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Conference 7.286::space

Title:	Space Exploration
Notice:	Shuttle launch schedules, see Note 6
Moderator:	PRAGMA::GRIFFIN

Created:	Mon Feb 17 1986
Last Modified:	Thu Jun 05 1997
Last Successful Update:	Fri Jun 06 1997
Number of topics:	974
Total number of notes:	18843

202.0. "NASA's 1987 Budget $7.8 Billion" by LATOUR::DZIEDZIC () Mon Aug 11 1986 09:51

    I heard the tail end of a report on CNN Saturday that the NASA budget
    for the next year was about $7.8B, while the Pentagon's expenditures
    for space stuff (including SDI?) is about $15.2B.  I think there's
    a moral in here somewhere.  Wish it was the other way around ...

T.R Title User Personal
Name Date Lines

202.1 TRIPLE the $ CYGNUS::ALLEGREZZA George Allegrezza, ISWS Writing Services Mon Aug 11 1986 16:28 34

T.R	Title	User	Personal Name	Date	Lines
202.1	TRIPLE the $	CYGNUS::ALLEGREZZA	George Allegrezza, ISWS Writing Services	`Mon Aug 11 1986 16:28`	34
	I don't think a convincing case can be made for the premise that large DOD space budgets and large NASA budgets are mutually exclusive. Certainly that was not the case in the early 1960s when the Kennedy nuclear buildup coincided with the peak funding years for Apollo. The important point is not NASA's relative level of funding vs. the DOD but its absolute level of funding relative to the budget and GNP. DOD space budgets are bound to rise because so much of modern warfare is based on communications and surveillance capabilities that reside in space, without even considering SDI or anti-satellite systems. With a Key Hole 12 recon satellite going for about $1 billion out the door and the Milstar communications system costing about $10 billion, the money really starts adding up. And a change in Administrations won't affect defense-oriented space spending; even a arms control oriented President has to maintain large space reconnaissance and communications systems to ensure treaty verification and nuclear C3. I think the operative issue is the failure of any of the last five Administrations to provide a vision of America in space and the resources necessary to support the program. Remember, real NASA funding peaked in FY 1965 and has declined by two thirds in real terms over the last twenty years. Only one of the four post-Apollo space projects envisioned by NASA was developed: the Space Shuttle (in a cost-limited configuration that led us directly to our present crisis). The post-Apollo program put forward by the Agnew Committee would have cost $20 billion annually in 1969 dollars, a figure that would have represented more than one percent of GNP throughout the 1970s. The recent National Committee on Space report recommended a funding level of between one-half and one percent of GNP for the foreseeable future; depending on whose GNP deflator you use, that's $18 billion to $43 billion in 1986 dollars. Does anyone in Washington have the guts to push such a program forward? I doubt it; but can we afford to allow our space leadership erode past the point of no return?

I don't think a convincing case can be made for the premise that large DOD
space budgets and large NASA budgets are mutually exclusive.  Certainly
that was not the case in the early 1960s when the Kennedy nuclear buildup
coincided with the peak funding years for Apollo.  The important point is
not NASA's relative level of funding vs. the DOD but its absolute level of
funding relative to the budget and GNP. DOD space budgets are bound to rise
because so much of modern warfare is based on communications and
surveillance capabilities that reside in space, without even considering
SDI or anti-satellite systems.  

With a Key Hole 12 recon satellite going for about $1 billion out the door
and the Milstar communications system costing about $10 billion, the money
really starts adding up.  And a change in Administrations won't affect
defense-oriented space spending; even a arms control oriented President has
to maintain large space reconnaissance and communications systems to ensure
treaty verification and nuclear C3. 

I think the operative issue is the failure of any of the last five
Administrations to provide a vision of America in space *and* the resources
necessary to support the program.  Remember, real NASA funding peaked in FY
1965 and has declined by two thirds in real terms over the last twenty
years. Only one of the four post-Apollo space projects envisioned by NASA
was developed: the Space Shuttle (in a cost-limited configuration that led
us directly to our present crisis). 

The post-Apollo program put forward by the Agnew Committee would have cost
$20 billion annually in 1969 dollars, a figure that would have represented
more than one percent of GNP throughout the 1970s.  The recent National
Committee on Space report recommended a funding level of between one-half 
and one percent of GNP for the foreseeable future; depending on whose GNP 
deflator you use, that's $18 billion to $43 billion in 1986 dollars.  Does
anyone in Washington have the guts to push such a program forward?  I
doubt it; but can we afford to allow our space leadership erode past the
point of no return?