An analysis by Jim Meigs, in which he quotes Yours Truly.
I strongly disagree that SLS/Orion is the fastest way to get back to the Moon. I’ll be discussing that in a study I’ve done for the Reason Foundation that I hope will be published in a week or three. Briefly, we have all the pieces we need to do it quickly, without SLS/Orion, as long as we’re willing to go back to the Apollo levels of risk acceptance. And we’ll have to do that to beat the Chinese.
To quote a not so relevant observer, :
Get ‘er done!
Why do we waste time and money on demonstrable incompetents?
Ah,…we’re not in actual control of the check book.
With the sole exception of finding vast amounts of ice at the lunar south pole, to allow fuel depots to be placed in cis-lunar space, there seems to be little justification for establishing a moon base outside of national pride or to prevent foreign countries (China) from establishing land claims to large chunks of the moon. But would we need to really establish a base to do that? Or just land the occasional crewed surface “scientific mission” (ala Ice Station Zebra) to thwart that? Having the ability to conduct many, many surface missions all over the front and back sides of the moon would give us maximal flexibility without tying us to one particular spot on the moon, assuming we’re not building a fuel depot.
I suppose a crewed space radio telescope on the far side of the moon could in essence be a “moon base”. But why wouldn’t it be fully automated? With a cluster of relay satellites to relay the data back to Earth and commands back to the telescope? Life support not needed.
Vast amounts is about 200,000 tons of lunar water in a smallish region, though it one might do it with less, say 100,000 tons. Also depends on other volatiles, and could be less if have mineable frozen CO2.
If shipping the lunar rocket fuel to lunar orbit, one could also ship it everywhere on the lunar surface.
“that appears to be the fastest approach to get American astronauts back to the lunar surface.”
To what end? The two Artemis only make even a little sense in terms of development of that program, if that program is cancelled, all we’re doing is putting astronauts on the Moon for a few more days at an enormous cost instead of using the money and time to produce a sustainable presence. The ostensible object of the whole exercise. We’ll still have to start from scratchy if we want to do even another touch and go.
Kill it now, call the auctioneers, stop the bleeding and waste on just another dead end.