Scientific American, June, 1996
The Space Station's Disappointing Odyssey [Editorial]
Through three presidential administrations and a dozen
years of planning and replanning, advocates of the
International Space Station (in all its incarnations) have
sold it with pitches ranging from the romantic to the
pragmatic. They have called it our steppingstone to Mars
and the other planets. As a laboratory and forerunner of
space manufacturing facilities, it would yield potentially
marvelous scientific and technological benefits. And work
on building the station would pay off in jobs in the
aerospace industry and others.
A not so funny thing happened on the way to the launchpad:
the middle set of those arguments fell out. As Tim
Beardsley details in "Science in the Sky," [see Web site
below], the scientific and technological capabilities of
the station have been compromised to the point that many
researchers question the worth of the station altogether.
Of course, the station is still the only place to learn how
people will fare in microgravity. NASA has stated that this
is now the station's primary goal, and it is a good one
because it does keep alive our dream of exploring the
cosmos in the flesh. Still, even the most loyal fans of the
space program must admit to the tautology -- we should be
in space because we want to be in space -- in this
justification.
The economic arguments seem to have had most sway over
Washington, which fears killing the station and putting
voters out of work. Moreover, the project is now also
supposed to keep Russia's scientific establishment well
employed and out of mischief. Thus, humankind's greatest
adventure reduces to a high-tech jobs program and an
instrument of foreign policy.
As a child of the space age, I feel cheated. But should I?
The Apollo program was clearly a weapon of national
prestige and a technological engine during the cold war,
but going to the moon was a glorious adventure nonetheless.
Economics and politics have never been alien to the manned
space program. Moreover, creating jobs and opportunities to
spin off new technologies are desirable ends.
But if enthusiasm for follow-up space missions evaporates,
and work on the station has failed to deliver down-to-earth
benefits, an angry electorate will be wondering why so much
money was wasted. And if keeping the aerospace industry
occupied on a meaningless project distracts it from the
more economically vital job of reinventing itself for
post-cold war competitiveness, the $27-billion price tag of
the station may be higher than we imagine.
It will be very nice to have a working space station. It's
a pity that we'll be getting this one.
John Rennie, Editor in Chief, editors@xxxxxxxxx
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To read "Science in the Sky" see:
http://pwp.usa.pipeline.com/~jya/iss.txt