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Sixty years ago, spurred on by competition with the Soviet Union, the United States created NASA, launching a journey that would take Americans to the moon in a decade.
Since then, the US Space Agency has enjoyed glorious successes and overwhelming failures in its efforts to push back the frontiers of space exploration, including a deadly fire in 1967 that killed three and two explosions fatalities in 1986 and 2003.
Now, NASA is struggling to redefine itself in an increasingly crowded field of international space agencies and commercial interests, with the goal of returning to the world. deep space.
These bold goals make rhetoric the silver is simply not there to reach the moon in the next decade and March in the 2030s.
And the inability of the NASA to send astronauts into space – a capacity lost in 2011 when the space shuttle program has ended as planned, after 30 years – is a lasting stain on the stellar image of the agency .
While US private industries are working on new spacecraft, NASA still has to pay Russia $ 80 million per seat for US astronauts. o The space on a Soyuz capsule
How it started
In 1957, the Soviet Union launched the first satellite in space with Sputnik 1 , while American attempts failed miserably
the government was already working to reach the space, but mainly under the appearance of the army.
President Dwight D. Eisenhower called on Congress to create a separate civil space agency to better focus on space exploration.
Entry into force of the Aeronautics and Space Authorization Act on July 29, 1958.
NASA opened its doors in October 1958 with approximately 8,000 employees and a budget of $ 100 million.
Race to Space
The Soviets won another key part of the space race in April 1961 when Yuri Gagarin became the first person to orbit around of the earth.
A month later, John F. Kennedy unveiled plans to land a man on the moon at the end of the decade.
"No single space project in this period will be more impressive for humanity, or more important for long-distance exploration of space, and none will be as difficult or costly to achieve, "said the US president. The Apollo Program was born
In 1962, astronaut John Glenn became the first American to gravitate around the Earth. In 1969, NASA astronaut Neil Armstrong became the first man to walk on the moon
American astronauts of the time were national heroes – military pilots with a combination of brains, courage and courage known as "The Right Stuff". "The title of Tom Wolfe's classic book."
The words of Armstrong while he was stepping on the lunar surface – "a small step for the man, a giant step for "Humanity" – have been heard by millions of people around the world.Apollon was a unilateral demonstration of national power, "recalls John Logsdon, professor emeritus at the Institute of Space Policy of the United States. George Washington University
"Kennedy decided to use the space program as an instrument of overt geopolitical competition, of national politics, with a very large share of the budget," he said at the time. AFP
. In total, 5% of the national budget was allocated to NASA at the time of Apollo.
Now, NASA receives about $ 18 billion a year, less than half of the federal budget, "and this is no longer the same instrument of national politics," said Logsdon
] New era
More days of glory followed in the 1980s with the birth of NASA's shuttle program, a reusable spacecraft that carried astronauts into space, and finally to the Station international space, which entered into service in 1998.
But what is NASA today?
President Donald Trump defended a return to the moon, calling for a lunar bridge that would allow a continuous spacecraft and people to visit the moon and serve as a starting point for Mars.
Trump also called for the creation of a "Space Force," a sixth branch of the military that would focus on defending US interests.
NASA has long been considered a world leader in space innovation, but today the international field is much more populated than 60 years ago There is something like 70 countries that are d & # 39; one way or another involved in space activity, "said Logsdon.
Rather than competing with international space agencies," the focus is on cooperation "Teasel Muir-Harmony, Curator at the National Museum of Air and Space
"How Can NASA Benefit?"
Jim Bridenstine, Director of the NASA, told a recent panel he discussed the possibility of strengthening cooperation with China and how he recently traveled to Israel to meet commercial interests working on a lunar lander [[traduction] ]
19659005] Bridenstine stated that the reason for his v isite was "how do you do that, what are you doing and is there a way for NASA to take advantage of it?"
NASA departs from the Low Earth orbit, seeking to put the space station back to commercial interests after 2024, and spending millions in seed capital to help private companies like SpaceX and Boeing build capsules to transport humans in the years to come
In this context, Bridenstine said that determining what NASA does, compared to what it buys as a service from commercial vendors, will be "one of the fundamental challenges I will have to to face during my term of office ".
Bridenstine said Trump's budget demands for NASA were "very generous."
With his eyes on a crew mission on the moon in five years, NASA plans to spend about $ 10 billion
The predecessor of Bridenstine at the helm of NASA, the astronaut retired Charles Bolden, warned against the repeated mistakes of the era of the shuttle, when the United States ended "We can not tolerate another ditch like this", has Bolden said.
"It is very important for NASA to facilitate the success of commercial entities to take over" in low Earth orbit, 400 miles (400 miles) above the planet
"And then for NASA's do what she does so well, be the leader of the lunar orbit. "
Learn more:
New boss of NASA receives "hearty congratulations" on space
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