[RightWhale]

Blame Congress, not the AF. Actually, since we elect Congress, both houses now, blame the votors, ourselves.

[Prof Engineer]

ping

[mbynack]

I had the honor of meeting General Jumper when he went through F-15 pilot training just before I retired from the Air Force. He is an exceptionally bright individual with a enviable service record.

MAJOR AWARDS AND DECORATIONS

Defense Distinguished Service Medal with oak leaf cluster
Distinguished Service Medal
Defense Superior Service Medal
Legion of Merit with oak leaf cluster
Distinguished Flying Cross with two oak leaf clusters
Meritorious Service Medal with two oak leaf clusters
Air Medal with 17 oak leaf clusters
Vietnam Service Medal with five service stars
Republic of Vietnam Campaign Medal

He has over 4000 hours of flight time in everything from small cargo planes to the top of the line AF Fighters. He also has 1400 hours of combat time during two tours of Vietnam.

If General Jumper says that bigger rockets aren't a priority for the Air Force, I would believe him. Satellites are nice, but steel on target is what wins wars.

[Kozak]

Were the Battleship Admirals the enemy of air power?
I bet there were plenty of Hoplite generals who stood in the way of developing the Macedonian Phalanx. The established bureaucracy will always try and prevent change, it's more of a threat then any enemy...

[Kozak]

Especially since a space based weapons system called THOR, basically orbiting bundles of kinetic kill "rods", capable of what amounts to a guided meteor storm anywhere in the world within minutes makes most Army, Navy and Air Force weapons systems obsolete. The country that grabs THIS high ground will rule the world for quite a while...

[narby]

The real breakthrough in space will be when someone has the guts to build a horizontal launch, air breathing first stage, reusable orbital launcher.

There are several very practical ideas about how to do that (not the X-30) on the drawing boards.

My favorite being the turbojet powered craft that would launch lightly loaded, hit a KC-135 for fuel top off, and light a rocket in its tail to boost to 300k feet and mach 6, where it kicks out an upper stage that will go into orbit.

Now THAT is a practical method to get small payloads into orbit. And since you could fly it almost every day, assembling larger structures in orbit is a no-brainer.

But the article is right, the AF will not want it. But not because they're trying to protect turf (indeed, such a vehicle could be the most important thing they flew), but because if such a thing were built, the Chineese, and worse, Al-Quaeda would buy one quickly.

Quite simply, space fairing governments want space travel expensive and rare, so only they can afford it.

[hedgetrimmer]

ping

[MalcolmS]

I justwish the author would tell us how he really feels.

[John Locke]

What is needed now is true heavy lift (80-100 tons to LEO)

No: what is needed is true heavy lift - 1000 tons plus to LEO.

Skip the wimpy stuff and build the real big dumb booster - Orion.

[KevinDavis]

Maybe the Air Force is developing this:


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

[Young Werther]

This is why I keeping harping on my Space University concept! www.nssnt.org.

Wrest control of the civilian space program from NASA. When space becomes an eduational program, it'll be funded by the universities of the world and the clarion call to sudents would be

"How would you like to live and study in space at MacAuliff A&M?"

Space exploitation will occur because the space entrepreneurs will want to begin our march Ad Astra! We can see the fruition of Burt Rutan's efforts when he is delivering tourists to the college town that'll spring up next to MacAuliff A&M. I don't know about football but 3D soccer might be a gas! Arts and Science? Cameron gets to make his spaceage titanic film and how about "Ballet Dancers in Space?" {check out the article at the above web site on ballet!}

[tophat9000]

You may need to read between the lines just no being big on rockets is not anti-space

The Air Forces preferred way in to space has always been to “fly” to and back (I.E.. and aircraft) ... The original x15 project was going to be part of a larger project to fly in to orbit... with the moon race.. that was all canned to get there as fast as possible, money was no object.... with the moon race won is was back to the original concept(I.E.. and aircraft aka the shuttle)

I truly think that the Air force has both sub orbital and orbital aircraft in the classified “black” world right now .... Maybe more

Back in the mid 90’s I worked with a guy in telecom network control he was ex Air Force Satellite tracking and other classified stuff in Co. Springs ... we got be good friends as we work the graveyard shift together... (Fri night to Sat. morning monitoring a global telecom backbone is about as dull as it get... people talk on the weirdest stuff)

Well got on the subject of the space program ... and after a while.. I comment about the Moon .. and how sad it was we hadn’t gone back after Apollo

Well he starts acting funny and gets quite ... then said” what make you say that.. it might not necessarily be true..

So I asked him what he meant.. and he said “Well the moon a natural spy satellite fo the earth best there is you not going to shoot it down

So I ask “ What you trying to tell me”

And he said” Not telling you anything but we spent alot of money on military projects in the 80’s with Reagan ... ... and it might not necessarily be true we haven’t gone back to the moon.