Bush Space Policy Announcement Next Week?

NBC Nightly News tonight reported that President Bush will unveil his
space policy "next week" and that the plans would include a long-range
proposal for "permanent human presence on the Moon."

Brian

He's moving camp x-ray? ;-)

Brian Thorn wrote in message . ..
NBC Nightly News tonight reported that President Bush will unveil his
space policy "next week" and that the plans would include a long-range
proposal for "permanent human presence on the Moon."

Brian

This looks to me to be an open-ended plan to counter
whatever China might have in the works lunar-wise.
The leak says that the U.S. "may" return to the moon.
To me, that means that the U.S. will return to the
moon, but only if it has to.

The worrisome part is the statement that NASA will be
directed to curtail all work not related to the manned
lunar/mars efforts.

- Ed Kyle

Brian Thorn wrote in message . ..
NBC Nightly News tonight reported that President Bush will unveil his
space policy "next week" and that the plans would include a long-range
proposal for "permanent human presence on the Moon."

Brian

And Foxnews too:

"PALM BEACH GARDENS, Fla. — President Bush will announce plans next
week to send Americans to Mars and establish a permanent human
presence on the moon, senior administration officials said Thursday
night."

no more jokes about WMD please, it's not funny.

I just read the following article at:

http://www.upi.com/view.cfm?StoryID=...7-123930-1532r

To me it sounds like a lot of second hand information from a guy who
knows a guy who overheard some other guy about what he thinks will
happen next week.

A lot of the stuff spewed out in that article raises a lot of
questions.

First, are versions of the new third version of the Orbital Space
Plane, called the Crew Exploration Vehicle, going take humans to the
moon, nearby asteriods, and Mars? Launched from current boosters like
Ariane and Soyuz? Is that even possible?

As soon as the International Space Station is completed it will it
then be shut down?

If the space station has a completion date of around 2009-2010 after
which the space shuttles will be retired, and the Crew Return Vehicle
version of the OSP is scheduled for use in 2008-2010, and prototypes
of the Crew Exploration Vehicle are to fly in 2007, then when are we
going to experience this "...period several years when NASA would lack
manned space capability" (aside from spacecraft groundings like the
current one)?

Will NASA really only fund human exploration programs and not any
others? What about Prometheus, JIMO, the Pluto mission, the James
Webb Telescope, and Mars Sample Return?

Is the US to develop a new launcher at the same time?

Is it really going to pay for all of this with a $800 million
downpayment in 2005 with a 5% increase in NASA's budget every year
thereafter?

Is this big speech week next week going to produce the results of John
F. Kennedy's Moon Speech or is going to quickly fizzle out like George
Bush Sr. speech directing NASA to send humans to Mars back in the
early 1990's.

What really surprises me is the co-author of that article: Keith L.
Cowing of nasawatch.com, certainly a guy with an ax to grind but not
someone I would expect to completely submit an article (to UPI!) like
that without doing a sanity check on it.

Dave

Brian Thorn wrote in message . ..
NBC Nightly News tonight reported that President Bush will unveil his
space policy "next week" and that the plans would include a long-range
proposal for "permanent human presence on the Moon."

Brian

It was more detailed than taht. According to CNN, the plans would
include not only a permanent human presence on the Moon, but use of
the moon as a training ground for human missions to Mars and
retirement of the shuttle by 2010. To my utter amazement, it's
apparently been suggested that we use Ariane and Soyuz to fill in
between the retirement of shuttle and the development of a new Saturn
class booster--or was that actually an Apollo like capsule? It's
unclear in the stories what is meant.
Hmmmm. . . big things afoot either way.

Tom Merkle

In article ,
(Dave) wrote:

To me it sounds like a lot of second hand information from a guy who
knows a guy who overheard some other guy about what he thinks will
happen next week.

It sounds to me exactly like what they did in December -- anonymous
"administration officials" tell the press what the President may tell us
in a week or two, but since they're anonymous and it's all unofficial,
the administration can simply deny everything if they don't like the way
the public reacts.

This is a bid to get Bush reelected, nothing more. If the campaign
managers don't like the way the public reacts to this latest rumor, then
the announcement will never happen. If they do, then the announcement
will happen, and wheels of change will be put in motion at least until
election day. After that, I'm skeptical that anything will really
change.

,------------------------------------------------------------------.
| Joseph J. Strout Check out the Mac Web Directory: |
| http://www.macwebdir.com |
`------------------------------------------------------------------'

(Dave) writes:
First, are versions of the new third version of the Orbital Space
Plane, called the Crew Exploration Vehicle, going take humans to the
moon, nearby asteriods, and Mars? Launched from current boosters like
Ariane and Soyuz? Is that even possible?

Why not? The Apollo CM worked for lunar missions and for Skylab
missions. Something similar ought to work, with appropriate changes
to things like TPS and internal systems.

As soon as the International Space Station is completed it will it
then be shut down?

I'm guessing it will be run like Mir was in its final years. There
will still be people on board, but there will be no more "assembly"
missions to add new modules. Just visiting Soyuz, Progress, ATV, HTV,
and possibly CRV/CTV flights.

Jeff
--
Remove "no" and "spam" from email address to reply.
If it says "This is not spam!", it's surely a lie.

In article ,
jeff findley wrote:

As soon as the International Space Station is completed it will it
then be shut down?

I'm guessing it will be run like Mir was in its final years. There
will still be people on board, but there will be no more "assembly"
missions to add new modules. Just visiting Soyuz, Progress, ATV, HTV,
and possibly CRV/CTV flights.

I'm sure the Russians, at least, will continue to run it as a tourist
destination, at least until better tourist destinations are built.

(Ironic that the during the cold war, Russia represented communism as
much as the U.S. represented capitalism -- but now, in space at least,
these roles are reversed.)

,------------------------------------------------------------------.
| Joseph J. Strout Check out the Mac Web Directory: |
| http://www.macwebdir.com |
`------------------------------------------------------------------'

(Dave) wrote in message . com...

First, are versions of the new third version of the Orbital Space
Plane, called the Crew Exploration Vehicle, going take humans to the
moon, nearby asteriods, and Mars? Launched from current boosters like
Ariane and Soyuz? Is that even possible?


No existing booster could launch a complete lunar mission in
one flight, but Ariane 5, Proton, and the heavy EELV variants
might be able to support a lunar program via salvo launches
and earth-orbit rendezvous. A CEV would be launched by a
single rocket as the final step. A bigger booster would
be nice to have, though.

Will NASA really only fund human exploration programs and not any
others? What about Prometheus, JIMO, the Pluto mission, the James
Webb Telescope, and Mars Sample Return?

This is worrisome, but I wonder if the original quote might
have been directed only toward ISS funding.

Is the US to develop a new launcher at the same time?

Is it really going to pay for all of this with a $800 million
downpayment in 2005 with a 5% increase in NASA's budget every year
thereafter?


The plan discussed will raise NASA's budget from $15.5 billion
to $20 billion in five years. This will fund some type of
mildly-expanded program, but no way is there going to be a
permanent lunar base or a manned Mars program, or maybe even
a big new launch vehicle, on this budget. To me, it looks like
enough funding to build CEV, but not to go anywhere with it.

- Ed Kyle