Why $104 billion?

[frodo1008]

As I said, I am even willing to accept your figures for the maintenance part of the ISS budget. Now even allowing for 3% inflation we get some 15% total inflation of NASA's current budget by 2010 (5 years X 3%, I really don't have to be a mathematical genious here to use simple multiplication) this would then be multiplied by the current $1.8 billion for the ISS portion of the budget to get some $270 millon + $1.8 billion then approx. equals $2.1 billion NOT $3 billion. Now I am sure that an inteligent person like yourself realizes that using inflation in this manner is somewhat moot as ALL things will inflate at these prices, cars, housing. candy bars, etc, etc. But I am still willing to even use this if you wish. <br /><br />You can kill ANY program by summing up ALL of its costs: developement + production + maintenance + inflation over the life of the entire program!! As an example I could take the entire military budget over this same period (2006 thru 2018) and come up with the relatively astonishing figure of some 5 TRILLION dollars or more that we are going to spend on the military in the same period!! Does this mean that we should KILL the military? No, even a relatively peace loving individual like myself would be dead set againt any such thing!! <br /><br />I will readily admit that the ISS is somewhat of a political creature, but then so has been nearly EVERYTHING that such an agency such as NASA has done, after all NASA does NOT control its own budget anymore than any other governmnet agency does. It is controlled by politicians! However, NASA has done and will continue to do truly great things even under these circumstances. <br /><br />I am sorry that you seem to believe that fostering greater cooperation among all nations in space is a worthwhile goal. There has been far too little such cooperation among nations in the past and humanity has suffered greatly for that! In European wars alone in the last century more than 100 million human bein

 

[frodo1008]

I made a major error in my last paragraph, I should have said "is not a worthwhile goal" sorry, my error.<br /><br />Then I started to take a real good look at what this $104 billion is supposed to do. Now I may be getting into the area of other threads here, but I do think that this is indeed a budget issue. I was looking at what detailed plans there are for this new initiative, and I begin to wonder not if the shuttle and ISS are going to stop such an effort, but is this effort going to really give what it is stated to do at ALL? The amount of money to both fly the shuttle until 2010 and finish the station itself is actually kind of a strawman type of argument. Looking at what Griffin and NASA are proposing (and indeed by far the greatest amount of funding for this new going back to the moon inititative is going to come after 2010) it just seems to me to ask: "Is it worth doing at all?" Now I know that many are going to suppose that I have gone over to the negative camp here, but such IS NOT the case. We are going to spend this money on putting a new lunar module on the moon that has very little more capabilities than the old Apollo LM did! It will only stay on the moon for some 14 days with 4 people. I thought we were going to go back to the moon to stay, increase exploration by a large amount , and even start to exploit the resources of the moon itself! <br /><br />This plan just seems to be another political boondoggle! The STS system was also very underfunded, and the kluge that eventually became the shuttle (a magnificent kluge, but still a kluge) was the result! Why, oh Why, can' t the proper amount of funding be used to do this right be allocated for a change!!<br /><br />During the height of Apollo (and I know this as I was indeed one of these very workers), we had some 400,000 people employed, and the funding reached a level of some 4% of the national federal government nudget. There are very few of even the most negative on these boards who think

 

[lampblack]

Wow... the ISS and shuttle programs arguably -- given the clarity of hindsight -- represent the outcome of poor policy decisions. But they are hardly the devil's handiwork.<br /> <div class="Discussion_UserSignature"> <font color="#0000ff"><strong>Just tell the truth and let the chips fall...</strong></font> </div>

 

[frodo1008]

I think that orrery21 seems to think that I am some kind of liberal naive idiot. I really hate to have to break it to him, but I not only worked on NASA civilian projects in my aerospace career, but also the rocket engines for the Atlas ICBM (a major component of the MAD policy that kept us and the USSR from destroying each other during the cold war), I also worked on the original B1-A bomber before Carter foolishly cancelled it. I also machined pressed Beryllium shell halves for the gyroscopic parts of the guidance system for the Minuteman missile. I also inspected parts for the Peacekeeper missile. And I was also in the California National Guard, and even joined such long before it became chic to use the guard as a place to avoid Viet Nahm. Only a year after I received my honorable discharge [and I almost re-upped, but my family and education came first] the outfit I was in was activated and spent a year in Nahm.<br /><br />And I bear no shame what-so-ever for having done all of these things! After all, a strong missile defense was absolutely necessary to making our side of the Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD) work properly, and it WAS this policy that kept the USSR and the US in a cold war for some 40 years, and NOT a hot war. Such a hot war would have made sure that NONE of us would be here to even have these discussions in the first place!!<br /><br />So I guess I don't quite fit the picture of an anti-war peacenik type of starry eyed liberal, now do I??<br /><br />Also, as you stated so well and simply, neither the space shuttle nor the ISS can by any stretch of the imagination be considered purely military projects. Now the STS system was indeed influenced by the Air Force, as NASA needed allies with political power to even get the shuttle into production. Of course, NASA has since regretted this decision I am sure, as some of the greatest flaws in the shuttle system have been a result of that military influence. However, the military itself then aban

 

[tmccort]

<font color="yellow">I also worked on the original B1-A bomber before Carter foolishly cancelled it.</font><br /><br />I actually saw a B1-B Lancer at an airshow. Due to my unofficial seats in a parking lot across from the airport, I saw (and felt!) it do a low altitude, high speed pass right over my head. Pretty amazing.

 

[frodo1008]

You are indeed very kind, and I was glad to be of service. I think that as you read my posts you will hopefully realize that like most political moderates (on free space at least, an endangered species!) I am not adamantly opposed to your viewpoints on the shuttle or ISS, As I have stated if NASA can't find the nerve to even fly the shuttle to the relative safe haven of the ISS with enough flights to even finish our side of the obligation to our international partners in the ISS by 2010 (and I fully believe that next year IS critical to this position), then we should stop the shuttle program except for those propulsion items that Griffin wants to use for the VSE and heavy lift launcher! Then we either find another way to launch such equipment (after all, we have already paid to have such equipment built, it would indeed be a waste not to get it to its destination!) or at the very least turn it over to the Russians and ESA to find a way to lift it to the ISS! I really don't think that this is a position extremly far from your own. Our very form of constitutional republic government was based largely upon compromise. It should be no different for manned space programs, and their supporters.<br /><br />I am sorry if I sometimes get to ranting about these subjects. It is just that I am one who has intimetly seen what politics can do to something that I think is indeed vital to the future of ALL mankind. <br /><br />War in the big picture is a form of the worst of politics! It is the ultimate form of the failure of men to comppromise! I even see a much milder, but never the less similer situation over on free space with far too many taking absolute positions either as conservatives or liberals! However, even here I find some hope for humanity, as at least in such arguments people are only harming each others feelings, and not each others physical bodies!<br /><br />Follow moderation, and I fully believe that you to will be of great benifit not only to this country, b

 

[frodo1008]

Yes, I remember that while we were working on the B1A we were shown a film taken from inside the cockpit of one of the three active test aiRcraft while such an aircraft was flying down INSIDE the Glen Canyon over the water behind the Glen Canyon Dam. It was not only amazing (an achievement of the ground following radar system) but positively scary!! If such a system were to fail, the pilot would have very little chance of pulling the aircraft out before spattering all over the inside walls of the canyon! As I said very exiting if it worked (as it did in this instance) but also very scary!!

 

[radarredux]

> <i><font color="yellow">Wow... the ISS and shuttle programs arguably -- given the clarity of hindsight -- represent the outcome of poor policy decisions. But they are hardly the devil's handiwork.</font>/i><br /><br />The decision process behind many things are complex, and assigning blame to any one aspect is probably a foolish exercise.<br /><br />Likewise, trying to find a clean separation on costs between the "new vision" and Shuttle/ISS is fraught with difficulties. For example, the CEV/CLV is needed for both the "new vision" and ISS post-2010. To which program should we assign these costs?</i>