I speculated yesterday that there was a connection between the NASA-Pentagon-Ares-EELV issue and the delay in appointing a new NASA administrator. Now the issue is being more fully reported in the Houston Chronicle.
It’s actually my thought that the appointment of a general may not be a bad idea. Everyone respects generals and it’s not a given that one would be parochial about using a military vehicle. Plus, two generals (Lew Allen, Pete Worden) have gone on to run NASA centers with great success. Someone at that level may have the clout to stand firm against the powerful interests involved and actually make the right choices for the right reasons. Here’s what the “Chron” had to say:
WASHINGTON — During the past few weeks, the names of three retired generals have floated around Washington and Houston as candidates for the top job at NASA.
Each time, though, aides to President Barack Obama failed to say whether they had selected the space agency’s administrator, and the guessing game continued.
Now, some supporters of the manned space program with ties to NASA say that one of the key reasons for the prolonged selection process is that powerful politicians and rival space contractors are maneuvering behind the scenes to influence the choice.
At stake is a multi-billion-dollar project to develop the Ares rocket for the space shuttle replacement.
Read the full Houston Chronicle article
T. Keith Glennan, First NASA Administrator
NASA is a large and amazing organization, always embroiled in its own dramas – funding, priorities, battles between behemoth contractors with increasing noise from smaller startups, the ongoing bungee-cord balance between science, safety, cost, manned flight considerations, defense vs commercial vs exploration, US dominance vs all the other countries, and on and on. The latest issues to bump heads are the future of Ares, and the appointment of a new NASA administrator.
By now, you would have thought that a new administrator would be in place. Instead, there is no more activity than a few names being floated around. Interestingly, there are several from the military world. This plays into the other issue, that there are those who think that we should abandon Ares and go with military launch vehicles instead.
I’m not going to get into that line of reasoning here (Jeff Krukin has some thoughts), but I will say that it plays into the old assumption that political and other appointees will be parochial and come in with agendas. A military NASA administrator would be assumed to automatically support the use of military vehicles, for example. I’m not sure if that’s true or if a military appointee would necessarily be a bad thing (General Lew Allen had a good run as director of JPL in the 80’s, for example, and Pete Worden is happily ensconced at Ames) but it will certainly bring in a different perspective. Some people might argue that it’s not fruitful to have dual-track vehicle programs at all.
Anyway, for your interest here are links to a few people whose names are currently floating around as possible nominees for NASA administrator:
Spaceports has a longer but older (Dec ‘08) list here.
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Here’s a excellent opportunity for you to get up to date space news and information right on your desktop: the Space Info Toolbar . If at any time you see a yellow warning bar across the top of your browser asking you to confirm installation, click on “Allow.”
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Easy install – so try it out now. Need more information? Watch this 5 minute video I made about the Space Info Toolbar . (Please wait a moment for the video to load when the new window opens).
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Select any text on the web page you are on, and that text will automatically show up in the search bar, ready for a Google search. For instance, select the word Ares here and see how it shows up in the search bar.
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From the Orlando Sentinel, a reported phone call from Mike Griffin, the NASA administrator:
Industry officials say that a few days later, Griffin called Robert Stevens, the CEO of Lockheed Martin Corp., which jointly owns ULA together with Boeing Co., and demanded that Stevens stop what Griffin called the subsidiary’s efforts to “kill Ares I” by promoting versions of its own rockets that could carry humans to space.
Maybe Mike Griffin should get his wife to call. She seems to be doing pretty good rallying people around the effort to keep the Administrator in his job.
There was a lot of talk this week about the possible decision by the Obama team to merge certain NASA and military activities – specifically, to use existing military vehicles to loft humans into space.
The issues are these:
- The US sees itself in a race with China to return to the moon. China is moving ahead with its own space program. It’s already achieved lunar orbit, there was a spacewalk earlier this year, and it plans for an unmanned moon landing in 2013, followed by a manned mission in 2020, dates approximate.
- Pentagon launch vehicles such as Delta and Atlas are well established, at least the names. There is talk of scrapping the new Ares rocket program currently under development and using existing military launch vehicles instead. The Pentagon likes this idea, of course. NASA is balking, and there is unfortunately publicized discord between the Obama administration and NASA’s Republican-appointed administrator, whose wife is actively campaigning for him to keep his job.
- Finally, there is the ever present talk of cost savings. Everyone’s got an opinion on that topic, including me. Undoubtedly, the reports and analysis will start unfolding soon.
Here’s my singular thought for now. The last vehicle that we got from the military was the Hummer. Isn’t there a lesson here? Food for thought.
More reading:
