Glenn Urges Direct-to-Mars Trip

Geno Z Heinlein writes "Reuters reports that astronaut John Glenn testified March 4 before the President's Commission on Moon, Mars and Beyond, saying that Bush's plan 'pulls the rug out from under our scientists' and that 'It just seems to me the direct-to-Mars [route] is the way to go.' Referring to the Moon as an 'enormously complex' Cape Canaveral, Glenn said that NASA might spend all the money getting to the Moon and never get to Mars."

I fear that's the whole point

Spending all our money on the moon, that is. The moon has military value. Mars doesn't. If anything should serve as a base between here and Mars it should be ISS (after all it's a big reason we built the thing.) ISS should also be exploited as a place where returning astronauts (or samples) can be studied, safely, without risk to life on Earth (as low as that risk might be.)

Re:I fear that's the whole point

How does the moon have military value? I'm no expert, but doesn't it take like six days to go up there? Not to mention the costs. From a military perspective, wouldn't a base in orbit around earth be more practical?

Re:I fear that's the whole point

The only obvious thing I can think is of is the fact that the Moon is high up in Earth's gravity well. So you can shoot a big chunk of rock from the moon and have it hit somewhere on Earth. Then you get lots of destruction with no risk to friendly troops and without resorting to nuclear weapons.

Re:I fear that's the whole point

The problem with MAD, though, is we've lost both the M and the A. Who else can match our arsenal? Who else can deploy an ABM system?

All your other points are excellent.

The point of a moon base, though, would be a resupply base for all your orbital death stars. It's cheaper to get material out of the moon's gravity well than the earth's. It'd take a while to establish the industrial base needed on the moon, though; I'm thinking a permanent manned facility with a population of around 50,000 would be necessary to supply a ring of battle stations in low earth orbit.

"Fear will keep the third world in line...fear of our Orbital Death Lasers!"

Re:I fear that's the whole point

M: No one else can match our arsenal, but who gives a shit? China, Russia, and probably France and the UK have enough nukes to kill off tens of millions of Americans in one strike. That's really all anyone needs for an effective deterrent.

A: We will never, ever have an anti-missile system that can stop enough incoming ICBM's and/or SLBM's to fend off a massive strike. Period. And if we ever go to war on the assumption that we can, odds are decent that you and everyone you know will die.

Re:I fear that's the whole point

You are making the assumption that ABM systems are designed to stop all of the incoming ICBMs. While it may have been sold to the public on that premise, I think there were two more important (and successful) reasons for the ABM research:

1. Stop enough incoming ballistic missiles to make strikes less than a sure thing for some percentage of the number launched.
2. Make the other guy spend more money to make more missiles, including maintaining those missiles, at a higher percentage of the GNP.

In short; Outspend them until they fail.

Seems like it worked to me...

Re:I fear that's the whole point

Note that I didn't say "all," I said "enough." And my belief -- one that I think is well borne out by the numbers involved -- is that we will never be able to stop enough incoming ICBM's and/or SLBM's launched by any other major power to keep a significant portion of America's population from being killed in a nuclear war. "Outspend them until the fail" is an interesting proposition (and the collapse of the USSR is much, much more complicated than that) but the simple fact is that missiles are cheap and ABM is expensive.

You know, in some other countries, this might not be the case -- consider the great conventional battles of the past, in young men's lives were spent like pennies for a mile or two of ground. But Americans don't fight that way, and never have. (Gettysburg pales in comparision to the Somme, or Stalingrad.) There are governments which would probably regard the loss of a Chicago-size metropolitan center or two, or ten, as an acceptable risk. But traditionally, we don't think that way, and that's a Good Thing. I will be very saddened, and rather disturbed, if this changes.

Re:I fear that's the whole point

2 seconds? Dude, the lightspeed delay between earth and the moon is just over 1 second. How the heck are you going to launch a projectile at 50% of c?

At this point, the military believes they can build an EM-cannon that will (in a vacum) give a muzzle velocity of about 2 miles (3.2km) per second. Not counting accelaration, that's 34 hours.

I'll leave it to someone else more motivated than I to calculate the velocity added by the rock 'falling' to the earth.

Re:I fear that's the whole point

wouldn't a base in orbit around earth be more practical?

As opposed to that giant thing orbiting the earth called 'The Moon'? And you can shoot down something like the ISS with less difficulty than blowing up the moon.

Re:I fear that's the whole point

As opposed to that giant thing orbiting the earth called 'The Moon'?

The moon is a significant gravity well. Once you get there, you're going to have to overcome gravity again, not to mention you have to land slowly enough in the first place. While it may be possible to mine the moon for materials to help enable a launch, or to build a linear accelerator that would do so, a near-zero gravity way station might be better.

I'd like to see if it is possible to redirect and capture a moderate-sized asteroid for this purpose. Said asteroid might itself be selected for having the sorts of raw materials that could be used for spacecraft launching.

Re:I fear that's the whole point

wouldn't a base in orbit around earth be more practical?

As opposed to that giant thing orbiting the earth called 'The Moon'?

You seem to be forgetting about orbital distances. The ISS orbits the Earth at an altitude of about 500 km. The moon orbits at an average altitude of 378,000 km. (Analogy: the difference between traveling three miles to the grocery store or from Chicago to Los Angeles.)

Any weapon fired from the moon would have tremendous difficulties. A rocket-based weapon, such as an ICBM (IPBM?), would take 3 to 4 days to reach the Earth. One we fire from Earth could reach its target in a matter of minutes. Any laser-based or beam-based weapon would also have big problems, since the Earth, seen from the moon, only covers about 2 degrees of the sky. Aiming at a target on the Earth would require an instrument of incredibly high precision, and any such sensitive equipment would be exceedingly difficult to set up on the moon.

The moon is not strategic militarily. But I would agree that going to the moon as a jump-off point to Mars is a bit pointless, and it only made sense in the 1950s scifi books. Why leave one gravity well, just to land in another and have to overcome it again? The surface of the moon is every bit as unforgiving as orbit, since there's no insulating atmosphere. True, it has gravity, but that dust gets EVERYWHERE. It would make far more sense to do everything in orbit: build the spacecraft, fuel it, launch it, return it. Just stay out of the gravity well as long as possible.

Re:I fear that's the whole point

Well, the obvious military use for it is to put a huge number of rockets on it that'll, if fired, cause its orbit to be slowed. Then you'd have the ultimate deterent.

Any tin-pot third-world dictator threatens you, you just threaten to crash the moon into their country. Not only will they not want that, but their neighbours will probably overthrow said dictator on your behalf as the moon crashing into a country is likely to have severe repurcussions for anyone nearby.

I can clearly see Bush's reasoning on this.

Re:I fear that's the whole point

Yes, the moon crashing into the earth would cause a catastrophic drop in cheese prices everywhere. The swiss, normally neutral, would be furious.

Re:I fear that's the whole point

Any tin-pot third-world dictator threatens you, you just threaten to crash the moon into their country.

Mooning dictators? What have we stooped to?

Re:I fear that's the whole point

25 years ago it only took 3 days (and less than a decade to develop and test the technology, but thats another story). One problem with a base in orbit is the lack of available raw materials - everything has to be brought up from Earth.

Re:I fear that's the whole point

From a military perspective, wouldn't a base in orbit around earth be more practical?

That's no moon. That's a space station!

Re:I fear that's the whole point

How does the moon have military value?

Strategic deterrant value of the ability to control the international cheese industry. The Swiss and the French would be eating out of your hands for a start.

Wait a second there

Are you suggesting that we exploit the "dark side" of the moon to realize a "large moon-like space station, capable of destroying an entire planet"!?
That plot can easily be thwarted by a number of small spacecraft which would be small enough to bypass your large defenses and exploit your criticalities. Duh...

Re:I fear that's the whole point

Pretty simple, really:

a) The moon is easy to defend from Earth-based attacks. It takes a looooot more effort to get something to the Moon from Earth than it does to get something from the Moon to Earth.
b) Anything launched from the Moon can reach any target on the planet, easily enough, using Gravity.
c) The moon has tons of resources for constructing weapons, especially new kinds of nuclear weapons. There's no Greenpeace, no protestors, and no life to destroy, so the Military-Industrial complex can do a looooot of things on the moon that they wouldn't stand a chance doing here on Earth.

This was, incidentally, a hot topic in the 50's and 60's, and I seem to remember more than one sci-fi author getting into a lot of trouble for suggesting that the moon be used militarily in the Cold War ...

A moon base would be the Top of the Hill for the Pentagon. Its very, very difficult to defend against moon-launched attacks ...

Woozle-wozzle.

The moon may have been a military resource in the 60's, but it's hardly one now.

Soldier 1: "We're taking fire from that alley!"
Soldier 2: "Quick, deploy the moon missiles!"

It's hard to argue that the US has any problems controlling the top of the hill these days. ICBM's still work. US planes have operated pretty much undeterred for a long time. And MAD, on the other hand, is less viable than ever as a strategy (given enemy psychology).

The moon has tons of resources for constructing weapons, especially new kinds of nuclear weapons

That's silly. Constructing weapons would be a ludicrously costly, stupid thing to do on the moon. New kind of nuclear weapons? The old kinds work perfectly well, thank you - they are perfectly capable of supplying any kind of abomination the military might demand of them, even if they must be dropped out of a plane rather than launched from the moon.

The US military needs more precise ways to blow small things up that they can't see - not bigger ways to blow big things up that they can see from the moon.

Moon having "military value"

Is there any kind of International treaties governing use of the Moon? I'm thinking particularly of the situation with the Antarctic here. There certainly should be some kind of International agreement that it's "common ground".

If not, I suggest ESA had better at least mount some similar type of mission to NASA, making sure that there is more than one "presence" on the moon.

Yeah, OK, it's just a ball of rock - but it's a tad upsetting to think someone else might single-handedly "claim" the entirity of that pretty disc in the sky.

Re:Moon having "military value"

Is there any kind of International treaties governing use of the Moon? I'm thinking particularly of the situation with the Antarctic here. There certainly should be some kind of International agreement that it's "common ground".


Kinda like the ABM treaty? [fas.org]

*cough*

I've never been accused of being an optimist, but for some reason I don't think international agreements not to militarize space are going to mean a whole lot in the next 15 years unfortunately. The ABM treaty issue is being hotly debated in Canada and will be an issue in the next election. (US Plans call for ABM sites in Canada, leading to space-based weaponry)

Re:Moon having "military value"

even though the government with which the treaty was signed no longer existed?

There is always a difference between the spirit and letter of the law. The intent of the ABM treaty was to stop nuclear prolifertion and hold the status quo of power. While the Soviet Union has been dissolved, Russia and it's friends still have ICBMs in silos - and if their effectiveness is reduced, alternatives WILL be found. Nations do not have friends.

The agreement to not militarize space is supposed to represent a understanding amoung nations that our conflicts here on this planet should not exend elsewhere. Perhaps this is a naive view of the world, but I'd like to think that others might share it. The USA is in a position to militarize and dominate the theatre of space; At least until the LGM decide to show off their superiority in weapons.

Never forget, that this is a slippery slope - once it starts, it -will- end with nuclear weapons in space pointing down on us. I don't want to have to explain to my kids that there has to be MIRV orbital warheads aimed at the planet because we're really miserable to each other. Space is the last hope left for man working together as a species, and once it is gone, I fear it is gone forever.

It is likely the inevitable outcome of the USA's emerging world dominance. It will accellerate the development of (american) space initiatives. The USA will be making many moves in the next 10-20 years to solidify it's military power before world oil reserves become a problem [dieoff.org]. Having a monopoly on the heavy hydrogen reserves on the moon may be a justification down the road as well. Alas, I am an engineer, and not a military strategist.

My $0.02cdn.

Re:Moon having "military value"

Here's a page that describes the international treaty covering Antarctica:
http://www.antarcticanz.govt.nz/Pages /Internationa l/ATCM.msa

Here's part of it:

" The key elements of the treaty are:

1. Antarctica is to be used for peaceful purposes only. All military activities are banned, although military personnel can be used to support scientific programmes in such things as transportation of people, and equipment to Antarctica
2. There is freedom of scientific investigations and discoveries. Scientific plans, information and staff are regularly exchanged. This scientific cooperation has been genuinely successful among the treaty nations. The Cape Roberts Drilling Project is an example of successful collaborative scientific work.
3. All political claims for territory are frozen for the duration of the treaty and no new claims or enlargements can be made
4. Nuclear explosions or dumping of nuclear waste in Antarctica is banned
5. All stations/bases and equipment are open to inspection be observers appointed by Antarctic Treaty nations."

Re:I fear that's the whole point

You missed a big physics fact. The orbit that the ISS sits in is totally wrong for launching anything. Originally the orbit was to be just off the equator, but in order for the Russians to help and launch from the Cosmodrome in Khazakstan, the orbit was changed to 51 degrees. That meant a change in the mission of the ISS from a "jumping off point to outer space" to an international scientific outpost. Here's a NASA quote: "NASA spokesperson Phil West says the ISS' inclination of 51 degrees was chosen as a compromise to accommodate all of the international partners who will be launching from different latitudes. For example, Russia's launch site in Kazakhstan is further north than the Florida site, making lower inclinations difficult to achieve."
ISS History article [exn.ca]
Space Station History [centennialofflight.gov]

Goals

Most people seem to agree that going to the Moon is a silly thing to do if your goal is to get to Mars. But I don't think that's the goal here. I think the goal is to go to the Moon. The word "Mars" doesn't even appear in the executive order [moontomars.org]. Bush just added the "and at some point on to Mars" to the end of his speech to keep the Mars camp happy.

Frankly I don't care where we go, Moon, Mars or asteroids. Let's just get off this rock.

Re:Goals

Frankly I don't care where we go, Moon, Mars or asteroids. Let's just get off this rock.

Absolutely. We should send robots all over, but we should send humans, too, because it does us good to listen to people who have "been there, done that". I have a greater affinity for our fellow humans who have stood on the Moon, than for the manufactured tools we have sent there. When Armstrong stepped onto the Moon, I thought "gee, I could have been there." Now, I think "gee, my kids or my grandchildren could do that", and it's a nice thought.

I think, as a species, we're designed to go look for ourselves.

Re:Goals

And I totally agree with that. I would much rather see money used for some lasting, useful space infrastructure than blow all the cash on a one-shot firecracker to put a bootprint in red dirt.

Let's try for some logical progression here. The giant leap was when a man first set foot on something other than Earth. Now let's start walking. There are no lasting benefits right now from a massive Mars bootprint operation, let's go there when it's cheaper and we have some practical Moon colony experience to build on.

Re:Goals

Easy solution. DON'T follow the Apollo mission profile when you go to mars. A profile where you are expending a massive effort to do a round trip with the dubious returns of a short stay on Mars, bracketed by a massively long, expensive, dangerous, debilitating trip there and back.

Instead start launching large cargo containers with water, food, nuclear reactors, habitats, bulldozers and rovers. Use the same craft to transport this cargo you will use to fly astronauts there. When the cargo ships are arriving reliably and there is a critical mass of resources on the surface launch people as colonists, not astronauts, on a one way mission to Mars. It will be a lot easier to fly people on a one way flight than it will be to do a round trip. The ROI will be immense on a colonizing mission versus miniscule on a short stay round trip. You could send real geologists who would spend a life time exploring the planet and would have a motivator in they are trying to find the resource to free themselves from cargo flights from earth. You also wouldn't need to continue expensive manned flights from earth if and when a self sustaining colony is established. Mars is better for a colony than the moon because gravity is higher, its not a hard vacuam, and it probably has a lot more resources than the moon. It is only marginally worse than what the scientists living at Antarctica experience (the four added problems being radiation, no air, limited water availability, and long expensive supply runs).

The technology spinoffs form a Mars colony would probably be huge because you would, for example, need to establish a society with zero dependence on fossil fuels and you would need significant advances in food production and manufacturing.

The human race desperately needs a frontier colony with a fresh start. A colony where we might try to lose a lot of the economic and social baggage all the nations on Earth currently carry. The 20th century was the first one where mankind stopped having frontiers on Earth and that is not a positive change.

Moderators probably should mark this redundant because I post the same thing everytime a Mars thread comes up.

Re:Goals

I think what Bush has in mind is nuclear propulsion. Various tree hugging organizations will do whatever they can to stop the launch of a nuclear craft from Earth, but they can't say anything if it's launched from the moon. The primary advantage of a nuclear craft is the surplus of energy. No matter your orbital inclination, you still have enough power for a short (3-8 months depending on the craft) flight to Mars. Of course, some types of craft could be lowered into the gravity well and launched on a more normal trajectory. However, if Bush is considering something extremely powerful like an Orion, he's got to launch it from high orbit. Otherwise the EMP could wreak havoc with our orbital infrastructure.

Some excellent engine choices from low to high:

NERVA - 800-1000 Isp
Gas Core Nuclear Rocket - 2000-5000 Isp
Nuclear Salt Water Rocket - 4500-10000 Isp
Orion - 10000-100000 Isp
M2P2 Orion - >10000 ???

Orions are particularly interesting because of their ability to scale, and be made of traditional building materials instead of composites. (read: Steel) Since the efficiency of Orions climb as the size of the craft does (Thermonuclear H-Bombs give a better bang for the same mass as an Atomic warhead). The largest Orion calculated possible with 1960's technology is 8 million tons. A moving city in space!

Re:Goals

I personally believe that if we can't make it back to the Moon and establish a base there that we will NEVER get to Mars.

The moon needs to be the proving ground for the technology needed to get to Mars.

This weapons platform gibberish is just the rantings of Bush haters.

If you really want NASA to succeed it needs long range plans like Bush's proposal. AND it needs the opposition party not to fight them. The timelines for going to Mars are so long that political machinations need to be kept out of the equation or Mars exploration just becomes something to kill off the next time the opposition party takes office.

Re:I don't get Glenn

Isn't it obvious why $800billion of stuff sitting on the moon is better than $800billion of stuff sitting on Mars?

No, it's not. Military-related paranoia aside, the potential for long-term residency is far better on Mars because of the higher gravity and existing atmosphere--even if it's not breathable, it still provides some protection from solar radiation.

John Glenn doesn't want the rest of us to go moon

So. why doesn't John Glenn want the rest of us to go to the moon? what's he hiding? WHAT DO THEY KNOW IS UP THERE.

whoops. ignore I said any of that. tinfoil hat slipped

Re:How about telling the truth, Glenn?

The ISS budget is not 2.5 million, but 2.5 BILLION!

Glenn wasn't talking about the complete ISS budget, just the science portion that's projected to be cut.

Bush's Moon Plan is a 'shock and awe' tactic:

A moon base is just a way to get people thinking about votes.

Re:I grow weary...

Wow, that is a really uniformed opinion. All of the early astronauts participated (to a greater or lesser extent) in the actual engineering and planning of the missions. Please note that in addition to being a pilot, Glenn is an engineer. I found the below facts just from a simple Google search:

From His NASA Bio Page [nasa.gov]

He attended Muskingum College in New Concord and received a Bachelor of Science degree in Engineering.....

When astronauts were given special assignments to ensure pilot input into the design and development of spacecraft, Glenn specialized in cockpit layout and control functioning, including some of the early designs for the Apollo Project.

Hero Gone Politician

John Glenn lost all credibility with me when, as a US senator, he pulled that garbage line about "exploring the effects of age on space travel" as an excuse to get NASA to launch him back to space.

He was once part of a band of heros. Now he's just another politician.

Re:Hero Gone Politician

Amen. This is just more of the usual "criticize the other side" partisan bickering.

Nothing to see here. Move along.

Re:Hero Gone Politician

He participated in 83 science experiments over 9 days while up in the shuttle. (That's an average of 9.2 experiments per day, for those having trouble with the math as well as with history).

So what? The tests were pointless because, as the linked story says:

Glenn, 77 at the time and the oldest person ever sent into space, was so healthy and the mission so short that the results weren't much different from tests done on men and women half his age.

Then is goes on to quote Glenn saying we need to send more old folks up to get more varied test results, but that'll never happen. NASA won't send anyone up who isn't in excellent physical health because they don't want the risk.

Re:Hero Gone Politician

John Glenn lost all credibility with me when, as a US senator, he pulled that garbage line about "exploring the effects of age on space travel" as an excuse to get NASA to launch him back to space.

Yes, of course it was an excuse. Can you blame him for wanting to see space just one more time? Can you blame him for wanting to experience space in something a little less confining than than the Friendship 7 Mercury capsule? Can you blame him for wanting to spend more time up there than the ~5 hours of his 1962 flight?

Well, I suspect that some here can blame him, but I can't. After a lifetime of government service, one ticket on a shuttle flight was as fitting a reward as we could have given the man. And, as other posters have pointed out, he made himself a real part of that crew and did real work while he was up there. I'll never earn a reward like that, but I can't begrudge it to anyone who does.

China

Though Mr. Glenn's arguments are sound, they fail to take into account one of the most pressing reasons for a permanent moon base - China intends to build one in the next 12 years. Though it smacks of the Cold War, could the president really allow a (communist) foreign power unlimited access to the moon?

Re:China

That reminds me of a Futurama episode I saw recently (season 2 episode, but new to me). Paraphrasing since I have crap memory.

Fry "The president of the world? What's he to us, thus is the United States!"

Leela "Fry, the United States is part of the world"

Fry "Really? Wow, the future really is different"

The moon is a silly waystation

For serious manned space missions, the moon is not a particularly good waystation. What's needed is a serious long-term space station for interplanetary vehicle construction, industrial micro-gravity operations, and scientific research. (This implies a two-part station, incidentally, with a rotating section for living quarters and office space and a stationary section for labs, factories and docks.)

The moon is a gravity well. It may be shallower than the Earth, but it still takes a lot of energy to slow descents and then escape again. Eventually it may be a useful source of material resources, but there's nothing particularly attractive about it now.

Re:The moon is a silly waystation

I think the "useful source of material resources" is kind of key. Using a space station for interplanetary vehicle construction means that the vehicle, the station, the scaffolding, the blast shield in csae the fuel goes up, etc. all have to be hauled up from Earth, at huge cost.

With a moonbase, you have space, a stable framework, and ample supplies aluminium silicate dirt, from which you might be able to refine something useful. Even if you can't, you can pile it up to provide bracing, shielding and the like.

If you just want to dock three or four pieces of Mars mission together you might as well just do it, in LEO with no station. If you really want to start building, you want to be somewhere with some ground to lean on.

Of course if Earth->orbit costs come down by a couple of orders of magnitude, for instance with an elevator, then it's a different game entirely, but I think we're probably 20-30 years away from that, if we're lucky.

Re:The moon is a silly waystation

I can see you aren't an astrophysicist. The dark side of the moon is called that because it faces away from the Earth, not from the Sun. It gets the same semi-lunar worth of daytime as the near side.

waystation != mfg. center

The Earth is very fortunate to have the Moon. The only better things for space manufacturing are asteroidal moons and even a rubble ring (like Saturn has).

A waystation is generally better served in an orbit, yes, but the Moon is a currently unparalleled manufacturing site for space development. It has only 1/6g; is abundant in sunlight, oxygen, aluminum, silicon and iron (with calcium, titanium and other traces); has no atmosphere; and is about a 3-day journey from the mother world.

The problems of the Lunar well are solved by mass drivers built on the surface. With no atmosphere to stop it, an iron bucket carrying cargo (usually basic materials mined from the Lunar regolith) can be flung off the Moon at Lunar escape velocity -- you just have to build the linear accelerator long enough. Then you have to have mass catchers in Cislunar space to capture and make use of said materials.

Really, reaching for Mars without first preparing a Lunar manufacturing site is such abominable stupidity that I can only predict the Mars Adventure will end as Apollo ended ... memories, rocks, lost billions and finally piles of equipment rusting in the Florida sun. A "straight to Mars" mission is almost entirely political -- with the remaining portion being some scientific intent.

With a well established Lunar base, all other planetary tours can take place as a side-effect of Lunar manufacturing activity. And once asteroidal missions return a sufficient chunk of volatiles to Cislunar space, shipments from Earth can be reduced to personnel and other small, specific cargoes like medicine, special equipment, biologicals and trace elements.

If the US is short on cash...

what better time to join up with the other countries of the world and create starfleet early.

Wouldn't it depend...

a lot on the type of vehicle to be used? If we start looking at NERVA rockets and such, the moon would be a much better place to launch them from than Florida. A standard chem rocket to get to the moon, then something nuclear to get to mars.

Or, if the rocket is refuelable, you use a tank getting to the moon, escaping the 1G gravity well, then you refuel and use a lot less fuel getting out of moon's gravity field (isn't it 1/6th of earth?). This puts you in orbit for Mars with a whole lot of fuel left in a tank of the same size, right?

Re:Oh Come on...

Um, John Glenn never went to the moon. His only flights were on Friendship 7 (as part of the Mercury program) and on STS-95.

Re:Oh Come on...

Just because the man made it to the moon

Glenn never went to the moon. NASA wouldn't let him go, they didn't want to risk losing their hero.

does *not* mean he is an authority on the economic / social / political needs to make a manned trip to Mars

Having served in the US Senate, I'm sure he's much more of an authority on those matters than you would belive.

There are some reasons to go to the moon

First of all, I completely disagree with the Bush agenda. However, there is at least one compelling reason to go back to the moon, and that's to put a radio telescope on the far side.

One of the big problems with radio astronomy is noise interference from Earth and the many satellites we have in orbit. The nearest zone free of this interference would be the far side of the moon.

Building a radio telescope on the moon would likely require a full-time manned base for handling repairs and maintenance. One of the disadvantages of having a radio telescope on the moon is that radio astronomy has been advancing along with other technological areas and upgrades would be needed periodically in addition to repairs.

I think Radio Astronomy would benefit enormously from such a project, but I doubt that's on the Bush agenda...

Re:One question: why?

This talk of trips to the moon and Mars makes me ask: why?

Because man always has and always will seek to further his horizons. We've run out of horizons on Earth.

What can people on the moon or Mars do that a robot can't?"

Experience it first hand. Describe being there in a qualitative as well as a quantitative manner. In short, FEEL what its like to be there. If you fly a kite, you can hardly say you flew, can you? Similarly, putting a robot on the moon or Mars does not justify the statement that man has been there.

Robots are even better suited because, well, they can be specially built to be suited.

No, robots are actually LESS well suited becuase they MUST be built to suit. Being specialised is not a good trait when you are unsure of the circumstances in which you might find yourself. The ability to adapt to changing circumstance is not one that the field of robotics has yet mastered. Thankfully nature has done the work for us, and we are natural adaptors.

Re:One question: why? because...

Is a digital camera or a DVD better than your eyes? Would you rather be at the Duke basketball game or watch it on TV?

Can you look at a mountain range on a video or in a picture and see it context to your height, surroundings, atmosphere?

The answers to all thos questions and more is no.

Manned missions are important to the entire human race as accomplishment and to be cliche, "To seek out new life and new information" - Experience moves the human race forward - Robots confine us to to the earth - limit our boundaries. Both are useful - but one is only a step for the other - each is an enhancement to the knowledge gathering.

Ohio constituents

Bush's plan 'pulls the rug out from under our scientists' and that 'It just seems to me the direct-to-Mars [route] is the way to go...

Which translated means Lewis Reasearch Center in Ohio has entrenched interests in the Space Station and stands to loose funding in the short term with President Bush's initiative. What Senator Glenn doesn't make clear is how a direct Mars effort can be funded concurrently with Shuttle/IIS. It can't.

Also Robert Zubrins argument

In "The Case for Mars". Moon bases and space stations increase cost and complicate missions and crucially will push back the date by which we get there. Direct to Mars is clearly the best approach but who is going to convince Nasa? Or Bush?!

Method of exploration should be

A space station in earth orbit, where you can get fueld up for a powered journey to the moon. In moon orbit, another space station that has a shuttle down to the moon, where cheap solar energy is farmed, and used to fuel the stations, the shuttle, and to put together enough fuel for sending a fuel barge to mars.

The fuel barge docks with a small station in mars orbit. This is reserve fuel to get you home.

Now you take a powered journey to mars from moon orbit. You use the fuel from the fuel barge to return to earth.

You go powered all the way. This is the future of space travel, not the current coasting, taking years to arrive anywhere, but it needs a moonbase where fuel can be manufactured.

It's harder to get to the Moon than Mars

OK,
I keep hearing this idea of using the moon as a refueling station. If you haven't looked at the numbers, t seems like a good idea. However, a quick look at the actual orbital mechanics shows that the Moon is a big waste of time. Here's the breakdown for ow much Delta V is needed to get to the Moon and Mars:

Moon.........Mars
LEO to Moon/Mars..3.2.........4.0
Orbital Insertion.......0.9.........0.1
Orbit to Surface.......1.9.........0.4
Total.............. ......6.0.........4.5

Yes, it actually takes LESS fuel to get to Mars primarily because it has an atmosphere you can use to aerobrake. The Moon has no atmosphere and so you have to carry fuel to bleed off your transorbital speed. Furthermore, Landing on Mars is assited by being able to use the aerobrake to bleed off speed on the way down unlike the Moon. Those figures even assume that you don't use a parachute and rely upon retrorockets to come to a stop.

OK, what about the idea of the Lunar refuelling station? You now lose the 1.9km/s of energy you need to get back off the lunar surface. (you still pay for it but the refuelling barge now pays that cost) The problem is that the cost of getting to the Moon and in and out of Lunar orbit is as expensive as getting to Mars to begin with. Sure, you now havea refuelled ship that can go to Mars from lunar orbit which is cheap BUT you just spent as much fuel getting to the Moon as it would have taken to go to Mars without stopping!

To use an analogy, I want to drive to New York from Seattle. Now, would it a be a good idea to send a bunch of my friends out to Washington DC to build a gas station for me so that I can drive there, gas up and then drive up to New York? NO! The only way it would make sense is if we were building a spaceship in lunar orbit which is simply insane - we can't even do that in LEO right now. Hell, we have enough trouble doing it on the ground right now.

Furthermore, as the other respondant mentioned, you can't make fuel on the Moon. All rockets that aren't ion drives (which have no need to refuel at the Moon anyways) need an oxidizer and fuel. There's plenty of O2 on the moon in the form of metal oxides. The Moon's something like 70% oxygen. There's plenty of metal and O2 if we want to expend the energy to get it. However, O2 is the oxidizer - we still need the fuel. All our fuels use (to my knowledge) carbon, nitrogen or hydrogen. That includes everything from gasoline and candle wax to hydrazine and liquid H2. The moon has no large supplies of H2, C or N. You'll have to haul all of those in anyways. It really makes no sense to refuel there.

There's plenty of good reasons to go to the Moon, refuelling on the way to Mars is NOT one of them.

The Real Point of the Bush Plan

The real point of the Bush policy changes is to promote reform at NASA. Terminate the shuttle program -- and redirect resources to achieving lower costs to orbit. Terminate ISS -- it's not turning out to be a real benefit for science or much of anything else.

I can easily support a manned mission to Mars. But it must be part of a space effort that is more broad based than the current work is. To achieve that, we're going to have change the way we do things. The spectacular project that sometimes succeeds, sometimes doesn't, offers little hope for this style of action.

NASA's predecessor, NACA, helped make revolutionary progress in aeronautics by sticking to technology development and working with nascent aeronautical companies to develop real airplanes that could be used for a wide range of activities by a wide range of organizations. We need the same kind of work from NASA.

Zubrin's Mars Society seems to be doing well ...

I remember, a few years ago (5?) that the various Mars programs being fronted by the U.S. government were in direct opposition to the way Zubrin and his Mars Society were proposing we do it - with the "Mars Direct Program" [marsdirect.com].

Now, it seems that there are a significant number of Washington players who are getting behind the scientific thinking that Zubrin's program has produced for us ... and thats good news.

When I think about where we are currently at, evaluating the Mars situation, and where we've come as a result of an independent organization, it warms my heart. The Mars Society have done a lot to get humans thinking about going to Mars properly, and finally it seems like their momentum is having a great effect.

Space Elevator

If they would just fund research [amazon.com] on the Space Elevator [www.isr.us] They could have both the Moon and Mars!

He's completely wrong

I respect Glenn, but he is completely wrong. Going to Mars we need lots of water, air and rocket fuel. The Moon has a huge supply of Helium3 which we already know can be converted to a fuel.

I support that Mars fanatic's way of going there. First send an unmanned supply ship that will land with all the equipment to make air and water. Then something like a year later, send the crew so when they get there, they already have a liveable platform and enough H20 and oxygen to live.

Eventually.

I agree with Mr. Glenn, but I do not believe that we have enough expertise built up on the idiosyncrasies of the Martian atmosphere or the planet itself. We have been having a educational, albeit difficult experience with unmanned rovers on Mars' surface. We had to h4x0r the rovers! I would not want to have to h4x0r an actual shuttle. We also now know we need wiper blades on the solar panels of any vehicle that would potentially be sent to Mars, on account of the dust. I think it would be more prudent to send crews back to the moon, get that down, then maybe stretch to Mars. Any manned Mars mission before we are absolutely ready for one is suicide for the astronauts aboard. The amount of time/fuel it would take to get to Mars for a manned, fully loaded shuttle, complete with life support systems, testing equipment, rovers, etc, would be astronomical (pun intended).

Space Elevators

If you really want to make the USA into a Space Faring Nation again, we should put our money into space elevators [spaceelevator.com].

In just 2 decades, this idea has gone from being impossible to far-out to design studies [sciencentral.com].

By comparison, the ISS is a waste and the Moon would be an expensive diversion. Space elevators would really open the solar system up for human - not just robot - exploration.

Because you believe it?

Because you really think that NASA will go to the moon or Mars like Bush said?

Because you really think the Congress will let him do that with a half trillion deficit?

Well, it's election year guys. NASA will go nowhere, the Congress will never vote for it and one year from now we won't even talk about it.

Issues

I'm not a rocket scientist, but I've spent a fair amount of time as a virtual astronaut using the Oribiter Space Flight Simulator [orbitersim.com], and I can't help but to ask "Why The Moon?"

It already takes a lot of energy to climb out of Earth's gravity well. Granted, on the moon, it takes less to achieve orbit, but why decend into a gravity well at all unless theres a good reason? The ideal place to launch into transfer orbits (in the Earth-Moon system) is LEO. Right now, it costs an arm & a leg to get things into LEO. In addition to that, Hohmann transfers, while energy efficient are painfully slow. If a spacecraft could ride 1 G of accelleration for extended periods of time, journeys around the solar system could be measured in weeks, not decades.

If I were the President, my priorities would be:

• Fund space elevator research, and other low-cost LEO launch technologies
• Propulsion systems
• "Living off the land" technologies for other locations in the Solar System.
• Search for extrasolar earth-like planets
• Unmanned interstellar probe technologies

However, due to the nature of the government in the US, the office of chief executive can only be held for 8 years. I have serious doubts as to wether or not the US can commit to any kind of timeline longer than that in this day and age. It's a shame really.

Re:The Emperor Has No Spacesuit

You've got to be kidding.

Samples of moon rocks brought back by the Apollo missions show large amounts of aluminum, titanium, and several other metallic elements that could be used to build spaceship components easily.

Besides, by having a Moon base, we could set up laboratories and living facilities there to support missions to Mars, including safe testing of soil and rock samples returned from Mars.

Good practical reasons to establish a lunar base

I happened to sit in the audience on a panel at ConDFW whose topic was "Man on Mars by 2030?" or some such. At that session, it was pointed out that NASA is a political beast by its very nature, (and how can it be otherwise as NASA is an arm of the US government, itself one of the most political of beasts,) and does what it does for political reasons. That's why they haven't managed to get anyone out of low earth orbit in 32 years. There's been no goal that a politician has had that requires NASA to do that.

In fact, my opinion is that essentially no progress has been made in spaceflight in those 32 years. After all, it doesn't matter to me if a very select few gets to occasionally ride into space because I want to go, and I think that there are lots of people like me. Our interest in space is derived, not from a desire to read about or watch the exploits of a Glenn or an Armstrong, but to go ourselves. However, it appears as if the folks at NASA don't want that. They still view flying in space as being something only for the, well, few that they've selected. I'd like to see that change. Establishing a lunar base gives us the possibility of seeing that change.

There are a number of companies that have been established to exploit space commercially. However, none have really been successful so far. The primary reason is that the income from that exploitation has been uncertain at best. NASA now has the opportunity to change that. If they were to call for a request for bid on, say, five contracts: For providing transfer of personnel from the earth's surface to low earth orbit, for providing transfer of cargo from the earth's surface to low earth orbit, for providing transfer of personnel from low earth orbit to the lunar surface, for providing transfer of cargo from low earth orbit to the lunar surface, and for the construction of a lunar base, this would be the sort of guaranteed income needed to get commercial space ventures really going.

And once those contractors become established, they're going to look around for other ways to make money. One of those ways will be tourism.

In fact, in order to do business those contractors will have to build just the infrastructure you need to send human explorers off to the other planets. It is the establishment of the infrastructure that makes the cost of launching a Mars mission from a lunar base larger than going the Mars direct route. If NASA can get others to build the infrastructure instead, then the numbers look a lot better for launching from the moon or from a space station than for Mars direct.

Stupid idea to use the moon militarily

One thing repeated over and over in this topic is using the moon as some sort of Uber military space station. Please stop and really think about it. What kind of attacks do you think you'd be launching from the moon? Precision tactical attacks that would knock out targets like the size of buildings? The U.S. already has excellent essentially unstoppable relatively CHEAP weapons for doing that including B-2s, cruise missiles, F-117s, and hypersonic cruise missiles soon that will do the job in under an hour. Even the most powerful railgun on the moon would take much longer to cross the quarter million miles to attack and that's if the moon is visible from that hemisphere at that time! Lasers? You still have to hope the part of the earth is viewable and radiation based weapons are subject to the inverse square law. (Laser on moon would have to be 1 million times more powerful than one in LEO). How about using the moon for a strategic attack? (Dropping big rocks?). Well the strategic supremacy of the U.S. is so far from being challenged (submarines, ICBMS, bombers) by any other power that I question the need. We already have extremely formidable weapons that can reach anywhere on the planet in half an hour, they are called H-bombs. Won't it be cheaper to launch these weapons from the moon? Only if you build them there (otherwise you'll be dragging them from here to there and back again). The costs of building an infrastructure of the sort to build any of these weapons (rail guns, lasers, bombs) is so huge it defies comprehension. (Ten's of thousands of people, industrial scale operations in vacuum and hard radiation). Remember that the moon is still a very hostile place. Just one problem: unless they can find ice at the pole (which is now in doubt) there is NO WATER. (If there was concrete on the moon, astronauts would mine it for water!). Also all this talk of Helium 3 is just talk. Seen any nuclear fusion reactors working in your neighborhood? How much effort would it take to refine this He, on the moon, found in mere parts per million (billion) in the lunar dust? The moon may be a great (good?) place for astronomy but not for the military.

Glenn being a bit shortsighted, two-faced...

If the (Democratic) Senator wishes to say that getting to the moon is "enormously complex," then precisely how would he define a trip to Mars? It's a six day journey to the moon, but it's a six-to-nine month journey to Mars, followed by an almost mandatory one year stay, then a six-to-nine month return trip.

If complexity and danger are enough for Senator Glenn to rule out a moon colony, just how in the hell can he claim a Mars run is an easier choice?

Perhaps the Senator has, in his old age, forgotten Apollo 8, which did a dry run of the entire Apollo CM/LM setup all the way around the moon before an actual landing was attempted. Many claimed it was a waste to send the whole damned setup to the moon and not land, but NASA (rightly) decided that a shorter hop was safer than a massive leap. By establishing a moonbase first, we are in a far better position to send manned expeditions and, more importantly, colonization efforts to Mars.

The last thing I want to see happen is for NASA to blow its wad on a Mars trip, bring back a few rocks, and then sit on its thumb for the next fifty years like we did post-Apollo. We need permanent offworld settlements, not rock gathering missions. A moonbase gets us a toehold, but with an election year dawning and the Democratic Senator Glenn wishing to derail Republican Bush space initiatives, I guess politics wins out over safety of astronaut lives. Thanks, Senator. You're such an American hero.

Dock Worker

I used to work on a truck dock, and we had a philosophy that we lived by when loading and unloading trucks: never move your freight twice. It's double work. I'm with Glenn.