[ad_1]
Former NASA administrator Sean O & # 39; Keefe (center) speaks to a panel of CSIS on July 23, surrounded by the current administrator NASA's Jim Bridenstine (left) and former administrator Charlie Bolden. (credit: NASA / Joel Kowsky) |
by Jeff Foust
Monday, July 30, 2018
It's pretty clear when to celebrate the birthday of # 39, a person. NASA, however, is different.
Did you mark the anniversary of the birth of the agency, July 29, 1958, date on which President Eisenhower promulgated the Aeronautics Act and the Space that created the space agency? Or October 1, when two months later, NASA officially began operations, succeeding the National Advisory Council of Aeronautics? Or, maybe, both?
| "I hear all the time, people ask me," Well, will you be the chief of the Space Force? ", Says Bridenstine. |
The Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) chose the former date of last week when it held an event celebrating NASA's 60th anniversary. Current director of the agency, Jim Bridenstine, took the stage with two of his recent predecessors, Charlie Bolden and Sean O 'Keefe, and the organizers have promised that there would be a cake. 39; birthday.
"Being at the helm of NASA on the occasion of his 60th birthday is a bit humiliating," said Bridenstine, an agency administrator for just three months, in a speech that opened the door. # 39; event. This speech was largely historical, going back to the origins of NASA and even NACA and making its way through the Second World War and the Race to Space until today.
"We are here to talk about the 60th anniversary and there is a lot of history of which I have just spoken: some of them please us, others are not very amusing", he said. "But it is also true that NASA has an extraordinary future and I want to be able to talk about it too, and in the coming months you will hear a lot about it."
There was not much detail about this "extraordinary future" that Bridenstine offered to the event. However, and this may not be surprising given the host organization's interest in national security issues, there has been a discussion of a non-NASA space problem that has been a hot topic this summer: Space Force.
"I hear all the time, people ask me," Well, are you going to be the Space Force leader? "Said Bridenstine." And I'm here to tell you that it's not what NASA is and it's not what NASA does. "
Despite this statement, Bridenstine, until April, a member of Congress who had been very active on space policy issues, was more than happy to share his thoughts on the creation of 39, a separate military branch dedicated to space. "I want to be clear about Space Force and I support it 100%," he said, describing his past votes supporting a Space Corps in the US Air Force.
"The Space Force already exists inside the Air Force," he said, an argument that some have used to oppose the creation from a separate military branch for space. "At what level does the Air Force leadership pay attention to space?" Now, I'll tell you they're paying attention, no doubt they're paying attention. always been the case? I will tell you that many members of Congress do not think that this has always been the case. "
Bridenstine continued to discuss threats to space resources, particularly from China and Russia, even as dependence on these space capabilities increases. "In my opinion, it has already gone well because we have an autonomous force capable of preparing the workforce to protect our goods in space," he said. "Again, I want to be clear because it's important, it's not what NASA does."
"I should stop there," he says, concluding a comment during the group discussion that lasted more than six minutes, even though he seemed willing to talk even longer. Neither Bolden, a retired general of the Marine Corps, nor O & # 39; Keefe, a former Navy Secretary, have addressed the utility of a space force.
| "The peaks are really high and the lows are really low, and there is not much between them," said O. Keefe. |
When the discussion returned to the actual space agency compared to the proposed force space, a theme that emerged was the importance of international cooperation regardless of the future plans of the NASA in Earth orbit and beyond. "It takes a lot of time, it takes a lot of effort to try to find that common position that can be developed for mutual benefit," said O & # 39; Keefe. "You have the impression of being in a binding arbitration, to negotiate all the elements involved, but it is worth it."
"I think, with all due respect to the State Department and the Department of Defense, that one of the main soft energy purveyors for this nation is NASA," he said. Bolden. "If you want an example, it's the sustainability of the International Space Station over the past 17, 18 years, despite everything happening down here on the planet."
This "all the rest" includes tense relations with Russia that sparked concerns, in the days of Bolden as a trustee, on the future of the ISS and Russian participation in it. He defended this cooperation when moderator Todd Harrison of CSIS noted that no African-American astronaut from NASA had flown on a Soyuz spacecraft and that one of these astronauts, Jeanette Epps, had been withdrawn early in the year from a mission to the ISS in unexplained circumstances (even at Epps, according to a recent interview.) "What's going on?" Harrison asked.
"I think it's absurd" that the Russians refuse to rob African-Americans, Bolden said, citing his long experience working with the Russians. "I have never seen any indication of when I was the NASA administrator, to communicate with the Roscosmos chief and the cosmonauts themselves, that they had already had problems with someone we had decided to drive. "
Bridenstine, who says he is not aware of these problems, is focusing instead on the future of international cooperation in NASA's human exploration plans. He had just returned from the Farnborough International Airshow in England, where he met with officials of the European Space Agency and other national space agencies.
"It was amazing to me how many of them said," Tell us what you need. We are ready to go, "he recalls. "I was expecting that I would have to make a difficult sale.They are ready, they are just looking for what the Americans are saying: 'That's what we have to do', and they are going to pull the trigger.
However, any discussion of international cooperation inevitably raises the question of cooperation – or lack thereof – with China. For years, the so-called "Wolf amendment", named after the House's credit sub-committee, which NASA was overseen, has severely curtailed any bilateral cooperation between NASA and China in space flights.
These restrictions have eased somewhat over the years. "The ban is not against collaboration in science.The ban is against collaboration in manned spaceflight," Bolden said, citing cooperation with China in science and technology. Aeronautics after the notification of the Congress. "This was the last thing Congressman Wolf did before leaving Congress: he softened the language."
Bridenstine says that he has just informed Congress of his plans to meet with Chinese space officials at the International Astronautical Congress in early October in Germany. "We are going to have this dialogue," he said. With regard to the more substantial changes to this policy, he cited issues such as intellectual property issues and human rights issues that should be resolved in order to allow for further cooperation. "This deal will be well above my salary score."
| "I was the worst, the absolute worst administrator that the agency could have had my first two years," Bolden said. "I was shabby because I did not understand Washington and I did not understand politics, the system, everything else." |
"I think it's inevitable" that China will become a more important partner in spaceflight, according to O & # 39; Keefe. China, he acknowledged, has "an international reputation for trying to extract information from all kinds of sources," an allusion to the claims of piracy and industrial espionage. But since NASA is required by its charter to make information freely available, we "could just as well work with people for a common purpose."
What advice did the two former NASA administrators have for the new one? O & # 39; Keefe offered pretty general insights. "The summits are really high and the lows are really low, and there's not much between them," he said. NASA employees "are an incredible group of amazing professionals who are incredibly talented people" when they focus on a particular goal.
Bolden offered more than a critical self-assessment of his tenure as an administrator. "I was the worst, the worst administrator that the agency could have had my first two years." "I was ugly because I did not understand Washington and I did not understand politics, the system , everything else, "he said.
"It was only after going through those first two years of being" the rogue administrator "that I recognized that," he continued. "What did I believe in? Why did I come?
"Once I realized that my job was to take care of people, and that they would take care of everything else, it became the best job, the most One of the best jobs of my life, "he said. "For me, it was the most important thing, to be in the world's largest group of people, next to the Marines."
With this advice and his own projects as an administrator, Bridenstine was optimistic about the next 60 years of NASA. "There is no shortage of opportunities in the future because of what is happening, the processing capabilities that have probably occurred over the past ten years because of the track that these gentlemen have soaring" , he said. "If it's managed properly, the future is very, very exciting."
With this, the 90-minute event is over. It was time for this NASA birthday cake – only to find that there was "a problem with the bakery," according to Harrison. Maybe they can get solved in time for NASA's other birthday on October 1st.
Note: We are temporarily moderating all under committed comments to cope with an increase in spam.
<! –
– ->
Source link
