A First Space Brief to the New President

Running for office is (very) hard work, as you know all too well.  But when an election is over, the even harder work of governing begins.  Space may not be the first item on any new President’s agenda.  But the future and direction of the United States in space will be an important governance issue, with long-term implications in your administration.

By nearly any measure, the United States is clearly the world’s premier leader in space.  With an annual civil-space budget of nearly US $20B, the United States has most recently visited Pluto, Ceres, and Vesta, and placed the Juno probe in orbit around Jupiter.  The world continues to be amazed with imagery from Hubble Space Telescope and the discovery of new planets around distant stars made possible with Kepler.  The US remains the only nation to have successfully landed an operating spacecraft on Mars, a feat accomplished with increasing complexity, size, and mobility since Viking I landed on July 20, 1976.  The International Space Station is - often literally - one of the brightest stars in the sky, with over 15 continuous years of inhabitation and ongoing research activities, while also serving as an exemplar of positive international collaboration, even when the terrestrial relationships among partners are strained.  The efforts of the National Science Foundation (NSF) in space activities has led to the first-ever detection of Gravitational Radiation, opening a new window on how we can observe the Universe.

The new face of so-called “Commercial Space,” seeded in part from initial NASA investments made during the Bush-43 Administration, has grown vibrantly, and beyond the sphere of launch vehicles, into areas of Earth Observation, micro-satellites, payload processing and satellite servicing.  The sector has seen significant influxes of private equity capital and financing to a large number of start-up companies, nearly $2B of Venture Capital in 2015 alone.  In March 2006, President George W. Bush’s science advisor Dr. John Marburger reflected that the questions of progress in space exploration boiled down to ‘whether we want to incorporate the Solar System in our economic sphere, or not.’  While certainly not complete, we have moved - and continue to move - a long way in this direction.

SpaceX has demonstrated the ability to repeatedly land a rocket booster-stage after deploying satellites to orbit, and Blue Origin continues to repeatedly fly and land its New Shepard spacecraft, to and from the boundary of space.  Long-standing space companies such as Boeing, Lockheed-Martin, and Orbital/ATK operate side-by-side with newer entrants such as Sierra Nevada and SpaceX in delivering cargo - and soon people - to low-Earth orbit on a commercial contract basis with NASA.  Many of these companies have leveraged previous government investment in technology - SpaceX leveraging the NASA Fastrac rocket engine, Bigelow leveraging the NASA TransHab inflatable habitat design, and Sierra Nevada’s work building upon NASA HL-20 lifting body research, to name three) as foundations of their new and more advanced work, showing the long-term value of previous Federal investments in civil space.

Less is known publicly - as is appropriate - about activities in National Security space.  However some notable successes here are also evident.  Precise positioning through the use of US-developed GPS has transformed our economy in many ways, and immensely for the better.  Satellite-based positioning was derived directly from Department of Defense applications, and is used today almost without thinking, for activities as varied as finding a ride across town, providing directions across the country, or even playing Pokemon.  Over the past decade, the X-37 reusable space vehicle has executed three separate missions, with a fourth still ongoing, providing a high-quality testbed for advanced technologies and capabilities.  US imaging and information gathering capabilities remain state-of-the-art, and are significant assets in protecting the physical, economic, and strategic security of the United States.

This is not to say that the agenda of space is without significant challenges.  Development costs for the James Webb Space Telescope and other important scientific missions continue to exceed expectations, in part because our "technology readiness" for these missions is underestimated or simply difficult to estimate accurately from the start.  Our Earth observation infrastructure - critical for weather prediction, storm tracking, and scientific research - is aging and growing obsolete.  By the time you have completed your first 100 days in office, over 2,100 days will have passed since the conclusion of the last US-launched human spaceflight mission, the longest such gap in our history.  The US currently has no indigenous operating capability to put humans into space, a feature wholly inconsistent with ‘space leadership.’  The US remains entirely reliant on Russia for transport of our Astronauts to and from low-Earth orbit, as well as in using the Russian-built RD-180 rocket engine to launch highly valuable and essential payloads to orbit on the Atlas-V launch vehicle.  At the same time, other nations have vastly expanded their spaceflight activities and capabilities.  China has become the third nation to develop human spaceflight capabilities, has landed robotic spacecraft on the Moon, and recently deployed the first satellite for use in distributing quantum-based encryption keys from orbit.  India enjoyed a record number of satellite launches in 2015, to advance their national infrastructure and to support scientific and commercial space activities.  The capabilities and activities of other nations are often a global benefit, but can be also perceived as a real threat to the security and reliability of US assets in space, not to mention our position as a global leader in space.

We live in a very different time than when President John F. Kennedy issued a bold challenge to ‘go to the Moon’ and the Nation responded by landing Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin on the Sea of Tranquility in July 1969, while Michael Collins kept watch from lunar orbit above.  Although our world is very different nearly 50 years later, the impetus for a ‘Presidential Vision’ for space often still recurs.  Both Bush Administrations issued a “Vision for Space Exploration,” as did the Obama Administration.  None of these came to fruition, at least not fully, and in some cases can be argued to have done damage to the long-term trajectory of the United States and our role in space.  Nevertheless, each new administration naturally takes a “look under the hood,” to understand what is in place, to see what is working well, and understand what might need to be changed.  

The message to your incoming administration is three-fold: 

• First, the state of US Space activities, as measured “across the board” is very strong.  It must remain so. 
• Second, the United States must re-instantiate the lunar surface as a next primary ‘waypoint’ in our human exploration of the solar system.  Our global partners in space are most interested in human spaceflight to the lunar surface, as demonstrated (for example) by extensive discussions within the European Space Agency regarding the concept of “Moon Village.”  Other nations, such as China, are also interested in human exploration of the lunar surface.  For technical, sustainability, and global leadership reasons, the US should announce and demonstrate our commitment to lead humanity back to the surface of the Moon, following on to our last visit in December 1972. 
• Third, there are a few important places where notable adjustments - but not disruptive change - need to be made.  A de-novo (and yet another) “Presidential Vision” for space exploration, a “bold new goal,” or structuring US space activities as campaigning (what space can do to fortify particularly this new administration and simultaneously “throw shade” on political opponents), rather than governing (how can we use space to further our National interests), will inflict further serious damage to the Nation, in an environment where we are still recovering from both the removal of the Moon as a next primary destination and the aftermath of the instantiation of the last “vision.”  We do not do this with the Navy, the IRS, the National Park Service, the Library of Congress, or Homeland Security. We should not do this in space either.  We can do much better this time. We have to.

Instead of a “new vision,” America needs an integrated space strategy - one that coherently binds the realms of National Security, Civilian, and Commercial Space - to further our National interests, and uses space as an active tool of foreign and domestic policy to create better social, economic, educational, and quality-of-life outcomes, here and abroad.  Much like the “RGB” admixture needed to make every color on your computer screen, space activities are a dynamic palette, on which one can combine the “red” of National Security, the “blue” of Civilian Space activities, and the “green” (literal and figurative) of Commercial Space, into virtually any color required in order to fortify America’s scientific, economic, and security interests.

In light of an overall picture of strength, and yet a need to improve in some areas of emphasis, here are some recommendations for your incoming Administration:

• Treat US Federal Expenditures on Space as Investments:  Unlike ‘spending money,’ the expenditures we make on space bring real, tangible, and convertible equity to the United States, and for the long term.  Working with Congress under improved relations than have been in place before, seek to stabilize continually the funding for NASA and its programs - which include support for commercial spaceflight activities - along with National Security Space, in order to maintain focus on the generation of integrated, long-term benefit, rather than short-term gain.  Investments in NASA, NOAA, NSF, and other similar activities are akin to the 401(k) savings account for our country.  We may never be able to invest as much as we would like, or certainly as much as we could imagine.  But we must invest, and that investment should be proportional to the size of the National endeavor, not just the size of the Federal budget.  Establish a goal to maintain NASA funding as a (small) fraction of overall GDP, able to grow (or contract) with the size of the economy which requires investment for the future.

• Restore the Lunar Surface as our next waypoint in human exploration.  The Obama Administration was poorly served in being advised to remove the lunar surface as the next waypoint on our journey beyond low-Earth orbit.  Independent of the program implementations used to get there, the lunar surface offers the closest, most convenient, resource-rich, and affordable environment in which to gain a foot-hold outside of low-Earth orbit, and serve as a jumping-off point for further exploration into the solar system, notably Mars.  The current “Asteroid Mission” trajectory is an unsustainable, one-off, and largely unsupported direction, containing minimal scientific, engineering, or strategic value to the long-term space leadership status of the US.  The posture of “Been there, done that,” and removal of the Moon as our next waypoint, has done significant damage to the United States in technical and geopolitical arenas.  Re-instantiating the Moon aligns us with the balance of the space-faring world regarding where they wish to explore next (e.g., ESA’s “Moon Village” concept) but cannot themselves lead.  The rest of the world will pursue this goal, either with US leadership, or with the leadership of China and other nations who can both afford and can technically execute lunar surface missions.

• Step up our International Leadership and Collaboration:  The United States is seen globally as the leader in space, and many of our collaborators are waiting for us to lead.  Later this year, the European Space Agency will meet in its ministerial summit to address many important issues, things like “To what extent should we consider supporting the ISS further?”  They look to the United States for clear indications of the direction and mode we wish to go, so that they can follow suit.  During the 1970’s, the United States collaborated with the Soviet Union in the flight of Apollo-Soyuz.  This work paved the way for significant future collaboration, yielding benefits today in the form of the International Space Station, and the only means we have currently to launch US astronauts into space.  It is time to consider the strategic value of these kinds of carefully planned and focused activities with China, India, and other space-faring nations with whom we have not traditionally been partnered.  And where we make commitments, we need to keep them.  

• Extend the life of the International Space Station:  The ISS represents 30 years of our best engineering, complex systems design and operation, and international collaboration.  It is ‘fresh real-estate’ on which to develop a variety of scientific, economic, and engineering activities.  We have only just begun to generate the return on over $100B of US investment in learning to live and work in space, along with the investments made by our International partners.  With an innovative spirit and a tolerance for business-model risk (or failure), build innovative partnerships with the private sector to continue the life and value of the ISS beyond 2024, as long as the hardware on-orbit will enable us to substantially maintain a level of safety and usability.  Having secured this foot-hold in low-Earth orbit, however imperfect it may be, relinquishing this asset will set our efforts back 50 years.

• Support commercial crew and cargo to the International Space Station, while finishing and operating the civilian Space Launch System (SLS) and Orion.  These two objectives are deeply intertwined.   Incorporation of the Solar System into our economic sphere will begin with those activities that are less complex, require less (literal) energy, and for which coherent business models are more straightforward to construct.  This, to first order, is simply driven by the extent and duration for which one pushes farther outside the Earth’s gravitational well.  Commercial cargo to LEO has had some setbacks - three launch-vehicle related failures (two in flight, and one on the launch pad most recently) from two different providers.  But this business model is working well, has been supported by NASA and Congress, and should continue to be fortified.  Commercial crew to LEO will come in time - perhaps not as fast as we would like, but the advent of this opportunity is clear.  This should also be fortified.  However, enhancing the activity of the commercial sector in low-Earth orbit cannot come at the expense of the inherently governmental activities beyond low-Earth orbit for which there is not yet a business model, where risk is simply too great for the market to bear, where sufficient capital cannot be raised, where commercial business organizations and management structures are not aligned to make success most probable, or where commercial interests simply are not aligned with National interests.  SLS and Orion are the best means of implementation we have at the moment to return to the lunar surface and extend into the Solar System, given our current position and existing boundary conditions under which we are operating.

• Consider the question of whether NASA should continue as an ‘independent agency:’  What is the role of NASA in furthering our National Interests?  Clearly in the 1960’s the answer to this question was very straightforward.  But not so now.  If NASA is to be an important and integrated tool in foreign and domestic policy, it should also be organizationally integrated to the governing structure.  If NASA’s mission is primarily to execute space missions for future technology pull, in order to advance the foundational basis of our economy, then perhaps - like NOAA - it needs to be part of the Department of Commerce.  If NASA’s mission is to perform scientific and engineering research in the context of spaceflight, and spaceflight is seen as a transportation issue, then perhaps NASA needs to be part of the Department of Transportation, like the Federal Aviation Administration.  If we are recognizing that science and engineering research, technology, and innovation are the backbone of our new economy, perhaps we need to align NASA, NOAA, NIST, and other similar agencies into a ‘Department of the Future.’  Whatever answer comes out, the outcome must move the structure and form of the government to further the interests of the United States as they exist for tomorrow, and not as they existed at the formation of the space age.

Simply put, space is not a luxury.  It is not a campaign tool, nor is it a “nice to have” for our country.  Space is an essential function of Government in the 21st Century.  Our activities in space help "form more a more perfect union" (both “the Union,” proper, and collaboration among unions for a greater whole).  Space helps “provide for the common defense” of the United States and our allies.  Space “promotes the general welfare” of the country at home and abroad - through things such as the advancement and development of new knowledge and technology, enhanced economic competitiveness, and increased stature in the world.  All of these activities help “secure the blessings of liberty” for ourselves and our posterity.  In other words, our activities in National Security, Civil, and Commercial Space are well-aligned to the purposes for which our Government was founded.

Your new administration has the obligation to steward these space investments and activities to secure the optimal long-term return for the United States.