[KevinDavis]

Looks like a formation of a space force is about to happen.

[KevinDavis]

Space Ping! This is the Space Ping List! Let me know if you want on or off this list!

[Strategerist]

Geez, we've already got Stargate Command, forming another military space service seems redundant....

[RightWhale]

There is no reason the Air Force should be or should have been extended to patrols of outer space. It would be natural for the Navy to undertake these tasks.

[El Sordo]

Shines the name, shines the name of Roger Young.

[Centurion2000]

Who operates the biggest pieces of metal and with large crew sized ... US NAVY ... give them that job.

Deep space warfare will be far closer to naval warfare than anything the Air Force has ever done.

[Saturn_V]

Wouldn't this be slightly premature, given our basic dearth of long distance/duration vehicles (other than the ISS, which I'm not sure is particularly ammenable to military functions)? I mean, we haven't even got credible manned lunar capability right now, so a 'space force' seems a little silly.

-SV

[Captain Beyond]

I can't believe they are still in the discussing stage. The space force should have been started in the 70's so we could we be well ahead of the curve.

[Young Werther]

This battle isn't new. The attempt to unify our military goes back to the 50's. The Thor, (Air Force), Jupiter, (Army), rockets were similar in their specs but the services insisted that the designs be unique. The Thor and Juptier engines had the same thrust but were not interchangeable. Why? They were Rocketdyne engines but the plumbing was different because the Service Engineers designed them with different plumbing. I remember this story in the Parade Magazine of that era that went on and on about the inability of the services to get along. It was called interservice rivalry.

Then there's the Navy. It has its own Army, (Marines) and two Air Force Branchs (Naval Air and Marine Air). For the longest time each had its own Training Command and Communications Services.

Of Course, they have their own Academies and therein lies the final institutional bias.

Maybe we need to adopt Roddenberry's idea. "The Academy" is on the Moon and Star Fleet is Star Fleet! Set Phasers to stun!

[LibWhacker]

. . . a Space Corps will be obviously needed once there are sufficient national assets in space to defend.

IMO, we need a Space Corps now to defend assets on the ground and on the high seas.

I'm glad to see this is getting some air. We should seize space, deny it to all other comers, destroy their satellites and any installations on the ground meant to counter our assets in space. Why? Because we can and because we would come out on top after any such skirmishing.

Yes, others can and will claim that it's an act of war. But who in their right mind wants to declare war on us?

Obviously, we would be maneuvering for predominance in space if we weren't the world's only superpower, just as nations once maneuvered for advantage at sea. But since we ARE the world's only superpower, we should simply seize space to solidify that position. It'd be a freebee. IMHO.

[JediForce]

The first Shuttle was named Enterprise...therefore...can their be no doubt...Starfleet will be the name of our space force?

[King Prout]

shwinnnnnnggggg!

been saying we oughtta turn space over to the glow-in-tha-dark bubbleheads for years now.

[guitfiddlist]

As an Air Force veteran of Space Division, I always thought that the future would see a transition of space activities from the Air Force to the Navy, when long endurance missions involving large crew in spaceships, became routine. After all, the Navy has had hundreds of years of experience with "ships", so why not those operating in space?

However, this is counting our chickens before they hatch - dividing nonexistent spoils. We are NOWHERE in manned spaceflight....and languishing there fast. The national will to get out there and do something in space has frittered away to nothing. And we're now down to three fat albatrosses which are currently as airworthy as pink or white elephants.

We're gonna need a buncha Burt Rutan's to show the way to routine and economical space access, or hope for an alien Pearl Harbor to galvanize a renewed space initiative.

[boris]

Delta-Vee again. To lift humans (or anything) from the surface you must impart 30,000 ft/sec of delta-vee. This leads to costs of (currently) $10,000 per pound in LEO. Possibly reducible to $2,000/lb.

Translation: routinely launching big ships is economically infeasible. Routinely launching "little" ships (fighters) is also economically infeasible.

Build a space elevator first. Then you can start planning for a major role of the military in space. My WAG for making a space elevator a reality is 50 years and $500 billion.

--Boris

[Junior]

I like the name, United States Space Force. I'd like the rank structure to be nominally nautical, as it seems inappropriate for colonels and majors to be commanding vessels.

[Redcloak]

None of this alphabet soup stuff; they should call it "Star Fleet".