On these anniversaries of Shuttle disasters, I have some reflections on the history of the program, and the future, over at Popular Mechanics.
And yes, before you comment, I know the Challenger didn’t “explode.” I’m trying to get that fixed.
17 thoughts on “End Of The Shuttle Era”
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I hate the debate about whether the Challenger “exploded”. In the common definition of the term the Challenger accident was very much an explosion (though a deflagration explosion). However, among a certain technical cohort the term “explosion” has come to acquire the specific definition of “detonation”. This isn’t the first or last time that pedantic scientists have attempted to foist their specialized definitions on language. It’s fine to adopt more precise terminology for technical discussions, but it’s unhelpful to pretend that suddenly you’ve been put in charge of language.
Also: more on topic, the Challenger disaster was, as Feynman pointed out, the symptom of a larger problem. That problem still exists within NASA, if anything it is worse than ever and affects all aspects of NASA’s manned spaceflight operations, not just safety. That problem is an increasingly moribund bureaucracy which stifles innovation, suffocates internal feedback, more protective of its budget and workforce than its goals, and is utterly deaf to external criticism. NASA has tried to fix their safety issues due to this problem by being ever more cautious, but excess caution only works against their other goals.
Since Challenger, NASA manned spaceflight has become more and more a jobs program, everything else is secondary. Ares I is a perfect example of this. An unnecessary design less capable than the existing state of the industry, vastly more expensive than any other option, nearly a decade behind schedule, more dangerous than any other option, and with serious design defects. However, Ares I stands out from all other options in that it is the only one that preserves a significant amount of the Shuttle workforce. And somehow that criterion trumps all others. This pattern has been repeated over and over again.
NASA is no longer advancing the cause of manned spaceflight, they are actively harming it. After the Challenger report NASA had a chance to confront its institutional demons, to remake itself into an agency capable of achieving substantial goals in manned space exploration, it failed. It turned away in cowardice and became just another government agency, no more inspiring, and perhaps less worthwhile, than the USDA, Amtrak, or the IRS.
OK, speaking entirely hypothetically about being prepared for somewhat more symmetrical war and the need to maintain some manner of US aerospace industrial and R&D capability.
Suppose NASA is indeed a jobs project. What it is protecting are aerospace jobs, otherwise, why not put the whole crew to work building a high-speed rail system?
If NASA is a giant jobs project, specifically aerospace jobs, more specifically to maintain some form of aerospace capability (ahem, war over Taiwan — just hypothetically speaking), the figure of merit to judge NASA is whether it is effective as such a jobs project. Or would building the F-22 be more effective?
Generally speaking, F-22s are far more effective for maintaining national security than EELVs or the ballistic missiles from which they were derived. In the event of a clearly defined Cold War scenario, the rockets and other forms of competition can be used as proxies for fleets and armies. This is especially true when both sides have WMD, and have signalled a readiness to use them if certain conditions are met. Short of that kind of war without fighting though, or in an unanticipated conventional war (as was often hypothesized during the mid/late 1980s), you want the best conventional arms available on the planet. You want them more in time of peace than war, in fact, because they serve as a better deterrent than ICBMs. Big weapons like ICBMs come off as using sledgehammers to kill mosquitoes, compared to the conventional arms as cans of Raid.
Right now we’re in neither a cold war nor a conventional one, really. Our relations with strategic rivals (the PROC, “hypothetically speaking”) are far more cordial than the “correct” relations we maintained with the Soviets for decades. That relationship – or other, similar relationships with other friendly-rival nations – would have to deteriorate before we get to the point that either kind of rocket is more effective than wings and wings of Raptors.
The conflicts we face right now – the ones we’re actively engaged in, not any potential conflict on the horizon – are matters that we should have dealt with long ago with a more liberal application of cloak-and-dagger operations. The other option is to crush with absolute ruthlessness any and all opponents who refuse to play by the minimum rules of warfare as we ourselves acknowledge them. That will mean casualties, often as not collateral ones. The US has a long history of prosecuting wars in such a manner against those who refuse to “play fair,” though today we find such methods unpalattable (and given our capabilities, that’s probably for the best). The problem is, if you refuse to stand up for yourself when you’re on the spot, and refuse to stand up for yourself at a lower level over years and decades in the shadows, then to every other rival you’re a sap who can and will be pushed around by the next one that tries.
It is more than 30 years later, and there are only five shuttle flights left as of this writing. From STS-1 to the upcoming STS-134, the space shuttle program will have carried men into space more than 130 times since the first of NASA’s space shuttle launches launch in 1981. Space flight is still not commonplace, although a handful of multi-millionaire space tourists have been allowed to visit the International Space Station (ISS).
R Anderson:
How does an F-22 deliver a GPS guided JDAM without a GPS satellite? How does the US pinpoint an incoming ICBM launch without early warning satellites? Space launch systems are a necessary component in US defense. Double more so if the next large war involves denial of space assets. China keeps saying Taiwan is part of its national territory. Watch their weapons development and you see plenty of short range fighter bombers, amphibious land vehicles, short range missiles. They already tried invading Vietnam once (and lost).
In fact, the need for resilience in our launch architecture was driven home even more dramatically less than three months after the Challenger was lost, when a Titan 34D exploded just off the pad at Vandenberg Air Force Base in California, shutting down that program as well.
It was worse than that. In late 1985, a Titan 34 failed during launch from Vandenberg. Then we lost Challenger. Not long afterwards, we lost Atlas and a Delta boosters out of the Cape, followed by that second Titan 34 failure at Vandenberg. For a time in 1986, every US booster except the Scout (a low capacity solid-fueled booster) was grounded. It took a while to recover from all of those losses in such a short time.
God, the F-22 is an air-superiority fighter. It’s not designed for air support.
Also, the satellites just warn you of ICBM launches. They can’t tell you much about where the warhead is going to land because they only detect the heat plume of the boost phase, and the warheads usuall make mid-course targeting adjustments after the boost phase has ended. Plus they just don’t have much power, or big rapidly steerable antennas, nor superb signal processing. Your best hope of pinpointing targets is large ground-based phased-array radars. Arguably that’s why BMD has come to focus on terminal phase interception.
Satellites are nice, and they are invaluable when fighting an asymmetric war against shitheads with AK-47s, hugely reducing collateral damage and letting you swat mosquitos with tiny sharp blows.
But in a general war on a broad front — e.g. against the PRC — I think their utility is limited. Their intelligence isn’t that good, and they are far too vulnerable on many fronts. I doubt the Pentagon is counting on them. What would win a general war like that is, first and foremost, air superiority from day zero. That’s what allows carrier groups to steam with impunity anywhere they want, denies the enemy freedom of movement even on his own territory, cuts off his airborne vision., and makes his logistics a nightmare. Front that point of view, I think R. Anderson is absolutely right, the F-22 is way more useful than any rocket system.
I can see you being right only in two scenarios: the aforementioned asymmetric Iraq-style war and a 1970s-style all-out nuclear exchange delivered by missiles. The former is exactly what the Democrats have told themselves is all we’ll ever fight, and the latter is I think at this point unrealistic, because no opponent has anything near parity in strategic nuclear systems.
Also, the satellites just warn you of ICBM launches. They can’t tell you much about where the warhead is going to land because they only detect the heat plume of the boost phase, and the warheads usuall make mid-course targeting adjustments after the boost phase has ended.
That’s incorrect, at least in part. DSP (the current generation of missile warning satellites) can detect much smaller missiles than ICBMs, including tactical ballistic missiles. The long overdue SBIRS satellites will do much better, as proven by the two payloads already on orbit.
Navigation satellites provide a host of services, from individual and unit navigation to precision timing used in a variety of systems, and on to providing guidance for a wide range of weapons including JDAMS. Perhaps the biggest revolution in military technology in the last 40 years has been in accuracy and GPS in a very big player in that. Fact is, for almost any level of hostilities from asymmetric warfare through large scale engagements, GPS provides critical capabilities and is a terrific force multiplier. It changes just about everything.
The military is also a heavy user of communications satellites. In addition to relaying all sorts of data (e.g. intelligence imagery) into a theater, they enable long range UAVs/UCAVs like the Predator, Reeper, and Global Hawk. All of those UAVs (and others, too) relay their data via satcom.
ISR satellites provide the military with a wide range of intelligence data. It’s far more than pretty pictures, it’s things like SIGINT and COMINT.
Finally, while the F-22 is an air superiority fighter, it can carry up to two 1,000 pound JDAMS bombs or up to 8 Small Diameter Bombs internally. That capability is what allowed the Air Force to retire the F-117. The F-22’s AESA radar system is reportedly a weapon in its own right, able to actually do damage to enemy systems in a lot of spooky ways.
Building on what Carl said, I take it as a given for planning any future war that our satellite net will be taken out. That would probably be our first notice that we’re even in a shooting war, given our current (and frankly inexcusable) recent history of “intelligence failures.”
Just to give a simple example of how GPS changes everything, back when I was in the infantry (75-77), we trained in calling for fire support. We’d look at our map and determine our position as best we could. We’d then look through binoculars at the target and estimate the distance and use a magnetic compass to get a rough bearing. We’d call back to the fire control center saying something like, “Fire mission. Target 800 meters out at 256 degrees.” They’d use a plotting board with our previously reported guesstimated position and plot the position of the target. They’d them use that to calculate the correct firing parameters for the weapon derived from their guesstimated position and fire towards the target. We’d then issue corrections like “left 100 meters” to eventually walk the fire towards the target, hopefully before our own position was compromised and we were killed.
Today, a forward controller has a GPS receiver that gives his position to a few meters accuracy. The receiver is built into a device that also has a laser rangefinder and a compass. In effect, it can say “I’m here and the target is 759 meters away on a bearing of xxx degrees, so the target’s coordinates are _____” and be accurate to a matter of meters. That information can then be relayed to fire control centers or aircraft which also use GPS to know their precise positions. The aircraft can bomb on those target coordinates using laser or GPS guided bombs and take out the target about 90% of the time. Or, the fire control center can use mortars (some of them are laser guided now) or artillery (some of those rounds are also guided now) to hit the target, often on the first salvo. If there is enemy artillery around, the friendly artillery can shoot and scoot, sitting up in a new location in just moments and being ready to fire again.
None of that was possible in my bad old days as a grunt. It’s all good. Take away GPS and we’ll be back to the bad old days in a heartbeat. That would suck big time.
Re:Robin
I completely agree with all of the things you have posted.
I witnessed the loss of Challenger from KSC. It sure looked like an explosion to me. Pedantic is right.
I’d say the characteristic of an explosion is that it forms a blast wave. Under this definition, the Challenger incident would probably qualify.
The issue is less whether or not there was an explosion (which is debatable), but whether or not the Challenger itself exploded.
It didn’t. It was torn apart by aerodynamic forces.
Sheesh, larry j, I wasn’t denying the utility of GPS and satellites. They’re great things.
But you just reel yourself back to 1975 and ask yourself whether you’d rather have a GPS widget in your backpack so you can call in mortar rounds accuately or an A-10 loitering overhead. Intelligence is great stuff, but your square zero requirement is firepower. We’re asking whether you’d rather do without air superiority or satellites. Can there really be any doubt about the correct answer?
That’s very interesting about the SBIRS. But I did think the question was about terminal tracking, not warning per se. And you use radar for that, do you not? I’m finding it hard to believe you can actually fire anti-missile missiles with satellite based infrared guidance, instead of local radar. Can you?
As wonderful as the A-10s are (and ask any former or current grunt, we love them!), they have limitations on how long they can remain on station and how many weapons they can carry. Artillery and mortars are available round the clock. Air superiority is critical, never said it wasn’t. But you apparent lack of understanding and appreciation of the role satellites play in the US military is quite evident. Satellites serve primarily in the roles of space force enhancement and space support. Go read Joint Publication 3-14 and you’ll see how important space is to the modern military. Without space assets, I’d guesstimate our military would be far less than half as capable of performing operations with the systems we currently have in operation.
As for your apparent dismissal of intelligence, how do you know where and what to engage with firepower without it? Intelligence consists of so many things from immediately actionable tactical intelligence through dozens of different types of “INTs” (SIGINT, COMINT, OSINT, etc.) that each provide part of the picture needed for warfare at different levels.
From Joint Pub 1-02, Intelligence: (DOD) The product resulting from the collection, processing, integration, evaluation, analysis, and interpretation of available information concerning foreign nations, hostile or potentially hostile forces or elements, or areas of actual or potential operations. The term is also applied to the activity which results in the product and to the organizations engaged in such activity. See also acoustic intelligence; all-source intelligence; basic intelligence; civil defense intelligence; combat intelligence; communications intelligence; critical intelligence; current intelligence; departmental intelligence; domestic intelligence; electronic intelligence; electro-optical intelligence; foreign intelligence; foreign instrumentation signals intelligence; general military intelligence; human resources intelligence; imagery intelligence; joint intelligence; laser intelligence; measurement and signature intelligence; medical intelligence; merchant intelligence; military intelligence; national intelligence; nuclear intelligence; open-source intelligence; operational intelligence; photographic intelligence; political intelligence; radar intelligence; radiation intelligence; scientific and technical intelligence; security intelligence; strategic intelligence; tactical intelligence; target intelligence; technical intelligence; technical operational intelligence; terrain intelligence; unintentional radiation intelligence.
SBIRS won’t be used for the final missile engagement but it will be vastly more capable than DSP for tracking missiles from launch until late flight stages (and I can’t say anything more about that). It will have the capability to tell those ground radars where and when to look.
My view is that there are four infrastructure issues key to the US military: logistics, intelligence/communication, and focused firepower in that order. The fourth issue is the meritocracy which tends to place good people in leadership and technical positions, but I don’t know where that would go in the above list.