NASA Administrator Mike Griffin is giving a speech to the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA) tomorrow (August 31, 2005). Here's an advanced look at the speech.
Some quotes:
Those who are my age, or thereabouts, lived through the consequences of the same abrupt program termination that is now recommended by some in our midst. From 1975-1981, between the retirement of the Apollo-Saturn system and the first flight of the Shuttle, the United States did not have the capability to send humans into space, our country was not driving the space exploration agenda, and our aerospace workforce was decimated. We lost valuable people from the program, people who never came back. We lost valuable skills that were relearned with difficulty, or not at all. We lost momentum.
But the Station is expensive to sustain, if we continue to rely upon a government-only approach to that effort. As I stated earlier this year, one strategy NASA will employ to meet our future needs is to utilize, to the fullest extent possible, commercially-developed cargo resupply and, ultimately, crew rotation capabilities for the International Space Station. Indeed, we will issue this fall a request for proposal for such capabilities, with the development to be done on a commercial basis, much like that in the commercial communications satellite market. This is a priority for NASA. Utilizing the market offered by the International Space station's requirements for cargo and crew will spur true competition in the private sector, will result in savings that can be applied elsewhere in the program, and will promote further commercial opportunities in the aerospace sector.
The spacecraft and systems we will develop will build upon the foundation of the proven designs and technologies used in the Apollo and Space Shuttle programs, while having far greater capability. They will be able to carry larger and heavier cargos into space, allowing more people to remain on the moon for longer periods of time. Even on the initial missions, we will take the entire crew of four astronauts to the surface instead of two, remaining on the surface for a week instead of a few days, while the crew exploration vehicle remains unoccupied in lunar orbit. Going well beyond Apollo, we will have the ability to land and conduct exploration activities anywhere on the moon, including on the far side or in the polar regions.
The human imperative to explore and settle new lands will be satisfied, by others if not by us. Humans will explore the Moon, Mars, and beyond. It's simply a matter of which humans, when, what values they will hold, and what languages they will speak, what cultures they will spread. What the United States gains from a robust program of human space exploration is the opportunity to carry the principles and values of western philosophy and culture along on the absolutely inevitable outward migration of humanity into the solar system and, eventually, beyond. These benefits are tangible and consequential. It matters what the United States chooses to do, or not to do, in space.
It is our nation's privilege and obligation to lead yet another opportunity to explore places beyond our own, and to help shape the destiny of our world for centuries to come. We in our generation are uniquely privileged to be given the challenge of initiating a visionary program of exploration and discovery on behalf of the American people and the world. As you leave this conference, I hope you will take some time to ponder the enormity of the task ahead, and to contemplate the fundamental reasons why American leadership in space is so vital.
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Advanced Concepts (Oct 14, 2005)