Anthonares

I acknowledge that I am nowhere near the expert on NASA matters, but as a scientist and space advocate I feel some right to talk even from a position of some ignorance. Michael Griffin is now well into his first year as NASA administrator, and frankly I am very

disappointed to see how he has been received by the pro-NASA website NASA Watch, which I will take to represent the establishment. In contrast, there are two distinct outside voices, those calling for the expansion of human space exploration, and those calling for its cessation. Putting on my prognostication hat, I will present NASA as each of the three sides of this debate would have it. You will see that the position of NASA Watch and the entrenched establishment will ultimately lead to the worst end scenario.

The Entrenched Establishment
Priorities
1) Preserve budgets
2) Preserve the workforce
3) Finish what we’ve started

This group has the most personal interest in this debate. After all, the folks at NASA have devoted their careers and are staking their livelihoods on the current direction that things are headed. If programs are terminated, they want to see another start up just like it. Want an example? Venture star became Orbital Space Plane became Project Constellation. True change is not possible because it involves job losses. Also, NASA’s bloated focus on aeronautics, unmanned science, earth and climate change science, and manned exploration is partly the result of very powerful voices within the NASA centers lobbying for their position. Once something is created, the establishment makes it very hard for that program to be terminated.

Their perfect scenario would be a dramatic expansion of budgets that would actually enable everything to get done. These folks are extremely able and competent scientists, technicians, and engineers. If they truly had long-term support and big budgets they could do everything. “Better, faster cheaper” worked as a mantra for unmanned exploration because it meant that just as much money would get spent, and more successes would result. But that kind of thinking does not necessarily work when applied to the field of human space exploration. Those three words would spell the end of tens of thousands of jobs. Though I support this decision, Michael Griffin decided to keep the shuttle infrastructure as a base for the HLV and CEV in large part because it did not require the politically impossible decision to terminate the contracts of those highly-trained technicians.

Looming down the road for these people is the continual inability of NASA to do everything with so little money. Also, the enthrenched establishment contains a good many businessmen who make their money on cost-plus contracts and other antiquated procurement schemes. Eventually, after some limited successes, the manned program would probably be cut due to simple attrition and mission shrinkage. But, before that happened, great robotic programs would be canceled and Earth observation would suffer as well. This scenario is the worst of all because it means mediocrity and eventual failure due to the simple accumulation of bureaucratic plaque and lack of focus.

The Robo-Nauts
Priorities
1) End manned space exploration
2) Expand Earth observation
3) Shrink overall NASA budgets

These people, headed by the infamous Robert Park, are a someone nebulous and transient group. It is a politically popular idea to advocate the end of manned spaceflight because it would mean lots of billions cut from the budget. So, successes in the unmanned program are taken to mean that crewed exploration is unnecessary and wasteful. But, as soon as we see successes in the manned program again, this group will shrink quite a bit. Why? Because as I argued last week, this is not a defensible position for very long. Termination of the manned program would heavily beg the question of why we are spending money outside of LEO at all. That’s why not a single prominent space scientist advocates the cessation manned exploration activities. Park is not a space scientists, he’s a loudmouth scientist.

Their ideal scenario would be a leaner, trimmer, more efficient NASA. It would send out more frequent missions to the planets and those missions would become increasingly capable. Earth sciences, climate science, and Earth observation would see massive influxes of money because of the immediate return on investment, so to speak. But, in the long run this is all that would prosper. We would see an aggressive and capaable EOS, but a pathetic and eventually worthless solar system exploration fleet. NASA’s aeoronautics functions would be split off and fall under the jurisdiction of the FAA or something, so NASA would eventually be only a robotic exploration and maintenance organization.

Manned Exploration Advocates
Priorities shared by all
1) Reinvigorate the manned space program
2) Open up space as a realm for human enterprise and exploration

Priority not shared by all
1) End NASA’s involvement in the launch business

Describing this group is harder than the other two because the range of opinions is a bit broader. The major space advocacy organizations are all part of it, as are the mil-space people, and the libertarians as well. Many space scientists fall here (others in the establishment), as do many private citizens. The trouble with this group is that their focuses are so broad and often divergent that agreeing on a common direction is nearly impossible. A loose coalition of advocacy organizations under the umbrella of the the Space Exploration Alliance formed a few years ago but already some of the groups have split off because of disagreements about vision.

Common goals would see NASA continue its current direction with the shuttle-derived HLV, opinions on the CEV are not as uniform. Generally it is agreed that steps to make human spaceflight cheaper and safer are good. Exploration priorities differ by group, some support the end of the ISS program, others would like to see it continue and be a useful base for preparation of further exploration. Whether the Moon or Mars should be the first target for manned exploration is not agreed upon, and there are still some holdouts from the L5 society that think large space stations are the first priority. Either way, manned missions should be more frequent, more ambitious, and “destination-driven” (to quote Robert Zubrin). We should pick up that Apollo-Era focus that motivated so much success in so little time.

The problem with this group is that under current budget constraints, manned exploration can not become much more aggressive without damaging extremely important unmanned science. The Europa mission for instance is currently the highest-priority science mission NASA has to offer, yet the money to construct it is not there. Second (or first, depending on who you talk to), is the Terrestrial Planet Finder. This mission has shrunk, slipped, and then slipped again. Will it launch before 2020? We don’t yet know. In order to really accomplish serious manned science, budgets need to be expanded.

The good news is that nothing will increase budgets like footprints on another planet. None of the other positions in this debate actually contain the potential for expanding the space program, because only successful manned missions will open the world’s eyes to the promise of space. It is our future, we will soon outgrow this planet, and many will choose to leave. If humanity will still be around in 10,000 years, as folks over at the Long Now Foundation would have us think about, we will need to be off planet Earth in significant numbers.

The short term outlook for this group is mildly reduced budgets for Earth observation and unmanned science, but eventual expansion when vehicle development costs are not so high. This is the path that will save NASA, whether or not it continues to remain as a single agency. The others will eventually leads to its failure and dissolution.