Herb Schaltegger wrote:

jeff findley wrote:

Again with the air-breathing, space launch vehicle religion. I'm
wondering if the guys working on the program believe in the
air-breathing, space launch vehicle religion, or if they're just using
the religion to gain political (monetary) support for the program.

Or it could be a relatively simple basic research/experimental program
(hence the "X" designation) to help develop and better understand
supersonic combustion as a means of air-breathing propulsion, regardless of
what kind of vehicle a scramjet might propel. That *is* still part of
NASA's basic mission.

The only sensible applications for scramjets are military. Military R&D should
be funded by the military, not by poor old NASA.


The fact that the NASA PA PR machine hypes it as
something else is hardly surprising, is it?

Well, no. But it's still disappointing to see it.