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Milspace policy analysis

A couple of articles in this week’s issue of The Space Review focus on some cutting-edge issues in military space policy. Matthew Hoey takes an extensive look at the latest developments in space technology, including small satellites and responsive launch, and wonders if this is the first step towards anti-satellite weapons and other space weaponry. Hoey believes that would be an unsettling development: “Many people believe that a deployed anti-satellite capability and an ability to attack targets on or near the Earth’s surface from space would create a global climate of insecurity both by enhancing current risks and by creating new problems.” However, given the reliance of the US military on space systems, and the growing capabilities of other countries in space technologies, including those discussed in Hoey’s article, there has been strong motivation in some quarters for at least a “defensive counterspace” capability to defend space assets. How realistic such capabilities are in the near to medium term, and how likely such systems could be developed into offensive systems, is a subject of considerable debate.

Meanwhile, Taylor Dinerman argues that the US would be best served by transferring most space systems into a separate “US Space Force”, a new military service. Such a service “will insure that when the Joint Chiefs and their civilian superiors meet to plan an operation, someone with four stars will be there to make sure that the capabilities and limitations of US and enemy space forces are taken into account.” This has come up from time to time, but there have been few champions of such a move either in the Pentagon on in Congress, particularly after Sen. Bob Smith, the biggest proponent of a separate space force, left the Senate after the 2002 election. Also unclear is how such a move would solve the severe procurement problems Air Force space programs have suffered in recent years, which, as Wayne Eleazer argued in a TSR article last week, have deep roots.

32 comments to Milspace policy analysis

  • Allen Thomson

    > “the severe procurement problems Air Force space programs have suffered in recent years…”

    Gen. Lord recently commented on that in his valedictory speech:

    http://www.santamariatimes.com/articles/2006/02/26/sections/opinion/022606c.txt

  • And, if it is going to remain in a current force, in the long-term the long travel times, expensive and irreplaceable ships, unforgiving environment, and need to carry your resources with you would all be more familiar to the Navy than the Air Force. However, a separate force would be able to adapt to the environment its in, much as the air environment has forced the Air Force to be very different from anything that had existed before.

    — Donald

  • Alistair

    Mr. Dinerman hits close to the mark on most of his points. Space is the red-headed step-child (with appolgoies to red-heads out there) of the USAF.

    Space is as uniquely different from the Air Force as the Army and Navy are. A baby step might be to make USSF somewhat akin to the structure of the Marines within the Navy, though I personally think a completely separate force makes more sense.

    Given that the Israeli Air Force is now the Israeli Air and Space Force, it’s time for the US to show some leadership (and probably piss some people off) and break off the “Space Cadre” into a new Space Force.

    [Not sure what uniform should be though. They’ve had some interesting ones on SG1, and I really don’t like the recently proposed (and dropped) blue tiger-striped BDU replacement.]

  • Chris Stone

    Just about Taylor Dinerman’s article about the need for a US Space Force. Preach it brother!! As a space warrior myself I can attest to lessons I have learned just by reading the QDR and other documents. I hope that the nation will see the need before its too late.

  • mrearl

    and we’ll call it Star Fleet!

  • Dwayne A. Day

    General Lord spoke:
    “Instead, we do need to ‘get over it.'”

    Lord was self-referencing a speech he gave last year that is reported to have annoyed many people on Capitol Hill. He was claiming that the acquisition problems were fixed and Congress should “get over it.” That was like poking them in the eye. Of course, SBIRS problems weren’t fixed, nor were NPOESS problems fixed. And nobody believed the Air Force on Space Radar or T-Sat. You can see all that in the latest budget deliberations. His comment then (and now) didn’t improve relations.

  • MrEarl

    I think it’s too early for a separate space force. Right now operational space forces are primarily recon. I think once space forces develop truly offensive and defensive capabilities that can be demonstrated to be fundamentally different from capabilities provided now by the Army, Navy or Air Force then we can spin it off into it’s own command.

  • Mr. Earl, at what stage was the Army Air Corps spun off into the Air Force? Wasn’t the primary purpose of air power at that time still reconnaissance?

    — Donald

  • …at what stage was the Army Air Corps spun off into the Air Force?

    After the development of strategic bombing, after battleships being eclipsed by the aircraft carrier, after Hiroshima. 1947.

    I do think that we need a separate space force, but that question doesn’t help the cause of arguing for it, given how little offensive capability we have with space (and the military doesn’t even have any way of getting personnel there).

  • Thanks, Rand. My recollection was that had been earlier. I guess I was wrong.

    — Donald

  • Dwayne A. Day

    “at what stage was the Army Air Corps spun off into the Air Force?”

    When the Army air forces’ budget began to rival the ground Army’s budget. 1947.

  • Dwayne A. Day

    Dinerman’s article makes little sense. Nowhere does he clearly state why a separate space force is needed. The best he proposes is that this will somehow be better than the current situation because then the space guys will not have to compete with the pilots for funding and personnel. But there are some big problems with that weak argument.

    First of all, the USAF’s space budget has been _increasing_ quite a bit in recent years. They’re not starved for funds, not by a long shot. Second, there is no evidence that the space acquisition mess is due to all of the good people going to the air side and all of the bad ones going to the space side. If there is evidence for this, it should have been in the article.

    The bigger problem is the vague assertion that space is a mission rather than a place from which to conduct tasks in support of warfighting missions.

    Creating a separate “space force” would only exacerbate a problem that has gotten better in recent years–the ability of space systems to serve the needs of the users. This has been a long-standing problem within the Air Force (and to a lesser extent, the NRO). The problem has been that the systems that they build don’t do exactly what the guys on the ground, at sea, or in the air need them to do. The Air Force used to develop space systems in an entirely separate command from the one that operated them. Air Force Space Command was created to bring development and operations into the same organization (see David Spires’ book for more information). One could argue that problems with SBIRS were an extreme outgrowth of this movement–trying to serve the users to such an extent that they forgot their fundamentals of design. But really the big problem seems to be that they tried to serve _too many_ users, not that they were wrong to emphasize requirements. (And it is worth noting that although the SBIRS acronym was applied in the mid-1990s, the program to develop a follow-on to the DSP missile warning satellites originally started in the late 1970s.)

    By separating Air Force space assets into an entirely separate force, the end result would be putting distance between the user community (which is not the space guys) and the developer/operators. There is still a benefit to having pilots walk around Space Command, because they can more easily tell the space guys what they need.

    (As for the uniform question, whenever the idea of a separate space force has been discussed within military circles, they often refer to the members of such a theoretical organization as “purple suiters.” )

    But although a separate space force has been discussed, it has never been seriously considered within DoD or the Air Force. There is a substantial body of academic and doctrinal literature on this subject, and DInerman refers to none of it.

    As for the Eleazer article last week, one of the problems with that article is that the author claims that the current satellite acquisition problems and the late 1990s launch vehicle failures have the same root cause. However, the launch vehicle problem was fixed (43 launch successes in a row for USAF), whereas the satellite acquisition is a more recent mess. They cannot have the same root cause if one is a major problem and the other is a success story.

  • Insertion of personnel (like an Alien 3 or Starship Troopers drop ship), a conventional intercontinental bombing capability that is cost competitive with forward basing of air bombers, beamed ASAT capabilities and a multi-trillion dollar penumbra of economic activity that is critically dependent on space assets all point to an eventual USSF.

    The Marines have a budget comparable to NASA at $16.8 billion in 2007. A forward looking President and Congress would start putting in place the culture, training and specialized structure to manage the anticipated major component of force projection in the year 2025 now. Don’t wait for air force one to be a space plane to make the switch.

  • Edward Wright

    > …at what stage was the Army Air Corps spun off into the Air Force?

    > After the development of strategic bombing, after battleships being
    > eclipsed by the aircraft carrier,

    However, it took Gen. Billy Mitchells and others advocating an independent air force for aviation to advance to the point where airplanes could sink a battleship.

    The history of the Air Force is more “chicken and egg” than straight-forward cause and effect.

  • Edward Wright

    > I think it’s too early for a separate space force. Right now operational
    > space forces are primarily recon. I think once space forces develop truly
    > offensive and defensive capabilities that

    That depends on what you mean by “space forces.”

    There are no offensive weapons based in space. However, Dinerman says “give them control of the Delta 4, Atlas 5, and other rockets.” If you consider ground-based missiles like Atlas to be space forces, then space forces have had nuclear warheads for decades.

    Note that Russia (and the Soviet Union before it) have had a separate “Strategic Rocket Force” for decades.

    Of course, one can question whether a military service led by the missile mafia would
    “[lay] the basis for a future reusable launch vehicle” as Dinerman believes. In the 1980’s, the missileers wanted EELV, not DC-X. Judging from their funding priorities, they still do.

  • Edward Wright

    > Dinerman’s article makes little sense. Nowhere does he clearly state why a
    > separate space force is needed. The best he proposes is that this will
    > somehow be better than the current situation because then the space guys
    > will not have to compete with the pilots for funding and personnel.

    Where does he propose that? I don’t see any place in the article where he even refers to pilots.

    > First of all, the USAF’s space budget has been _increasing_ quite a bit
    > in recent years.

    The robot and missile budget has been increasing (mostly due to cost overruns — that’s not the sign of a healthy program).

    The budget for reusable and manned space systems remains essentially zero.

    > Second, there is no evidence that the space acquisition mess is due
    > to all of the good people going to the air side and all of the bad
    > ones going to the space side.

    True, but there is considerable evidence that the space acquisition mess is due almost entirely to the “unmanned” space people, since they’ve been the ones getting all the money.

    This suggests that Dinerman might be drawing the dividing line in the wrong place. It doesn’t necessarily mean a line shouldn’t be drawn.

    > By separating Air Force space assets into an entirely separate force, the
    > end result would be putting distance between the user community (which is
    >not the space guys) and the developer/operators. There is still a
    > benefit to having pilots walk around Space Command, because they can more
    > easily tell the space guys what they need.

    Why do you assume the Space Force would not have pilots? There’s an “unmanned space” bias showing here.

    Also, if we accept your argument, “air guys” are not the user community, either, but “developer/operators” for the ground forces.

    > However, the launch vehicle problem was fixed (43 launch successes in a row for USAF),

    For a very generous definition of “fixed.”

    Even granting that Delta IVH was a “success,” boasting about “43 successful launches in a row” shows how little progress there’s been since Sputnik 1.

    It’s as if the US Air Force, in 1952, bragged about “43 successful airplane flights in a row” — calling any flight that delivered its cargo but resulted in a complete airframe loss a “success.” Even if that cargo (like the Delta IVH payloads) was delivered to the wrong destination and the Air Force had no way to ever get it back. And airplanes were so dangerous that human beings were not even allowed to fly them, except under very rare and expensive conditions (“man-rating”).

    And apologists said that aviation was “different,” you couldn’t compare it to other forms of transportation, and it could never be safe or routine, just as space apologists do today.

    > They cannot have the same root cause if one is a major problem and the other
    > is a success story.

    “Success” is relative to one’s goals.

    If you want to keep putting satellites in the wrong orbit, bragging about trivial launch rates, spending huge fortunes to make satellites ultrareliable because they can’t be repaired, having no ability to quickly launch conventional attacks on enemy targets from the continental United States, and spending a hundred billion dollars every 40 years to land a man on the Moon and return him safely to the Earth — then it’s “a success story.”

    If we don’t want US spacepower to remain stuck in the 60’s forever, then it needs a lot of work.

    Thinking of space as nothing more than a place to put satellites is like thinking of the air as nothing but a medium to carry weather and radio balloons. It seems like a reasonable view, if you look only at the past, but wars of the future will not be fought with weapons of the past. The United States could have ignored the development of airplanes in favor of solving “the balloon acquisition mess,” but Hitler and Tojo would have taken full advantage of that policy. We shouldn’t expect our current enemies to be more kind.

  • I wholeheartedly agree with Taylor Dinnerman this week (and said much about that elsewhere too). This is the right time for this discussion as Gen. Lord’s retirement has once again underscored the issues.

    “Aerospace” is a deliberate fusion of the words air and space that was created by the Air Force at the time they were becoming a separate service. What we actually have today is not an Air Force, but an Aerospace Force.

    It could have been a Hydrospace Force if the Navy had done it, and judging by the way astronauts train that might have been a slightly more appropriate coupling.

    Let me repeat that: A hydrospace Force would be a slightly more appropriate coupling than the merger of Air and Space that is the Air Force today. It is a ridiculous coupling; as ridiculous as a Hydroland Force or an Aeroland Force. As far as physics, technology and strategy are concerned land, air, space and sea are separate and distinct domains, and squinted vision doesn’t make them join up no matter how hard you try.

    But why else should space be a distinct service? Dwayne Day writes “Creating a separate “space force” would only exacerbate a problem that has gotten better in recent years–the ability of space systems to serve the needs of the users. This has been a long-standing problem within the Air Force (and to a lesser extent, the NRO). The problem has been that the systems that they build don’t do exactly what the guys on the ground, at sea, or in the air need them to do.”

    *places tongue in cheek* Well I don’t think the Air Force serves the needs of its users either. Why do we have a separate Air Force when there are already branches of the Army and Navy that address such needs? They should designate the Army as the executive agent for Air to ensure that air power is fully integrated into a supporting role for Army and Navy operations.

    *places tongue in other cheek* And for that matter, the logistical support of the Navy was slow in amassing land forces before the first Gulf War. Clearly, the Navy should be merged into the Army to save money and ensure that it more closely supports the needs of the Army as its ‘user’.

  • Brent

    The argument against a separate space force by saying we don’t have space weapons is circular and irrelevant.

    The USAF has determined that space forces are to “support the warfighter” and space weapons aren’t necessary. Gen. Jumper said a separate space force was a bad idea because we don’t have space weapons. As Chief of Staff, he could have directed the development of space weapons. He chose not to. By denying the space force weapons they can’t evolve into a separate service. So the USAF holds all the cards. They belittle the space forces by asking “Where are their weapons?” even though the USAF is the reason space doesn’t have them in the first place! Catch 22 huh?

    Imagine if the Army belittled the Air Corps for not having air weapons because the Army kept eliminating the funding for the B-17?

    My big concern regarding a separate space force isn’t that its not needed, it is, but that I fear no current space general is competent enough to lead it. I think a prerequisite for a star in Space Command is to publicly ridicule the idea of a USSF. Oh, and manned spaceflight is anathema to Space Command leadership as well. Lots of vision.

  • Dwayne A. Day

    “I think a prerequisite for a star in Space Command is to publicly ridicule the idea of a USSF.”

    I’ll repeat: there is a substantial amount of academic and doctrinal literature on this subject. The fact that nobody here seems to be aware of it, and certainly does not refer to it, limits the utility of this discussion. If you don’t know what the people who _actually do_ this stuff have said about it, then you’re not contributing to the debate. This is one of my beefs about Internet forums–too many opinions, and not enough research or supporting information to base them on.

  • Edward Wright

    > As Chief of Staff, he could have directed the development of space
    > weapons…. So the USAF holds all the cards.

    Not all the cards. The Chief of Staff cannot develop anything without the support of Congress and the White House. Air Force brass has been an obstacle, at times, but hardly the sole obstacle.

    > Oh, and manned spaceflight is anathema to Space Command leadership as well.

    Largely because that idea has been hammered into them by successive Congresses and Administrations. The DynaSoar prototype was 80% complete when it was sacrificed to the great god Apollo and the Cold War propaganda line that manned space should be reserved for civilian scientific use (NASA). The basic policy continues to this day (e.g., the Bush “vision of space exploration” is completely NASA-centric).

    A near-term step toward a US Space Force might be the establishment of an independent Military Space Plane Agency, along the lines of the Missile Defense Agency. Even that would require a radical shift in thinking, however.

  • Edward Wright

    > I’ll repeat: there is a substantial amount of academic and doctrinal literature
    > on this subject. The fact that nobody here seems to be aware of it, and
    > certainly does not refer to it, limits the utility of this discussion.

    We’re aware of it, Dwayne. We just don’t mistake it for the Word of God because it was written inside the Beltway.

  • Brent

    Mr Day,

    You’re right in that there is some small amount of literature on the subject (not near enough, in my opinion). I am not aware of any published paper on a separate space force penned by senior space leadership, past or present (with Brig Gen Worden’s Space and Information Corps piece written a few months after his retirement the one exception I can readily think of).

    I do have to take issue with your insistence on referencing literature. I am almost certain I’ve read and have copies of every major work written on the subject. The fact that I don’t mention it stems from the fact that I don’t value their opinions much more than the people on this site. Academically published work tends not to be very forward looking or eager to broach controversial subjects. Whose work do you find most compelling with regards to space separatism?

    Mr Wright, I agree that the USAF isn’t the only obstacle. I tend to blame USAF senior leadership more than Congress, etc.. because they do have sole responsibility for what I consider the biggest obstacle to an USSF and American space power: the complete lack of intellectual development or space-centric viewpoint of AF Space Command personnel. “Supporting the warfighter” and other phrases used to intellectually and morally subjugate space officers is an unforgivable sin, and can be squarely put on USAF leadership’s lap.

  • Luke

    Brent is too nice to say it but he and I are both people who _actually do_ this stuff and have read much of the published works on it.

    I’m sure if you ask nicely he will send you any of the papers he’s written and published.

  • Allen Thomson

    Returning a little late to this thread (or whatever these are called in blogs), one thing that worries me about advocacy for space weaponization (replay many previous discussions of “weaponization” vs “militarization” if needed) is the lack of focus and specificity.

    That is,

    – Just how and to what extent would escort/ defensive satellites protect high-value US satellites? What likely threats wouldn’t they protect against? How do you protect against a direct-ascent ASAT or other object closing at km/s speeds with little warning?

    – What enemy satellites do we want to destroy/ degrade with ASATs and other offensive sats? What leverage would that provide against the enemy’s ability to wage war? Note that the US depends far more on space for warfighting than other countries — what might hurt us a lot might be more of a nuisance for China.

    As for space-to-ground/air/sea weapons, those might well be worth thinking about. (I kind of like the idea of a few orbital lasers for non-time-critical or surprise attacks against softish targets.) But again, some careful thinking about what the mission is and what other means might be used is in order. Conventional, precision-guided ballistic missiles in particular should be examined as an alternative to orbital bombardment.

    At the end of the day, I think that the US currently should be worrying more about increasing the survivability of its space-based capabilities through traditional means such as redundancy, dispersal, rapid replacibility, some hardening, alternate means, etc. Space weaponization might contribute in a modest way to survivability and have other niche applications, but it’s not the most important thing for the foreseeable future. IMO, of course.

    Of course, if everybody could just get along we wouldn’t have to worry about any of this.

  • Dwayne A. Day

    Air Force organization is not exactly my area of expertise, and I don’t have access to all of my books here at the office, so I’ll confine myself to the stuff I can think of off the top of my head or find in my filing cabinet.

    I suggest starting with several papers from Aerospace Power Journal:

    Lt Col Peter Hays and Dr. Karl Mueller, “Going Boldly–Where? Aerospace Integration, the Space Commission, and the Air Force’s Vision for Space,” Spring 2001.

    Lt Col Cynthia McKinley, “The Guardians of Space: Organizing America’s Space Assets for the Twenty-First Century,” Spring 2000.

    Maj Gen John Barry and Col Darrell Herriges, “Aerospace Integration, Not Separation,” Summer 2000.

    Lt Gen Bruce Carlson, “Protecting Global Utilities: Safeguarding the Next Millennium’s Space-Based Public Services,” Summer 2000.

    A few additional articles:

    Brigadier General Simon Peter Worden, “The Air Force and Future Space Directions: Are We Good Stewards?” Aerospace Power Journal, Spring 2001.

    Ralph Milsap, and D. B. Posey, “Organizational Options for the Future Aerospace Force,” Aerospace Power Journal, Summer 2000.

    Add to that several chapters in books:

    Peter L. Hays, James M. Smith, Alan R. Van Tassel, and Guy M. Walsh, “Spacepower for a New Millennium: Examining Current U.S. Capabilities and Policies, in Peter L. Hays et al., eds., Spacepower for a New Millennium: Space and U.S. National Security,New York: McGraw Hill, 2000.

    Brigadier General Earl S. Van Inwegen, “The Air Force Develops an Operational Organization for Space,” in Cargill Hall and Jacob Neufeld, eds., The U.S. Air Force in Space: 1945 to the 21st Century, Washington, D.C.: USAF History and Museums Program, 1995.

    Brigadier General Simon Peter Worden, “Space Control for the 21st Century: A Space ‘Navy’ Protecting the Commercial Basis of America’s Wealth,” in Peter L. Hays et al., eds., Spacepower for a New Millennium: Space and U.S. National Security, New York: McGraw Hill, 2000.

    And a few books:

    Major Stephen M. Rothstein, Dead on Arrival? The Development of the Aerospace Concept, 1944–58, Maxwell AFB, Alabama: Air University Press, November 2000.

    Steven Lambakis, On the Edge of Earth: The Future of American Space Power, Lexington, Kentucky: University of Kentucky Press, 2001.

    For a more basic discussion of the development of an organization within the Air Force to conduct space acquisition and operations, I would suggest starting with the management and organizational chapter in David Spire’s book Orbital Futures (it is in Volume 1; my contributions were largely limited to providing a number of documents used in Volume 2).

    You can add to that Spire’s history of the Air Force space program, Beyond Horizons. I think it is a little dated, because it was written in the mid-1990s and could not benefit from some later document declassifications (thankfully rectified with the Orbital Futures volumes).

    The predominant theme running through much of this literature is the question of whether the Air Force is effective at providing the user community what it needs from space assets, AND whether an alternative organizational structure would be better at providing those services.

  • Edward Wright

    > Just how and to what extent would escort/ defensive satellites protect
    > high-value US satellites?

    Hard kill, soft kill, stealth, electronic spoofing, decoys, hidden silent replacements, temporary proxies on quick-reaction vehicles…

    > What likely threats wouldn’t they protect against?

    They wouldn’t protect against paper cuts, pitbulls, or shark attacks.

    That argument is a red herring, No weapon, whether ground-, sea-, air-, or space-based, can protect against every possible type of attack. No one expects them to. That’s why we build more than one type of weapon.

    > Note that the US depends far more on space for warfighting than other
    > countries — what might hurt us a lot might be more of a nuisance for
    > China.

    Even if true, that’s not an argument for disarmament. If the Chinese can “hurt us lot,” there’s no guarantee they’ll refrain merely because we avoid developing weapons that are a “nuisance for China.”

    > Conventional, precision-guided ballistic missiles in particular should be
    > examined as an alternative to orbital bombardment.

    Do you really think no one has every examined them?

    A “conventional precision-guided ballistic missile” costs millions of dollars. A reusable spaceplane could accomplish the same mission for a small fraction of the cost (and other missions that ballistic missiles can’t).

    > I think that the US currently should be worrying more about increasing
    > the survivability of its space-based capabilities through traditional
    > means such as redundancy, dispersal, rapid replacibility, some hardening,
    > alternate means, etc.

    It’s hard to have much redundancy or rapid replacement when a single satellite launch costs many millions of dollars and requires an expendable launcher that must be ordered many months, or even years, before it is used.

    It’s difficult to harden satellites when every ounce of excess weight must be avoided because launch costs are so high.

    It’s impossible to disperse ELVs that can only operate from one or two national ranges.

    > Of course, if everybody could just get along we wouldn’t have to worry about any of this.

    Are you willing to grow a beard, burn your cassette tapes, and worship Allah in the Al Queda-approved manner? All of those are prerequisites for “getting along.”

    I’d rather invest in the weapons needed to secure our freedoms.

  • Luke

    Orbital combat is an interesting arena. Since everything in orbit is ballistic itself, hitting a mortar round with another mortar round in air is a tricky feat. However any Astro undergrad can bring up a matlab program to calculate an intercept from any given orbit if given enough DeltaV. The other option for killing is directed energy. This is nice for point, click and fry your target but somewhat more costly than shooting an A-sat off an F-15.

    As I sit here I am tempted to think that orbital combat will evolve into something akin to submarine warfare where stealth will be the best defense. A high value asset can be hidden from radar fairly easily given the lack of aerodynamic demands on a satellite. Communication with the SV could be done either though a proxy in higher orbit (radiating away from earth so the SV does not reveal its position) or even better, with lasers that may direct communication onto a very precise target.

    There are also the more mundane methods of denying service by jamming or spoofing, perhaps even eclipsing a SV with an umbrella like interceptor, who knows. The point is, our assets are not as secure as they once were, as we make space cheaper, it becomes cheaper for the badguys too.

  • Allen Thomson

    Coincidentally enough, there’s an article in the March 2006 Air Force Magazine that addresses some of the milspace questions/issues:

    http://www.afa.org/magazine/March2006/0306space.asp

    Making space launch faster, easier, and cheaper sounds simple. It’s not.

    Responsive Space
    By Jeremy Singer

  • Edward Wright

    > http://www.afa.org/magazine/March2006/0306space.asp

    > Making space launch faster, easier, and cheaper sounds simple. It’s not.

    Developing ELVs isn’t fast, easy, or cheap? I am shocked.

    And RASCAL didn’t work? Trying to fly to 200,000 feet with turbojets — you’re surprised that didn’t work.

    So, you conclude that nothing can be fast, easy, cheap, and simple?

    What about SpaceShip One? The article doesn’t say that was impossible and failed.

    RASCAL wasn’t fast, easy, or cheap because it wasn’t simple. It failed because it dictated a complicated approach, not because what it was trying to do was impossible.

    SpaceShip One easily exceeded the RASCAL altitude goals, because it was using a simple rocket engine rather than a bleeding-edge airbreather.

    Just because one thing fails does not mean everything will fail.

    Likewise, the article also states, “Satellites typically take months to ‘check out.'” Does that mean it’s impossible to ship complex electronics without months of checkout? Companies like Dell and Apple do it every day.

    It’s easy to think up reasons why things are “impossible.”
    It takes slightly more work to make them happen.

    As Roosevelt said, “It is not the critic who counts.”

  • Allen Thomson

    > you’re surprised that didn’t work.

    > So, you conclude that nothing can be fast, easy, cheap, and simple?

    Perhaps I misunderstand whom you mean by “you,” but I didn’t write anything following the URL. The author or perhaps the Air Force Magazine staff did.

    I posted the URL and lead-in because I thought it is an interesting and useful article that addresses an identifiable and real problem the US has in the miilitary use of space.

  • Edward Wright

    > Perhaps I misunderstand whom you mean by “you,” but I didn’t write anything following the URL. The
    > author or perhaps the Air Force Magazine staff did.

    Sorry, I missed that. Since there were no quotes, I assumed the words were your commentary.

  • Brent

    I wonder if anyone’s still looking at this thread…

    Mr Day has a good deal of decent material above, but I would like to add some more that generally tend to be less bureaucratic and more supportive of a USSF.

    Everett Dolman’s Astropolitik: Classical Geopolitics in the Space Age lays a great theoretical foundation for an independent space power theory.

    http://www.au.af.mil/au/aul/bibs/sepsp/sepsp.htm

    The web site above is from the USAF Officer Training School and is a compilation of some of the articles and papers written regarding a separate space force. Of particular interestst is Col Story’s paper and Col Whittington’s. However, all are good sources.