Space policy without a space vision

In an earlier post, Congressional opposition to commercial space ventures like Dragon has already been discussed. Despite the incredible success of the Dragon mission to ISS, Congress wants to kill it, for obvious reasons. Notice that the most outspoken Senator has a large NASA center in his state, one which is in search of something useful to do.

What should the US space policy look like? The President's science advisor has admitted that today's space policy is difficult to explain. Of course it is, because it has no vision behind it. There is no President Kennedy saying, "I see no reason why America cannot put astronauts on the moon in this decade, and bring them safely back to Earth."

The Review of U.S. Human Spaceflight Plans Commission, also known as the Augustine Commission, laid out in its report a reasonably detailed set of options for missions and systems, that would culminate in human exploration of Mars.

But does anyone agree with their proposed approaches? Does the White House? And the commission didn't really say WHY it's so important to have humans there rather than robots. Nor is there a corresponding research program, with a sufficient budget, to address the huge challenges confronting human missions to Mars:

• bone mass loss
• radiation effects
• eyesight degradation
• resource conservation and reutilization
• etc., etc.

On the outside, there are people who do have exciting visions for a robust, productive, profitable future in space. Jeff Greason, CEO of Xcor Aerospace, a member of the Augustine commission, has a particularly compelling and coherent one. But, again, what is the intersection between Jeff's ideas and a national space policy? Certainly one area of intense disagreement is the development of a heavy-lift launch vehicle. Jeff thinks it's unnecessary and wasteful, as do I. But the Congress is determined to fund one. You'll find it referred to in the budget as SLS, the Space Launch System. Doesn't help the commercial people, doesn't do anything for other space missions, only supports the one mission--going to Mars. The Augustine commission seems to have been chartered to support this project, rather than investigating alternatives like robotic on-orbit assembly.

But it doesn't really matter. Until there is leadership again, the government will take whatever dwindling resources it allocates to space activities and fritter them away in uncoordinated, unproductive ways--until the government is no longer a player in space at all.