Subject:
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Re: Some good news for a change, maybe?
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.off-topic.debate
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Date:
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Wed, 23 Jun 2004 15:32:45 GMT
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Viewed:
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1342 times
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In lugnet.off-topic.debate, J. Spencer Rezkalla wrote:
> In lugnet.off-topic.debate, Larry Pieniazek wrote:
>
> > Each and every one a bad decision. You're making my point for me. NASA wanted to
> > be shut of the Saturn any way it could, and it's a typical bureacratic tactic to
> > get rid of (or build) one thing that no one will notice, then use that as
> > justification for the next, till you've got the whole thing gone (or built, as
> > the case may be)
>
> Did it? Wasn't it Congress who wasn't too keen on buying more Saturns and cut
> the remaining moon missions and all the cool future Apollo applications projects
> that NASA DID want.
True. But it's difficult if not impossible to divorce NASA and Congress. NASA
does what Congress tells it to do.
> The shuttle was then sold as a way to get more
> bang-for-the-buck and as a way to possibly entice Congress into throwing bucks
> for more additional space stuff in the future. Of course it didn't quite work
> out that way.
>
> Why would you want to keep any of it? Your actual point is the Saturn should
> never have been exchanged for the shuttle program in the first place,
You're sort of trying to put words in my mouth here and I have to correct you,
I'm afraid...
No, the point is why (in 1969) kill off or plan to kill off a perfectly good
program for heavy lift? NASA should have fought harder to keep it. While the
blame mostly goes to Congress. the REAL point is that government is wasteful and
inefficient. Even the best parts, like NASA.
> not that
> once the shuttle was approved, NASA took deliberate steps by destroying the
> infrastructure to insure the Saturn could no longer be used and couldn't be kept
> as a future option.
Do you deny that they did this? Whether their hand was forced by Congress or
whether they decided to burn their bridges behind them or whatever, it was
nevertheless, at the time, and now in hindsight, a bad decision.
> I can't see any economic justification for paying to keep
> just part of the Saturn system potentially viable for all these years.
Me either. Not my point. The whole system should have been kept. Tooling was
just the most visible part.
> There are
> enough heavy lift shuttle deriviative concepts that would make better sense now
> anyway.
NOW there are. But not then.
Imagine a different world in which we saw dozens of Saturn launches a year,
building up space manufacturing infrastructure. By now we'd have the flying cars
we were promised. (rhetorical comment)
Killing off Saturn was a stupid thing to do, no matter who you pin the blame on.
And no matter who it is, it's someone in government.
QED.
Killing off Saturn is just one of many things that NASA, or if you like,
government in general, has done to hobble commercial space.
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Message has 1 Reply:
 | | Re: Some good news for a change, maybe?
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| (...) Probably. But how many major aerospace endeavors come off exactly like they sound on paper? Hindsight is always 20/20. I certainly wouldn't call the shuttle program a huge mistake. Sure, it didn't deliver the promised goods, but I believe the (...) (20 years ago, 23-Jun-04, to lugnet.off-topic.debate)
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Message is in Reply To:
| | Re: Some good news for a change, maybe?
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| (...) Did it? Wasn't it Congress who wasn't too keen on buying more Saturns and cut the remaining moon missions and all the cool future Apollo applications projects that NASA DID want. The shuttle was then sold as a way to get more bang-for-the-buck (...) (20 years ago, 23-Jun-04, to lugnet.off-topic.debate)
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