Now, I’m just trying to ensure that we’re heading in the right direction so that my grandchildren may live to see it.

Comment by Paul D. Spudis — February 19, 2010 @ 4:07 am

Good day Paul,

I have read a number of your articles over the years, but certainly not everything, and so I apologize if the question I ask here has already been answered.

I recently read an article, linked through NASAWATCH, that again tackles the view that space is about science, and robots do it much better than people. If we look strictly at the science component of the space frontier I certainly can only agree: the majority of our scientific voyages to the Planets, and moons, and asteroids have been accomplished vicariously through our machines. Now I have said it before; I very much agree with you that the focus of our human space endeavours should be the incremental establishment of a space infrastructure that utilizes (if possible) natural assets that already exist in space – thus giving us the economical means to move even farther out into the solar system. The NASAWATCH article, however, caused me to reflect (again!) on what I believe is the fundamental question, and also the most difficult to answer, related to human space flight: Why humans in space?

Although in principle no reason exists preventing space resources from being used to support unmanned space vehicles, how do you defend your human spaceflight rational if no rational can be identified for placing humans in space in the first place? (I am approaching the question from a particular angle: the space resource infrastructure is only necessary if your aim is to move humans out in the solar system. I don’t think such an established capability would serve any purpose for those living on the Earth’s surface.) The proponents for ‘robots only’ in space seem to be interested solely in science, where as supporters of human spaceflight seem to approach the idea from an emotional side that is not easily defended by pure logic.

All the best, Phil

Comment by Phil Backman — February 19, 2010 @ 11:00 am

Hi Phil,

Why humans in space?

There are lots of different answers to this question and which one you latch onto depends on your perspective. For the short term (say, the next hundred years), we need people in space to do all the different things that we want to do there — robotic spacecraft are quite accomplished, but there are simply some things that they cannot fully do, like service and maintain complex machines or conduct field science and observations. If we want to process space resources to create new capability, much of the “grunt work” can be automated, but I suspect that those machines will need to be tended by human operators and service technicians.

In the long term (millenia hence), there is a broader objective. The ultimate goal of human spaceflight is to create sustainable human communities off-planet. This is the rationale given in the Augustine Committee report (although they stated it and left it there, without carrying it to its logical conclusion). But in brief, the story of life on Earth is the story of extinction. Extinction could come from external causes, such as asteroid impacts, from internal disasters, such as a super-volcano, or even a self-inflicted disaster, such as global nuclear war. But there is simply no doubt that at some point, human life on Earth will be erased. It’s simply a question of when, not if. By settling other bodies in the Solar System, we preserve human culture, that and our genes being the only thing truly lasting in human existence.

Comment by Paul D. Spudis — February 19, 2010 @ 11:14 am

NASA astronauts need to be more than just explorers. They need to be pioneers!

We need a base on the Moon to see if humans can adjust to a 1/6 microgravity environment over months and even years on the lunar surface.

We need to know how easy or how hard it is to use regolith to protect shelters from radiation.

We need to know how efficiently we can extract oxygen from lunar regolith for air and rocket fuel.

We need to know if water can really be harvested from the lunar regolith.

We simply need to know how well humans can live off the land on the moon because that’s what pioneers do. And this important information tells privateers what the possibilities so that they know what the investment possibilities are and how to go about safely exploiting these resources.

A government base also gives privateers a place of refuge just in case they have difficulty setting up their own private facilities on the lunar surface.

Its a shame that the public vs. private ideological battle that has already paralyzed the economic growth of this country now threatens one of the best government agencies ever created. I can’t think of a government agency that has created more wealth for America and the world, per dollar, than NASA!

Comment by Marcel F. Williams — February 19, 2010 @ 10:50 pm

I don’t think that the new ‘plan’ reflects either a vision which is impaired nor does it confuse the means and the ends.

I know that you, as a lunar scientist, are gung ho that we establish a base on the moon and that this should be the first priority. You (and I-we are both about the same age) would like to see this done in our lifetimes, so that gives us another 25 +- 5 yrs.

But in order to get to that point there are a number of issues which have to be resolved in a meaningful sequence.

(1) The existing program, Constellation, with all of its elements, Orion, Ares 1, Ares 5, and Altair, needed another look, which Augustine did.

(2) Based on the Augustine review, they decided that we would not get there from where we are today. The program was not being supported adequately and would not be sustainable in the long term. Things needed to change.
They provided a number of change options. BTW, part of the discussion I heard was about the longer term US goal, and that was missions to Mars.

(3) The near-term piece of Constellation was Orion and its booster, Ares 1. The Vision stated the goal was an earth to orbit/ISS transport. The Vision said that hardware was supposed to be derived from Shuttle, and that it was to make maximum use of commercial services. The Vision said Orion would fly by 2008 and be supporting ISS by 2012.

The booster was originally supposed to be Shuttle derived, but by the time it was substantially changed there was not a lot common with the original SRB. The Orion was a totally new vehicle, designed from the outset to be a high energy Mars and lunar return vehicle. Only in the last 6 months did Constellation decide to prioritize the ISS mission first. Aerospace Corp, Sally Ride, and Augustine all looked at the Orion/Ares plan and said they’d be flying by about 2019, which was too late.

There has been a lot of discussion about why Constellation was not meeting program goals.

One reason offered was that they were getting inadequate funding. That is a matter of perspective.

The original Vision said that NASA’s budget would not increase substantially, but would remain stable at about where it has been since Apollo ended. Dr. Griffin, NASA Administrator, wanted to put all of his eggs in the Constellation basket and took money from aero, science, and other programs in order to give Constellation the maximum dollars.

Many of us working within the program believe that the reason was really bungled management at multiple levels.

First you had the Administrator choosing an architecture which was a poor fit for the Vision.

Then you had a program manager who really did not have a free hand in what he was doing. But the program still owns much of the responsibility because it never did a serious review of how best to proceed or whether the ESAS architecture as the Admininstrator levied could be implemented. Ultimately the Program is responsibile for implementation.

You recall that during Apollo the architecture was a major area of contention and was not decided upon until late, and it was arguments between the different program managers, center directors, the President’s science adviser, and even the President, that brought it to a head. None of that discussion went on over the last 5 years.

The Program really needed to be focusing on first things first, which was a crew and cargo delivery service to ISS. They instead were focused on a high energy lunar or Mars return vehicle.

The Program should have been laying out a long term plan for what were the right things to do in the right order. Was it LEO ISS capability first, then lunar sortie missions, then a lunar outpost/base, and for what purposes, such as ISRU, and then Mars missions ? Where would the technologies be developed to support Mars missions ?

Instead Constellation seemed focused on lunar sorties, aka Apollo on Steroids. Constellation never had a longer term view or a nearer term plan, you cannot establish good top level requirements. The requirements were never established and were still changing last summer when crew size on Orion was reduced. At the same Constellation was all over the map, trying to set up offices for lunar science, experiment planning, etc. These things would not have been needed for 15-20 years at the rate the program was moving, and so already scarce resources were being spread into areas that really did not need to be a program concern at this point. Besides, going back to Apollo, other organizations like the USGS had a major role in deciding upon scientific aspects of the program, though NASA ultimately took control of science implementation.
Nowhere in the mix was Constellation making significant use of commercial suppliers.

(4) Given the Augustine findings, and because there was neither a long term implementable plan nor a near term answer to the loss of Shuttle, I think there was only one near term solution, and that was to stop. That was the recent decision. The decision talks about a longer term goal for developing new technologies and deep space missions, including to the moon, asteroids, and Mars. I don’t think they’ve ended the 2004 Vision; they are simply saying that NASA needs to refocus on what the Vision originally said.

There was not much harm in ending even the near term piece, Orion and Ares 1, since because of the schedule they were on, they were not going to meet the nation’s needs.

The decision was just that; I don’t think that the Administration or NASA were ready just yet to try and re-establish the entire new program. I am not certain that what the Vision requires is a single replacement program anyway.

In Apollo-like terms, Ranger, Surveyor, Lunar Orbiter, and Apollo Applications were all established as separate programs.

The other thing the decision does is invoke the need to develop new game changing technologies. That has been NASA and NACA’s function for nearly a century. Just re-building an Apollo like capability does not serve this purpose. If you can build a nuclear or renewable energy source ‘space cruiser’, like a vehicle that could go from LEO to cis-lunar or lunar trajectories, or to planetary trajectories, then you do not need to throw away the spaceships; and you do not need high energy return vehicles at all. This kind of a vehicle is different from Orion. It shares many characteristics with ISS, so makes it a good ISS follow-on. It makes lunar mission more affordable over the long term. You still need two other vehicles and one is a cost-effective earth to LEO transport and the other is a lunar lander.

The new architecture needs to reflect the original Vision. The first steps are the earth to LEO transport, and an ISS follow-on that provides crew accommodations for long term missions but which can move from LEO to beyond earth trajectories.

Follow on steps are lunar landers, Mars landers, rovers, surface infrastructure…..

Some people directly involved, whether Musk and SpaceX, or Boeing, or Chang-Diaz and Vasimr, believe we can have the first steps:
- the earth to ISS transport, and
- the ‘deep space cruiser’,
in place within 5-10 years and at affordable cost, if we do it differently than the way NASA has been operating. I think these two things are the first new programs. At least a couple of the commercial earth to orbit transports are already in work, and as these should not require new technology, they are best left to commercial industry outside NASA. So NASA’s focus needs to be on the ‘deep space cruiser’.

Whatever replaces Constellation should have a near enough focus so that the management does not get lost again.

What this also means, though is that decisions on lunar landings, lunar bases, and Mars missions are about 5-10 years away, after the first could of steps are taken.

Someone, like Bolden or Obama, might say they’re decision is to develop a lunar base first, but the implementation of such a goal is far enough away that its likely to change once or twice before anyone gets there.

Lesson learned, we need real, near-term, achievable goals that depend upon a single-minded focus. I think that is what the recent administration decision was.

We might still do a lunar base as the next step, starting ina bout 10 years and leading to implementation in about 20 years; it might still happen in our lifetimes; its a schedule not too dissimilar from what Constellation was pursuing for its lunar sorties.

But first steps first.

Comment by Jeremiah Louis — February 22, 2010 @ 12:33 pm

Jeremiah,

I don’t think that the new ‘plan’ reflects either a vision which is impaired nor does it confuse the means and the ends.

Well, we disagree.

(1) The existing program, Constellation, with all of its elements, Orion, Ares 1, Ares 5, and Altair, needed another look, which Augustine did.

No argument, except that I don’t think they looked at in terms of changing it for the better, but rather, to answer the question of whether it fit a cost envelope or not.

(2) Based on the Augustine review, they decided that we would not get there from where we are today. The program was not being supported adequately and would not be sustainable in the long term. Things needed to change. They provided a number of change options. BTW, part of the discussion I heard was about the longer term US goal, and that was missions to Mars.

Yes, they did decide that, but their “change options” were all focused on the launch vehicle, not the mission objectives, which they never discussed and (apparently) did not understand. BTW, I think that the “Mars is the ultimate destination” mantra they advanced is wrong – our goal is to go anyplace we choose. Mars is just one destination among many.

There has been a lot of discussion about why Constellation was not meeting program goals. One reason offered was that they were getting inadequate funding. That is a matter of perspective.

I agree and have said as much in these pages. But Augustine didn’t help this matter because all their “costing models” assumed continuing down the Cx path, rather than refocusing and changing the architecture to better address VSE goals. Their “options” were all focused on LV choice, not destination activities or “mission.”

The Program really needed to be focusing on first things first, which was a crew and cargo delivery service to ISS. They instead were focused on a high energy lunar or Mars return vehicle.

To borrow your own words, this too is a matter of perspective. The VSE called for the new CEV to be “capable of traveling to and from ISS” but did not require it to become the workhorse of that facility. ISS access was ancillary to the main goals of the Vision, human missions beyond LEO. As they were shooting for a lunar surface presence by 2020, it was not out of line to design your vehicle for that strategic horizon.

The Program should have been laying out a long term plan for what were the right things to do in the right order. Was it LEO ISS capability first, then lunar sortie missions, then a lunar outpost/base, and for what purposes, such as ISRU, and then Mars missions ? Where would the technologies be developed to support Mars missions ? ……Constellation never had a longer term view or a nearer term plan, you cannot establish good top level requirements. The requirements were never established and were still changing last summer when crew size on Orion was reduced….. Nowhere in the mix was Constellation making significant use of commercial suppliers.

Absolutely agree and I have said exactly this in these pages. What does any of this have to do with my claim that the new path has no direction? None of what you list above is part of the new direction.

The decision talks about a longer term goal for developing new technologies and deep space missions, including to the moon, asteroids, and Mars. I don’t think they’ve ended the 2004 Vision; they are simply saying that NASA needs to refocus on what the Vision originally said.

Wrong. If they were saying that, I would support the new direction enthusiastically. But both the budget run-out numbers and statements by NASA and administration officials indicate that the VSE is being dropped. The Moon as a goal has been specifically eliminated; you have an administrator who seems to think that six flags on the surface means that we’re done there. And all this at the same time we are finding the Moon’s resource potential is even better than we had thought.

The other thing the decision does is invoke the need to develop new game changing technologies. That has been NASA and NACA’s function for nearly a century.

The problem is that without direction, technology development has nothing to work towards. The NACA was mostly technology development, but it was not a “mission-focused agency;” its successor NASA was and is one. The NACA also had a microscopic budget and making that situation come true for NASA seems to be the real objective with the “new path.”

In a pure technology development program, the general state-of-the-art will improve, but not necessarily with devices and techniques that you need. As the way to achieve a goal, it is the most inefficient way to proceed. Of course, if you have no goal, it’s perfect. And that’s why the new direction will end up as pointless widget-making.

The new architecture needs to reflect the original Vision.

Indeed. And if you had ever read even a few of my earlier posts here, you would know that such is exactly what I have been calling for. I contend that the new direction offers none of this, has abandoned the Vision, and replaced Constellation with nothing. No direction for this agency is a prescription for aimless wandering, a $20B per year hobby shop for tinkerers and bureaucrats. It is exactly as I have described it – no plan and no Vision.

Comment by Paul D. Spudis — February 23, 2010 @ 4:42 am

I beleieve I’ve simmered down, at least a little bit, since I made the fevered remarks in Comment #6.

But we all know China is rising fast and they have definitely made the moon a major target with the upcoming rover & sample return mission.

Overhaul, yes. But not this strange destruction of the written Vision for Space Exploration goals. Call your congressmen today, the committees, and the President, to stop this sudden abandonment of the Moon as our national goal.

Comment by J Hansen — February 23, 2010 @ 1:32 pm

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