To save NASA, does Charles Bolden need to go to China?
By Eric Berger on February 4, 2013 at 10:12 AM
In Sunday's Chronicle I had a long story about the future of U.S. human spaceflight, which overall was pretty pessimistic. Here's the top of the story: On the sun-streaked day before the final shuttle space shuttle launch in July of 2011, the nation's spaceflight chief, NASA administrator Charles Bolden, was adamant with reporters.
"The future of human spaceflight is bright. I'm going to say this over and over, so you might as well print it," he said at Kennedy Space Center in Florida.
No doubt Bolden would say the same today.
Chinese lunar exploration program.
Yet, 18 months after the shuttle program's end, as the space community reflects on 10 years since Columbia's disintegration, some industry insiders would use a less charitable word to describe the space program's future: rudderless.
That's also the conclusion of two recent reports on the space agency: NASA lacks a clear human spaceflight goal, and it lacks funds to carry out an ambitious program.
If you're interested in some of the reasons why the future of NASA is troubled, despite the happy talk from Congress and the agency itself, I'd advise you to spend some time watching this panel of space experts who recently discussed these issues at Rice University's Baker Institute. They cover a lot of the challenges facing NASA, which principally are the lack clear human spaceflight goal, lack of political will and a lack of funds to carry out an ambitious program.
Interestingly, the panel almost universally advises Congress to allow NASA to do what it has been prohibited from doing until now: work with China.
During the panel discussion, Joan Johnson-Freese, a professor of national security affairs at the U.S. Naval War College, sums it up thusly, "If you think China is a competitor, then keep them close so you know what they are doing. If you don't think China is a competitor, then keep them close and let them pay the bills. Either way I don't see the downside."
China has the money and the will to do great things in space. NASA has more of the know-how. Bringing China  -  and eventually India, Brazil and other rising nations  -  into the existing international partnership could create a truly global partnership.
I noted today that Bill Nye, chief executive of The Planetary Society, has expressed a similar view of the United States and China working in space.
To those who say there's no way the United States could ever work closely with such an economic and military rival, I would simply ask them who currently takes U.S. astronauts  -  safely, I might add  -  into space.
It won't be easy. Politics rarely is. But for NASA, it may be critical. Categories: National, Space Tags: charles bolden | china | nasa Eric Berger View Comments Connect with SciGUy Blog Search