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OpEd: Beyond the Moon

Source: Doug Stetson & Jim Bell, "OpEd: Beyond The Moon," Space News, February 3, 2009.
http://www.space.com/spacenews/archive09/stetsonoped_0202.html

On Dec. 4, 2008, NASA held a press conference to discuss the issues surrounding the delay of the Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) to 2011. This event was remarkable for two reasons:

* First, it demonstrated that the technical concerns and judgments of the JPL engineering team could in fact lead management to make an unpalatable decision with significant programmatic implications — in other words, the system worked as intended to ensure success for such a complex and costly mission.

* Second, it provided context for NASA science chief Ed Weiler's announcement of a new commitment to an international Mars exploration program. This recognizes that future advances in Mars surface exploration beyond MSL promise to be exceptionally challenging but also tremendously rewarding, and should be planned and undertaken as a global endeavor.

The Planetary Society recognized this global imperative in "Beyond the Moon: A New Roadmap for Human Space Exploration in the 21st Century." In that document we emphasized that the coming years represent "an opportunity for American leadership of a peaceful international collaboration," dedicated to exploration and discovery and guided by the long-range vision of eventual human missions to Mars. The complexity and cost of such an effort dictate that it must be planned from the outset as a cooperative program in which investments are "synergistic rather than duplicative" — not one perceived as an Apollo-style juggernaut in which international participation is an afterthought.

More than that, though, a truly international program will be unifying and inspirational, and will send a clear signal that the new administration is committed to leading the nation in new, innovative, inclusive ways. And once having established this global enterprise in the context of space science and exploration, "America can direct this spirit of cooperation to other important areas, including increasing our understanding of global climate change and other threats to planet Earth."

The roadmap describes a number of steps toward Mars that should be integrated into a flexible program, driven not by artificial schedules but by scientific and technological progress, budgetary and political realities, and the evolution of international and commercial space exploration capabilities. These steps include:

* retiring the space shuttle as soon as possible, according to plan;

* using the international space station for research into the human factors of long-duration spaceflight;

* demonstrating interplanetary flight by making the first human mission beyond Earth's gravitational influence; and

 * conducting the first human missions to near-Earth objects to learn how to use their resources and mitigate the threat of impacts.

 Each of these steps represents clear progress toward Mars and is also an important technical and cultural milestone in its own right. Missions to the Moon also should be part of this international plan, for scientific research, for identifying and utilizing resources, and for demonstrating surface exploration capabilities. However, lunar exploration must be clearly planned and perceived as part of the larger vision, not as an end in itself as it was during Apollo. Lunar missions should be done at the time when they are of greatest benefit to the long-range architecture, when they are affordable, and when they can be enhanced by the burgeoning suite of international and commercial capabilities. The roadmap also recommends enhancing planetary science, including fundamental space science research, an international Mars sample return mission, and integration of robotic and human exploration goals and capabilities into a synergistic program.

The international space station represents the potential and the promise, as well as the challenge, of international space exploration. Access to the international space station must be assured as the new transportation system is being developed, but we urge the new administration to continue on the present path to retire the space shuttle as soon as possible. Failure to do so will jeopardize the budget and schedule for its replacement, and will add more years to the time when humankind will finally venture beyond Earth orbit — and beyond the Moon.

As stated in The Planetary Society's roadmap, "Mars exploration is a unifying objective worthy of a new global partnership for peaceful exploration of the planets and the universe beyond." The small step recently announced by Ed Weiler, with little fanfare and in the context of what was felt by many to be a disappointing day, may in the future be looked upon as a defining moment in space science and exploration. It may represent the moment when the United States started down a path toward a true commitment to an international program of robotic and, eventually, human exploration of the planet Mars.

Doug Stetson is a consultant to The Planetary Society and founder of the Space Science and Exploration Consulting Group; Jim Bell is president of The Planetary Society and a planetary scientist at Cornell University.