Economically Restoring the U. S. Human Spaceflight Program

The Impact of the Continuing lack of leadership with Vision on U. S. Space Policy

By Charles P. Vick
Senior Technical & Policy Analyst

Disclaimer
The opinions and evaluations stated here in are only the author’s and cannot be construed to reflect those of any Government agency, company, institute or association. It is based on public information, circumstantial evidence, informed speculation, and official US government documents and histories, oral histories, interviews and engineering analysis. As with all data regarding the intelligence programs of the US space programs, this analysis is subject to revision--and represents a work in progress.

On this the 42th anniversary of the Apollo-8 & Apollo-11 missions I believe we can do better than the present NASA Heavy Lift booster SLS derivation “Saturn-7” design for our international space fairing partners much less our own space farers. Truly this endangered US human spaceflight effort is worse than just troubling in the face of the new SLS launch vehicles designs with it new Apollo-II - Orion MPCV human spacecraft as well as the new lunar lander human spacecraft as they are undergoing their most critical review by the administration. This is an end of an era in its most dangerous period of greed driven political design bureau payoff decisions that must undergo a total step back rethink for their exceptional danger to U. S. human spaceflight continuance.

We must step back and re-think the SLS design unless this new administration desires to kill U.S. human spaceflight. The SLS like Ares-1 is nothing less than a suicide political design bureau imposed design for political payoff that must be stopped and reconsidered and done right.

As much as I personally respect the inline design concepts presented by the old late Dr. von Braun’s team we must ask ourselves how much longer must out astronauts endure these solid motors political payoff padding design bureau’s Office of Management & Budget and Congressional imposed design and get killed for it in the name of politics before we learn that this is not the way to go. No self respecting spacefarer devoting most of their lives careers to the space program projects would in their right mind place themselves on those mad dog Shuttle derived booster designs

I do not think this administration wants the responsibility for this suicide design.

To quote several of the von Braun American team members in relation to the Ares-1 design“Not on my watch”.

I think that says it all for the still surviving American team taught by the Dr. von Braun team. I do not think that the solid motor providers are the only game in town. Fine give them a new development contract from the Air force rapid response military space booster for it requirements if the economy and Congress can justify it at all but get the solid motors out of the human spaceflight program period.

The Constellation – Orion – spacecraft was found to be woefully inadequate to the planned tasks as definitely not robust enough and lacking adequate spacefarer structural and safety features that should be totally reworked. I really dislike the use of solid propellants for the any boosters: low specific impulse, high pollution, no shut down, etc. Dumb. It may be that development of the spacecraft is what will take the most amount of time. 

Do not tell me that everything was fine and that everything was ok with NASA and the new Ares-1 human booster Orion CEV spacecraft program with design weight constraints ignoring safety requirements because that is to deceive one’s self into delusions asking for certain catastrophic failure and loss of human spacefarer’s life. For there to be at that time so much publicity about the design issues with employees clearly in open rebellion says volumes about things that were not right within NASA and is why that effort was severely revised by the present leadership at NASA. It also suggested that management had lost control which is doubly serious implying that a stand down was required once the political transition had taken place. It was done…

Clearly the SLS needs a new liquid propellant Saturn first stage that will provide the robust payload mass that is required for a robust vastly safer improved MPCV Orion spacecraft. I can live with the Ares derived upper last stages that I prefer to call the Boeing Saturn-IVD and Saturn-IV-E stages but not its first stages. A three or four F-1 step throttled Saturn-V first stage would be better than any other options available with an already developed proven vehicle. Basically this is the old Saturn-V INT -20 with an S-1C first stage topped by an S-IVB stage. If I have said it once I have said it a hundred times that Saturn-V and its variant configurations are the answer that the American people spent a fortune in treasure to develop only to have it thrown away which is total failure in leadership. Ares-5 had already grown to the Saturn-V, 33 foot diameter. To rebuild the Saturn-V based space program is to help rebuild the once mighty industrial base that was America ’s strength and world leadership.

The Requirement that is Economically Feasible

All that is needed is initially for the updated modernized 33 foot diameter Saturn-V, S- 1C first stage and derivative S-IVB Third Stage (J-2X powered S- IVD & S-IVE) stages along with the Apollo-II Orion spacecraft elements to be put in production with only new updated flight avionics. The critical R&D has been long completed and proven with victorious national historic engineering monument, geopolitical results, dramatically cutting cost and development time making it possible in this nation now when it is so needed. We can later when economics make it possible place into production the J-2X powered S-IIA a revised updated strengthened Saturn-V, S-II second stage along with the two and possible four liquid propulsion strap-on boosters with their common first stage kerosene, liquid oxygen propellants supplied with propellant cross feed lines with a 1.8 million pound thrust F-1A. This could also serve the USAF fly back booster desired closed cycle F-1B class engine developed jointly by Pratt & Whitney and Aerojet all modernized with better materials. We only needed to increase the internal diameter of the F-1A’s turbine-pump shaft to meet NASA’s safety requirements.

SPACE POLICY REALITY—A CASE FOR A SATURN-V FUTURE SATURN- VII & SATURN-IX

This analyst refuses to except that NASA can not return to Saturn-V and its design variants it’s most cost effective per pound to orbit exceptionally reliable still viable best option for human deep space lunar & planetary exploration development through careful planning, and management of the United States, science and technology, economic and commercial, industrial base resources. For the present requirements the Cold War Space development exploration thinking is not relevant except to not be dependent on other nations for access to space and take on China’s geopolitical challenge if we care not to be eclipsed in the 2010-2020 time frame appearance wise for our geopolitical foreign policy by a capability we do not have that we scrapped thank you in the 1970’s thanks to what political administration agenda? What did or did not that agenda buy for the US ?

The future of manned space is directly in question unless we recognize certain realities which the United States leadership to date have been unwilling to address. At no time have unmanned scientific programs been allowed to wag the tail of the manned programs, and vice versa. Indeed, that policy has been and remains the rule in which unmanned precursors are used in su pport of future manned exploration development and it is not going to change because without human beings there is no science. An additional truism is: Where the humans are is where the political, economic support goes. All of which is spent here on Earth to employ U. S. citizens. We must recognize why we have been doing these large Science & Technology (S&T) projects in the West--which is rarely, if ever, explained.

It has been the plan at least since the Eisenhower and subsequent Kennedy administrations to do the following: To apply from the total available discretionary government funding about 40% to basic Scientific Research to push the basic sciences and about 60 % of the available funding to push the basic technologies, (Research & Development) to drive the national economy and to provide for the Citizenry’s well being. Above all, it is to provide for the National Security of the nation by keeping the USA technologically industrial base ahead of the rest of the world that opposes our social system by two to two-and-one-half generations strategically. Based on experience unbalancing this kind of funding distribution can only be sustained for a short time for a specific national purpose before it has a heavy impact on the national economy of a nation. The former Soviet Union is an example of the impact of only emphasizing technology development for several decades that bankrupted its command economy among several others reasons for its demise.

To a large degree today, we are still benefiting from this policy that matured during the 1960s and early 1970s but since then it has been faltering (except for the SDI period). In short, NASA is the basic organization helping to maintain this strategic S&T National Security industrial base balance, and it has not been able to maintain it to the level required because of the consistent lack of a ppropriate su pport since the early 1970s, and we are presently paying dearly for compromising our own selves for this right now.

The most vivid examples of this lie in the U. S. Space Transportation Systems technology, and its commercial aircraft industry su pport verses what Europe has done for its aircraft industry (and the lessons learned) for every administration in office from the early 1970s onwards. These administrations have failed to display the political campaigning leadership with vision required of this Strategic Policy that can not further endure the assault on it without jeopardizing US National Security.

Some five times this Nation has attempted to produce an economically-viable, fully reusable Space Shuttle system since the early 1970s, and five times we have fallen on our collective faces for the effort--because we are not technologically “there” in the critical S&T areas as the retired NASA administrator made painfully clear as he called a halt and redirected the Space Launch Initiative.

--First in the late 1960s early 1970s, we attempted to develop the two stage fly back shuttle system which the then-sitting Nixon administration was not about to su pport. It had the same political technological problems that later systems faced and failed to master.

--Second, to paraphrase Dr. George Mueller at a Washington, NASA History Conference in recent years, We “got the shuttle we have today from the ‘Bureau of the Budget, Design Bureau’” that NASA did not want, that was not cheaper than Saturn-V. (Saturn-V which was becoming cheaper and more reliable with time was put out of production at 15 plus boosters well short of the intended 74 boosters originally envisioned. We certainly failed to recognize how far ahead of its time Saturn-V was in the face of delusional lies we told ourselves on what our shuttle technology could accomplish.) To again paraphrase Dr. George Mueller, “If we cannot launch Shuttle often enough to make it economically viable, then we would have been better off to have stayed with Saturn-V.”

--Of course, it fit what the politically-correct contractors desired for the required political padding payoff, and anything with John F. Kennedy’s name on it that was competitive with the Soviets had “to go,” of course, for Détente sake. These individuals could not allow Saturn-V to remain in production, because it was cheaper, quicker and more reliable than the Shuttle we had then (and are now at last no longer stuck with) which was not intended to replace Saturn-V. Shuttle also came at the expense of a ruse by the Soviets to copy the West’s technology trait of the then-existing Soviet leadership that really strained their command economic system at the expense of N1-L3M, the Soviet Lunar Base project. The Soviet leadership was not up to the vision of Designer Generals S. P. Korolev and V. P. Mishin that would have placed the Soviets ahead of the Americans (establishing a lunar base while we wasted our time with the technologically inadequate dead end project that was the very dangerous Space Shuttle). Both nations should have explored the limits of the sciences and technologies involved before committing to its development. Indeed the lessons of the Columbia tragedy which could have been prevented not merely applies to the U.S space program but all space programs including Russia’s today as we have so vividly seen unfold recently.

--The U. S. then tried the NASP National Aerospace Plane single stage Shuttle launch vehicle (which is what it actually was, not a commercial transport) for its third attempt during the Reagan era. But that administration had no intentions of completing the effort beyond pushing the materials sciences, propulsion and flight avionics technology for the military for such a grossly expensive launch system. It remains unknown officially which Black Programs benefited from this effort. Common sense says they had to have benefited from that R & D effort which recent wars have made partially clear.

--The follow-on was the attempted development of the X-33 single stage to orbit space transportation system using the un-flown Aero-spike propulsion system technology. It ran into the Soviet aero-spike N1 propulsion lessons as well as the composite hydrogen tank problems (that the US initially tried to develop back in the early 1970s). NASA should have explored the limits of the sciences and technologies involved before committing to its development. Another grossly expensive system was sto pped after the technological problem caused cost overruns. Although some of these issues have since been partially resolved they are far from a perfected technology.

-- Finally we attempted to return to the two- or three-stage fly-back shuttle system for the fifth attempt under the Space Launch Initiative, only to realize we were years from perfecting the materials sciences, propulsion systems and fabrication technology to make such a system possible much less economically viable.

-- Add to that the subsequent Bush Administration highly flawed exceptionally dangerous Ares-1 and the constantly revised flawed Ares-5 Constellation boosters. That say’s nothing of the woefully inadequate issues surrounding the original Orion CEV manned spacecraft both of which this Obama administration put an end to for the nation’s betterment.

 

These results should have been forecasted because if one is not prepared to put out that which is required to make the S&T breakthroughs, you are not going to move forward on the National Security Front as you must.

The NASA/Industry partnership has consistently from the late 1960s and early 1970s been damned if they did (and damned if they did not) lay out the reality of what it was going to take to get the S&T job done for these various projects. NASA was lucky to get a ppropriations from one year to the next, much less for a required extended period of time—such as over five-to-seven, or ten-to-fifteen years required to make those technological breakthroughs (and keep them coming) that provides the US a lead on the rest of the world. I think NASA and Industry earnestly tried to do the job, but it was an unrealistic Game of Futility. (Indeed, to get the ISS, fibs had to be told about the true cost to get the job done just to get administration a pproval. Thus, they only advertised what it would cost to build it on Earth - but not the launch, assemble and operational costs.) NASA has since the early 1970’s been desperately attempting to make progress on the leading edge of the envelop S&T with greatly under funded stretched out projects in a similar manner to the Soviet command economy grossly under funded in personnel and resources allocations that was imposed by the Soviet political, ministerial leadership on the Soviet manned lunar programs of the 1960 and early 1970’s. You do not make progress that way without destroying your industrial base for such strategic operational capabilities.

Oh and let us not forget the cry of the Republican apologists to the space industry in the 1970s and 1980s and even today that “free enterprise” & “commercial human spaceflight” is the answer to reducing the cost and complexity of space travel. The repeated failures of these “free enterprise” efforts to combine their efforts and resources to take on the repeatedly displayed complex difficulties of the rocket sciences invalidated that bad political joke for what it is: A Lie. Frankly this suggested “commercial free enterprise” answer to the space question has been taunted so long, that they have come to believe their own lies to themselves. It was and remains to this day a blatant abuse of this nation’s Sciences & Technological capabilities.

However encouragement matching funds from the Government through two flight test after acceptance by a tough S&T board charged with exploring the limits of the sciences and technologies involved before committing to its development as well as the economic technical viability of proposed projects programs from the civil sector should be considered both in space transportation systems and commercial aircraft programs. The government would in turn get that matching funds payback through free flights once operational flights begin. But it is equally abusive for NASA to not have a replacement for shuttle or a standardized manned spaceflight transportation system ready or working parallel with shuttle as was originally intended.

This Obama Administration is in fact trying a form of this suggestion through the COTS program for ISS crew and supplies transport with some success that is intended to restore competition to the Aerospace industry commercial sector to get better products and services at hopefully cheaper pricing which has yet to be established. This is instead of the former administration Defense Secretary’s post “Cold War” industry forced collapse melt down consolidation of the 100 or so Aerospace industry organizations down to a hand full of organizations. In reality the existing aerospace organizations are in fact commercial competitors as well as the new boys attempting to rearrange the rice bowl to become big companies receiving what was originally the established company’s domain. The Jury is still out deliberating on this and only time will tell whether it is not just a flash in a fry pan. Without ISS this program would not exist and the jury is out on it life duration possibilities.

Yes it is not the business of government to interfere with free enterprise but it is the business of government to maintain control that assures competition. If the government finds that it is in competition with free enterprise it must decide what is more adequate to meet its requirements for the nation at large. To date the smaller industries have been trying to compete with the larger established industries with government contending with its demanding requirements that has not been met to say the very least.

Add to this the fact that the NASA founding charter directive is dedicated to a constant Research and Development and Testing and Engineering (R&D&T&E) environment (that the greatly debilitated US aerospace industry base has also configured itself to accommodate the short life systems) that has created some serious fundamental incompatibility problems with the former Shuttle’s reusability, long-life systems design, and its maintenance-life cycle. The execution of the charter directive has also created conflict with the Soviet/Russian experience in high reliability, long-term full-systems life-production model (in excess of 40 to 60 years and more) along with the general Western aerospace industry base consolidation melt down that would have to be reconstituted are exacerbate points to the overall issue.

This conflict with NASA’s founding charter (and how it has been interpreted) must be changed in such a way as not to conflict with the space systems necessary reliability issues.

In short, we have been spinning our wheels since the early 1970s because we have been technologically “not there” in the critical S&T arenas as the past retiring NASA administrator has made so painfully clear when he called a halt and redirected the Space Launch Initiative. At the same time, he was trying to retain some semblance of a critical Propulsion Initiative with no directed a pplication in order to absorb the lessons learned from the crown jewels of Russian technology (the Russian rocket-engine, materials S&T) to make up for over 25-30 years plus of US National neglect. That successful effort is being sustained through joint NASA/USAF propulsion closed cycle kerosene, liquid oxygen demonstration program similar to what led to the Saturn-V’s F-1 engine of the 1960’s.

Astronaut Tom Stafford recommended that we put the F-1 engine back in production and he was right then and it still applies today.

What we need is a robust proven liquid propellant booster that can be put into production now with new updated flight avionics. No or very little new R&D and concentrate on the rebuild of the launch test infrastructure we are going to have to do anyway and the new robust safer than now Orion spacecraft. Any other R & D effort is extra as we are in a geopolitical Science and Technology Industrial base game for keeps and we are losing fast. I reject everything offered so far for serious inadequacy or serious safety issues and the required new R & D. Oh just how long did it take NASA to test fire the J-2 once the order was given to do so and how about the F-1 that Astronaut Thomas Stafford strongly suggested that we put back in production. Truly amazing and if we do not do it …..

As the person who did the initial background briefing in Huntsville, Alabama in the last half of the 1980s on Russian Rocket Engine technology (that brought that technology to the United States to be a pplied to U. S., Russian and other launch vehicles), we must learn these lessons before we can build any future replacement for the Shuttle that achieves the level of reusability required that the Soviets/Russians had already achieved with their engine systems technology. It is too bad this effort was not directed but it could be redirected, as the E-1 engine evolved to the F-1 engine in the late 50s and early 60’s, to develop improved closed-cycle versions of the F-1 engines used on the original Saturn-V to a pply to an improved Saturn-V that would use multiple contractors with more experience with the Russian technology that could eventually be a pplied to a real Shuttle fly back booster for the U. SW. Air Force down the road along with a full space exploration & development infrastructure. Finally development of the F-1A’s for the two or four strap kerosene lox strap-on boosters added to the improved super Saturn-V can be quickly achieved because 1.8 million pound thrust engine already developed only required a larger diameter turbo-pump shaft design. We really only need to develop new flight avionics modeled after Saturn’s proven flight avionics and that can be done with virtually off the shelf technology already available. Why reinvent the wheel for what already works. Added to that the development of a sea level version of the Hydrogen Oxygen M-1 engine called M-1A for a new Saturn-V first stage & first stage engine replacing the hydro-carbon stage as former Vice President Al Gore has strongly suggested can be accomplished later on to be in line with that policy.

To again paraphrase Dr. George Mueller, “If we can not launch Shuttle often enough to make it economically viable, then we would have been better off to have stayed with Saturn-V.”

The previously existing Shuttle system has been correctly characterized as “a dead end very dangerous, grossly expensive, very confining inflexible system” that the American space program could ill afford. Unfortunately we were dependent on the Space Shuttle to finish the assembly of the ISS which above all was designed to develop the systems lifetime durability technology to allow for future manned lunar bases and planetary manned missions and Hubble su pport missions, but once those were completed with absolutely minimum crews, Shuttle was finally retired and needs to be replaced by a more flexible launch vehicle system--like a modernized Saturn–V. Shortly the next 10 to 15 years of R&D&T&E planning for shifting to the systematic phasing in of the reconstituted infrastructure for the improved Saturn-V/Apollo-II Improved robust Orion-MPCV spacecraft must be sustained to meet any future space leadership challenges. How many Atlas, Titans, and Thor/delta booster did the U. S. produce in all configurations?

We should produce at least half of that many Saturn–V’s over time and sell it on that kind of commercial purchase pricing. This should dramatically reduce the cost to the U.S Aerospace industry primarily Boeing if presented as an unsolicited challenge contract proposal. Saturn-V which was becoming cheaper from its approximate $771,000,000.00 cost in pre-economic collapse dollars per booster and more reliable with time was put out of production at 15 plus boosters well short of the intended 74 boosters originally envisioned. Further, this Saturn universal space transportation systems must be kept in production through 300-500 vehicles or more for 45-50 years at a rate of 4-7 boosters a year with compatibility materials long term storability for planning and development of the missions payload national goals made possible by a known readily available reliable safe launch system which Shuttle was not to say the least. We must act now decisively because China is Challenging the US leadership in space regardless of what they say and we may wake up one morning between 2010 and 2020 based on China’s Forecast Planning statements that drive their capitalist economic zones supported command economy, Five Year Plans system and learn that China is about the eclipse the US space leadership as it launches an unmanned precursor to a manned lunar circumnavigation mission to later be followed by the planned 2025-2030 manned lunar landing. We can do this much sooner if we try.

Notes:

1. This chart as a guide reflect the approximate number of launch vehicles that are going to be required to support a human Lunar base and human Mars outpost for the next half century plus through its higher production type numbers.
2. It is apparent that only a 2% rate of failures can be maintained through the use of standardization of the same booster design like Saturn-V and Soyuz for all payloads in order to maintain such a high success rate of 97-98 % with proper quality control.

 

A further expansion of the ISS should also consider in the near term combining the Evolutionary Expendable Launch Vehicle, EELV with a revised reusable ICM (Interim Control Module) revised to a space tug tasking for station modules logistics and a required shuttle re-supply emergencies vehicle. A revised crew rated clustered EELV Delta-4 Heavy variant should be considered as interim assured space transportation access vehicle for the Apollo-II Improved robust Apollo-II Orion-MPCV spacecraft until the improved Saturn-V comes on line. Longer term production and utilization of the improved EELV must be kept available to supplement the Saturn operational missions. In Part some of this is being addressed by the NASA, “COTS” projects.

Saturn-V could be launched on time, on demand with greater flexibility than any Shuttle system will ever give us at a level of unsurpassed safety reliability. In pure economic terms, this makes the system more economical or less costly by any standard by any manned launch system (except possibly Soyuz) at a consistently far cheaper price than any Shuttle system or shuttle derived system or SLS system would ever allow.

We must not forget the Apollo lessons learned as well as the Soviet manned Lunar program lessons learned that you do not attempt to assemble four to 10 vehicles in earth orbit without an assemble harbor for the safety quality control requirements. That is why the U. S. went to the Saturn-V design and why the Soviets went to the N1-L3 design all up mission configuration and if ISS is to be sacrificed then we have to return to Saturn-V.

Attempts to redesign and up rate the yet to be fully proven EELV’s Delta-4/Atlas-5 class boosters to a human rated super heavy lift would cost essentially as much as if not more than it would to bring back an improved proven highly reliable Saturn-V with in the same time frame. To attempt to replace the former Shuttle by returning to Shuttle derived Solid Rocket boosters with an upper stage medium lift booster for the improved robust Apollo-II Orion MPCV with far less assurance of safety and reliability and shuttle derived heavy lift boosters is to return to the mistakes of the past. One is forced to ask the question of how many times do we have to fly with this shuttle hardware and how many crews do we have to kill before we learn the lesson that this is not the way to go? To attempt to cluster seven Delta-4’s common stages to replace the Ares-1 first stage in an unwieldy cluster with no cross feed is to recreate the very dangerous design seen in the past for engine out and propellant cross feed capability much less the hydrogen gas between the tanks explosion and demonstrated fire risk. That is why Saturn-V was designed as it was to eliminate those safety issues.

 

Note: The excess thrust/payload capacity gives and provides for added payload capacity 39-66 tons applicable to the MPCV spacecraft testing as well as a payload re-supply module for ISS. This is greater than the 25 tons capacity of the Ares-1

Ref; http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saturn_INT-20

We were successful with the Apollo Saturn-V approach so stay with what works safely, reliably on time on demand because without that you can not conduct a human lunar base and Mars mission outpost operation.

To paraphrase John F. Kennedy, “If we are not prepared to do what is required to get the job done it would be better that we not go at all.” I submit that that decision has long since been made we are committed and it had better not change.

In short, the political leadership of the United States especially the White House has “perfected the art of spending billions producing nothing” (1), had better get its S&T su pport act together, and let us be about the business of putting and improved version of Saturn-V back in production and an accelerated modernized Apollo-II capsule Improved robust Orion MPCV spacecraft system in development (as strongly suggested by several Industry, Astronaut studies). This combination would not only be ISS-applicable from which a spacecraft assembly harbor would have to be built, but also deep space, Asteroid, lunar, Martian, as well as supportive of the orbital space plane effort requirements. Continued or reworked “Paper Studies” would amount to nothing less than a continuation of the previous administration’s abuse of the S & T resources of the U.S. However reacquiring the Saturn-V NASA Industry drawings and technical documentation of the vehicle and its infrastructure and digitizing them and then modernizing them with new flight avionics for instance and limited materials changes along with a refocused closed cycle rocket engine effort would go a long ways towards laying the foundation for the “return to the Moon and onward to Deep Space and eventually Mars” as has been proposed by this administration. What we must concentrate on for the human lunar, mars missions is further noted by Mr. Mark Wade when he stated “…When people have talked about long term space travel for all these years, and no test of fundamental things in orbit - e.g. long term (several years) cryogenic propellant storage and re-liquefaction now under contract studies for NASA, - artificial G rotating stations (e.g. determining whether it will really work, and what the actual design parameters would be, as opposed to endless study of the human organism in weightlessness) - measure actual radiation doses of various shielding methods for use on the Lunar/Deep Space/Martian Moons, surface and in Mars transits.

Until these fundamental things are studied in orbit - and over a period of years - one cannot think of going to Mars. Yet the experiments have never even been proposed. Instead just endless discredited microgravity materials studies, human organism in zero G, etc etc. ….”

Certainly ISS was as previously noted developed with the intention to demonstrate the long term durability reliability of system for the Lunar Base and Mars/outpost missions and base requirements but this seems to have been lost on all concerned. So goes the ISS program so goes the space program is the plan.

Furthermore, reacquiring Saturn-V’s support launch infrastructure which we are going to have to do anyway regardless of which way we go now that ISS construction is completed (and the remaining Shuttle fleet is now grounded and placed in museums as the mistake it was and its lessons learned) can meet all challenges from our would-be challengers to our space leadership (such as China). Saturn-V should have its support thrust hold down points rotated 45 degrees or put on a rotatable ring to accommodate two or four liquid propellant strap-on boosters if required with Russian styled grates to replace its four fins to clear the tower during launch. They would be deployed once the tower is cleared.

The Greed driven Washington styled parties political game of self congratulations that is totally abusive reflects the almost 40 years of greed driven decisions that have so abuse the space program since the Nixon era.

Several times now congress did not even punt much less step up to the plate and force the administrations to do it right preferring to keep that payoff status quo. Not merely do the politicians appropriate for the job they also appropriate for their next election in the submitted legislation which industry duly appropriates back as campaign appropriation no matter how it is masqueraded.

It really rattles one to see this kind of assault that is nothing less than greed based that is totally out of control tearing this country to shreds and they are still at it like lemmings on a sinking ship on an incestuous feeding frenzy get even sacrifices that is truly sickening. We are in political policy self-destruct mode from my perspective over here. I have great fears for the US space effort that is already too late. Has this country become so elitist politically partisan charged out of control greed padding that the citizenry have to contemplate the unthinkable against its own government and its agencies to restore many aspects of governance enforcement of policy & fiscal responsibility for the present generation and especially our future generation’s relevance? Unfortunately today the obvious is all too apparent.

The game is lost in the face of Chinese competition so we must step back and rethink and do it right for our free world spacefarers. We just might get lucky and win again because we have done our homework before hand!

The U.S. federal government is to blame for this short fall of US space access capability. It should have ordered an updated modernized Saturn-V first and third stage into production instead of the U.S. Congress trying to be the dictating political election payoff design bureau followed by the Office of Management & Budget trying again to be the governing design bureau on behalf of the White House. It is the same political meddling process that gave us the dead end project that was the very dangerous Space Shuttle. Now the SLS is getting the same treatment. How many times do we have to go this way before we learn that this is not the way to go? The US has gotten exactly what it deserves and this is no reflection on our Russian partners that will correct the problems their way and get back to flight operations.

The world knows we are no longer a world power as they rush to fill the vacuum but what is filling that vacuum leaves me in great fear for humanity. We sold our industrial base destroying our strength end up loosing the final acts of the cold war and for what. And for what! To rebuild the space effort is to rebuild the once mighty economic industrial base that was America ’s strength. Saturn-V can also get us back on-track with our cooperative partners to where we belong: The leading space fairing power which the American people demand. In short put Saturn-V back in production. President Obama you need to make a speech in Huntsville , Alabama ordering it in short to “put Saturn-V back in production”.

1. Mark Wade , Encyclopedia Astronautica , http://www.astronautix.com/, astronautix@gmail.com, Wade, Mark, Personal communication e-mails between cpvick & mark wade March-02-05

2. China ’s Space Industry Forecasting, http://www.globalsecurity.org/space/world/china/china's_space_industry_forecasting.htm

3. China and Russia Challenging the Space Leadership of the United States, http://www.globalsecurity.org/space/library/report/2006/060421-prc-cpvick.htm

4. Hainan / Wenchang, http://www.globalsecurity.org/space/world/china/sanya.htm

5. Holder, William G., Saturn-V The Moon Rocket, Julian Messner, New York, 1969-70.