So, the Aerospace Industries Association has issued a position paper for a strategy on human space exploration, but it’s pretty unspecific about what the actual policy should be:
Developing this recommended path forward will not be easy; to that end, AIA encourages this Independent Study on Human Exploration of Space to address in detail:
• Near term human exploration milestones including robotic precursors. The lack of proximate exploration activity now could severely hinder our future exploration capability.
• Mission-oriented technology priorities that tie development of needed enabling technologies to milestones on our track toward eventual Mars exploration.
• Integration of science and technology missions with a parallel human exploration strategy. Exploration, science, and technology must progress hand in hand.
• The implementation, within fiscal constraint guidance, of societal and national goals stated as Key Objectives in the NASA Authorization Act of 2010.
• Path forward options if fiscal constraints change.
One good thing — there’s no mention whatsoever of heavy lift. The only way defenders of it will find it is to call it a “mission-oriented technology” or “needed enabling technology” for Mars. But it’s a hard case to make, if orbital storage and transfer of propellant is deployed.
If you squint just right, you can see the blueprints for a fully armed and operational battlestation.
That really is a one sheet wonder. I can’t believe it, but you quoted the meat of the paper. Only the first point seems to have any meat to it. Namely, land some probes so that you have on the ground data for your manned missions later on.
Past that, they just seem to be saying, “You ought to set a bunch of milestones” for the technology and the missions. And wraps up with “Set up back up plans in case Congress gets the ax out.” Seems like it could get a bit more descriptive than that, but maybe they were having trouble getting people to agree on things.
For all the Keynesian talk of infrastructure development, I’m surprised such an approach is rarely taken in space. Rand, you have mentioned fuel depots, but there is so much more that can be done. I’d like to see a commercial TDRS system in both LEO and lunar orbit. If AIA wants robotic precursors, then promote an infrastructure that makes robots simpler. Bonus, an improved LEO communication network could also benefit terrestrial UAVs.
GPS has done so much, as well as the current TDRS system. But why have we stopped there? Robotic precursors are the wrong answer. Without the infrastructure, each robot becomes much more expensive, as it has to carry extraneous equipment to its mission to allow it to track its location and send/receive data. For some missions, that’s all you can do, but those missions are not “precursors” to human presence.
Seems like it could get a bit more descriptive than that, but maybe they were having trouble getting people to agree on things.
The more consensus you need to get on a document, the less it’s likely to say.
The joker in the deck is “preserve the U.S. space industrial base and work force”. As Tom Heppenheimer said, the primary design criterion for every space project is to keep the parking lots full. Said workforce and industrial base needs radical downsizing if we’re ever to get a rational space settlement effort underway. The Shuttle program was the equivalent of the Great Pyramid of Khufu. It’s done now and the pharoah is dead. Time for all the slaves to be killed and buried along with him. If we don’t cashier these people, they’ll just keep consuming all the seed corn and we’ll never get beyond LEO.