perfidy

Why?

Because it's been two full weeks since the sun shone where I live. Two DAMN weeks. Also, two weeks of temperatures below normal. It has snowed three days this week. So eff it all.

Because I'm tired. Time change. Guuh.

Because the RAVE Act, as part of the AMBER Alert package, has gone to the senate for a vote. It passed committee, and what senator is going to vote against the AMBER Alert system bill because of a pesky amendment like the RAVE Act? Buncha mendacious venal fuckwits. Thinking about that makes me tired too.

BECAUSE, THAT'S WHY! Now you kids shut up and count license plates or something. We'll be near a bathroom soon.

Two further notes:

Buckethead, I'm surprised the Thomas Jefferson bait I dangled as gone unlunched-upon.

WCM, hazut pu tizuk!

An interesting editorial from the Guardian Unlimited discussed the parallels between America and Britain's pending occupation of Iraq with the British military occupation of Ireland. According to this article, people in Northern Ireland also welcomed troops in the early Seventies. But before too long, those troops were firing indiscriminately at Irish peaceful protestors in Derry. The article also exposes Ari Fleischer's ignorance of Irish cities.

So I was listening to a brief story on NPR yesterday that identified a possible misinterpretation of Iraqi jubilance. It seems that looters in Iraq, as well as those who appear to be welcoming British and American troops, are giving a thumbs-up. According to NPR, however, that might mean "up your's" in Iraq, as opposed to the American positive conotation. I got to thinking. While growing up and beyond, my half-Lebanese mother would frequently tell me to "Stick it up your [my] ass!" when she was angry with me. She would also jerk her thumb in the air while telling me to stick it up my ass. I thought that my mother probably acquired this habit from her Lebanese-born aunt, who contributed significantly to my mother's upbringing. 

During a telephone conversation this evening, I asked my mother if her Lebanese-born aunt would indeed jerk her thumb in the air while stating angrily, "Hazut pi tizuk!" It translates from Arabic, directly into English, as "Up your ass!" My mother confirmed that a raised thumb gesture would accompany the verbal declaration. 

While Lebanon is a different country than Iraq, in so very many ways, it's quite possible that there are cultural consistencies throughout the Middle East that might well transcend political and (since my mother's aunt was a Maronite Christian) religious boundaries. It is thus possible that some of these looters, and people believed to be revelers, who are not kissing American troops or otherwise making it abundantly clear that they are receiving troops with a positive attitude, are in fact telling the troops, "Hazut pi Tizuk" with their thumb gesture. 
 

I see nothing wrong with space exploration. It seems to be a natural consequence of human technological evolution. I get the sense from the previous posts, however, that it would be quite expensive for the government, maybe too much so, and also private investors. 

So here's a possible solution. Perhaps if the government did not go to war every couple of years while simultaneously cutting taxes, it would have more money for space exploration. What if the government did away with capitalism altogether? Then money would be no object. Of course they'd have to convince all the other countries to get rid of capitalism as well. 
 

British fishermen had been working the Grand Banks off Newfoundland since the late middle ages. British explorers discovered the coast of North America in the early sixteenth century. The first successful colonies were planted in the seventeenth century. Only in the eighteenth century did those colonies become large, prosperous and self sufficient. Is this the kind of time frame that awaits us in space? Granted, things do move faster in this day than in centuries past. But when the only government on the planet that has the capacity to pursue a bold program of space development has no desire to do so, things seem rather grim. The British government similarly held back colonization of the Americas for over a century. 

There is a growing number of small companies eager to break into the space transportation industry. They have a limited amount of financing from venture capitalists, typically geeky software billionaires. One major aerospace company, Boeing, has an independent venture that is outside the typical close relationship with NASA and the DoD. Sea Launch is a company that has already successfully launched several satellites from its mobile launch pad, using a rocket derived from Russian designs. It promises to lower launch costs by as much as half, by avoiding the waste inherent in many government run launch programs.

But these efforts are nowhere close to actually moving mankind into space. Currently, the amount of money required to develop space technology is completely beyond the reach of any private group. There is no possibility that any latter day Puritans could gather the resources to establish a New Jerusalem on the Moon, or anywhere else in the Solar System. 

Yet, there is hope. Three things may bring about a new golden age to space exploration. First is technology. The incredible advances in computer, manufacturing and materials technology over the forty years since the Space Shuttle first took shape on a draftsman's table may soon make it possible for a well funded independent company to design and build a working rocket. And not merely a rocket like those that have gone before, disposable and wasteful, but a true rocket like those envisioned in the pulp science fiction novels of the fifties - a space ship that can take off, fly into space and return in one piece. Computer aided design, advanced composite materials and automated manufacturing could conceivably bring this within reach, by sharply lowering the cost of development and construction. 

Once the first Single Stage To Orbit (SSTO) space ship flies, the door will open, at least somewhat. The cost per pound to orbit flying on an SSTO would be orders of magnitude less than on a traditional disposable roman candle. The company that builds it would be able to launch from simple space fields, with ground crews more like an airline's than NASA's. They would make a lot of money launching the world's backlog of satellites, and make affordable the launching of satellites for other purposes - those that didn't couldn't justify the vast expense of a current launch. 

Also, a working SSTO is also, by default, the fastest means of point to point travel on earth. No more than forty five minutes to anywhere on the planet. FedEx could certainly find a use for something like that, and likely Virgin Airlines as well. By creating a market for one SSTO, other companies will get in the game, and one would hope that the result would be something like the modern aircraft and airline industry after a little while. 

The second hope is that some other nation will launch an ambitious program of space exploration and colonization, prodding the American Government to get off its collective fundament and begin some exploring and settling of its own. The current world situation is not altogether favorable, what with Europe's economy on permanent hold, and Russia's in a death spiral. The only other potential is China, which is due to launch its first manned mission later this year, and has promised that they will go to the moon by the end of the decade. If the Chinese can pull this off, sheer embarrassment may force the U.S. into action. 

The third hope, and the most unlikely, is that strong leadership from the highest levels of government would create a drive to either go to Mars, or to privatize the space program. The first is extremely unlikely, but the second could happen if it turns out that the space shuttle is not safe to fly again. A decree that promises a large government purchase order to the company that first demonstrates a working SSTO would light a very large and hot fire under the aerospace industry, and thousands of dreamers on shoestring budgets as well. Remember that much of the development of the early aviation industry was motivated by government mail contracts and prize awards. Charles Lindbergh, the dark horse competitor for the Ortieg Prize, won $25,000 for crossing the Atlantic solo, non stop in 1927. But he beat several other competitors who were much better funded. 

People came to the America seeking gold and quick fortunes. In the process of not finding it, they created something as unlikely and wonderful as the United States. If, tomorrow, through some improbable convergence of events we find ourselves in possession of a working SSTO that can deliver cargo to orbit for a thousandth the cost of current launch vehicles; then the whole cornucopia of wonders promised by the space geeks might come true. But the invention of the caravel at the same time that Europe became politically capable of world wide exploration was unlikely, too. If we do go into space, the results will likely be stranger than we can imagine now.

So what does this mean for the frustrated space geek? Well, it's bad news all around. Not only is there no good reason for the government to undertake large scale space colonization, there are several reasons for them not to. 

Firstly, American military dominance is founded to an amazing degree on satellite technology. Our weapons systems use GPS satellites for guidance. Our weapons systems and soldiers communicate with satellites. Our commanders and planners depend on intelligence gathered by satellites. Our Air Forces depend on weather data gathered by satellites. Currently, no other nation has these capabilities.

The Air Force did a study back in the sixties, and realized that a small two man orbital station could do vastly better reconnaissance work with a small telescope than any conceivable (at the time) recon satellite. While computers have vastly increased the capabilities of our spy satellites, the fact remains that if people are up in orbit, a small telescope gives them powers comparable to the most sophisticated military and expensive military or CIA spysats. 

This concept has broad application. People do things better than robots. If people are in orbit, they can do many things that can currently only be done with expensive automated hardware that only the U.S. can afford. If the U.S. government makes it really cheap to get into space, then it will have given away one of the most incredible military advantages ever possessed by a nation. 

Also, when you drop things from very high up, they hit the ground very hard. This basic law of applied physics has already been proven by the use of Concrete bombs in the war in the gulf. Thanks to precision (satellite) guidance packages, a very large lump of concrete dropped from fifty thousand feet (about eight miles) can easily destroy a tank or APC. When you drop things from 150 miles up, in Low Earth Orbit, you can reach out and touch someone, anywhere on the globe, in less than half an hour, with the explosive force of a pony nuke. Access to space gives great power to anyone who can get into there. 

The U.S. Government does not want to lose these advantages. Nor would any sane government. Another reason that the government would be happy with status quo is simply to restrict access to space generally. In this way, only accredited commercial interests will be permitted launch slots. The other three nations that are space capable, China, Russia and France, follow the same restrictive policies. It is an exclusive club, and even run of the mill bureaucratic inertia and turf defense instincts would be enough to shape policy toward keeping things as they are. 

Then, there are all the commonly heard objections: "We need the money to give to crack mothers, or to fund Richard Maplethorpe." Or, "Space is a pristine environment, and we don't want to kill all the space otters with pollution from the combustion of Hydrogen and Oxygen." Or, "Exploiting space is a typical phallic dominance maneuver of the ruling political class, and only perpetuates the oppression inherent in the system." (Johno or Mike, you could probably do the academic bullshit speak better than me, you've been exposed to it more.) Or, "It will upset the French." 

These reasons, as ridiculous as they sound to the passionate space geek, are nevertheless politically potent objections. Along with the first two, they stand as a formidable bulwark against future space development. NASA may continue to design and redesign space vehicles so as to create an illusion of progress, but it truly is not in the government's interest to promote significant space activities. For the near term, government space activities will be limited to satellite deployment - the orbital equivalent of coastal navigation buoys; and the occasional deep space probe.

So what does all of this mean for space travel? Clearly, the American space program of the sixties was part of the larger Cold War. While Kennedy and his successors painted a lot of rhetoric on why we went into orbit or to the moon, the real reason was simply, and always, to beat the Russkies. Regardless of the hopes and dreams of the scientists and engineers working for NASA and the aerospace industry, they were engaged in the same kind of contest as Royal Navy Admiral Jackie Fisher had with his dreadnoughts sixty years earlier. 

Once Cold War political realities rendered the space race superfluous, it was promptly jettisoned. Of course, no bureaucracy ever truly dies; so NASA fought tenaciously to salvage some of its budget, and to come up with reasons for its continued existence. On their reduced budget, they achieved some rather remarkable things. What did they accomplish after the feverish race for the moon was over? Deep space robotic exploration and the shuttle/space station programs.

As we mentioned, exploration is cheap. For chump change in government revenue terms, we could toss out a Pioneer, Voyager, Pathfinder or Galileo probe every year for eternity and not feel the bite. And, like early sailing ship explorations they brought back fabulous images, scientific information, and a sense that we were engaging in something important. 

The Space Shuttle Program is a technological marvel, to be sure. But it is simultaneously a ridiculous compromise, a kludged up rube-goldbergesque vehicle that tries to be everything to everyone, while actually pleasing no one. So, the Space Shuttle is a shuttle. OK, fine, but don't shuttles shuttle back and forth between things? Oh yeah, well, we're building a space station for the shuttle to fly to. What does the Space Station do? Well, all kinds of nifty research, and it will embarrass the hell out of the commies. Didn't the Soviet Union collapse? Oh.

When you recall that the International Space Station, built with the help of every country in the world but North Korea, and cost two hundred trillion dollars because it was redesigned 8,000 times over twenty years, and in any event is smaller than the space station we let burn up and that was built out of spare parts left over from Apollo, having a shuttle to go to it doesn't seem so cool anymore. And then, after two tragic (not in the sense of aw, that's sad but in the original sense of inevitable doom) accidents, we don't even have a shuttle anymore. 

The Shuttle and ISS are the result of bureaucratic inertia, and the fact that the U.S. Government has an obscene amount of money. The exploratory probes are a result of the fact that NASA, in its spare time, is a jobs program for scientists, and the fact that the U.S. Government has an obscene amount of money. 

We should not be surprised that we do not have a space program, or at least a space program that space advocates would proudly call their own. There is absolutely no political reason to have one. The two reasons that governments fund anything beyond exploration of the most cursory nature is strategic competition with rival powers, or to gain control of vital resources or trade. 

But, the United States has no rivals, for we are a solitary superpower. We do not need to beat anyone to anywhere. The only possible rival is China, but this is not going to happen in the near term. There are no easily accessible resources in space. Most of space is, well, space. There is not only no "Gold in them thar hills," there mostly isn't really even a there there. The closest real estate to Earth, our Moon, is covered in Aluminum and Silicon based dirt. Aluminum and Silicon are hardly the most valuable of mineral resources on Earth. Add to that the fact that we would have to transport not merely miners and tools, but every drop of water, breath of air and crumb of food that the miners would consume during their entire Lunar sojourn, this becomes a undesirable investment option for government. Any other usable real estate is even further away. 

And, there are no friendly aliens to go out and trade with either, despite the fervent beliefs of many in this country. 

The final reason the government might agree to allow large scale efforts to colonize space doesn't apply to the United States either. By and large we are a fat, happy, prosperous people, and have no desire to move elsewhere. We've got it as good as any nation in the history of the world, so why should anyone want to leave? There are no Puritans, no Huguenots suffering from religious oppression, and even when things were much worse for blacks in this country, even when there was still slavery, they didn't want to go to Liberia. 

The only way that the U.S. Government will pay for a large scale space program in the absence of traditional motivations, is if we become so fantastically wealthy that a hundred billion dollars is pocket change..

There are many space exploration advocates who bemoan the fact that the American space program was a political entity, born of the cold war and dying with it. But this view is incorrect in that, historically, exploration has rarely if ever been anything but political. When John F. Kennedy launched the American half of the cold war space race, he followed a tradition of politically motivated exploration that stretches back half a millennium.

When Henry the Navigator organized the Portuguese exploration efforts in the late fifteenth century, he did it for an expressly political purpose - to find an alternate route to valuable commodities. The existing, and expensive trade route to the spices that Europe wanted went straight through the Islamic Ottoman Empire, which for reasons of religion, politics and greed restricted the flow of commerce to the Christian west.

When the Italian navigator Christopher Columbus convinced the Spanish to finance his expedition, the Spanish wanted an alternate route to the east as well - because the Ottomans and the Portuguese controlled the other two. French and British, Dutch and Swedish voyages of exploration over the next two centuries were the result of the desire of those governments to establish colonies in the new world, so as not to be totally left out of the game that was dominated by the first two exploring nations, Portugal and Spain. (And to discover new routes to the east, of course.)

While these explorations seemed to lead quite naturally to trade, colonies, empire and the like, it did not spring magically into existence, simply because new lands had been discovered. Gold inspired the Spanish conquistadors, and soon Spain was in possession of vast territories it didn’t know quite what to do with. The vast difference in military capability between the Castilian soldiers of Cortez and Pizarro meant that the Aztec and Incan empires could be conquered by small groups of adventurers, without constant support from the mother country.

But elsewhere in the world, progress toward empire was slow. In the early seventeenth century, the French government could barely convince a couple thousand of her citizens to settle in New France, and even by the time of the American Revolution a hundred and fifty years later, the population of Canada only amounted to tens of thousands. Even in the rich farm lands of what became the Thirteen Colonies, population growth was negative for decades - the colonies only grew through immigration. The first British colony died out altogether, and the second, third and fourth nearly did as well. Setting up colonies was a difficult business, and rarely profitable until decades later. State support for these ventures was minimal, unless placing a colony directly inconvenienced a rival power, or a valuable resource lay directly under it.

In Africa and in the East, outright empire building was slow to develop. The Portuguese, and later the Spanish, British, Dutch and French set up small outposts and forts to guard their trade routes. And even these were only viable because of the vast amounts of wealth that was easily obtained by trading with the nations of the east.

Governments financed exploration for political reasons - but exploration was cheap. A couple ships, crew and an overly brave explorer were easy to come by. Settlements and Empire were much more costly, and usually avoided, unless there was a compelling political or strategic gain to be had. Those colonies usually fell into one of two categories - securing land to prevent a rival power from getting it (usually sparsely inhabited or primitive areas), or smaller forts, treaty ports, and outposts used to secure trade routes to valuable commodities.

As Europe grew richer and more technologically advanced these networks of colonies, outposts and treaty ports eventually evolved into true empires; usually as the result of some ambitious Leftenant conquering or duping local rulers because the local customs offended his sense of propriety. But in the early stages, this process was expensive and run by the government for its own purposes. Merchants, colonists, traders and mechanics followed later, often much later.

Another factor to consider is that most of the early British colonies in America were self financed, and by groups that wanted desperately to leave England; or they were prison colonies. This pattern was also true, though to a lesser extent, in other British dominions, and in the territories of other powers. It was only after the colonies had become established over a period of decades or centuries, and became prosperous that the central government showed any interest in them at all.

Governments can finance exploration easily. Settlement is a tougher and more expensive endeavor, and only undertaken (by governments) when there is clear and immediate gain to be had.

The New York Times is reporting that the Taliban are consolidating their leadership and positions in Afghanistan with an eye to re-taking the country. The Times reports that police in Kandahar haven't been paid in months, that the foreign material and personnel support promised to maintain security has not materialized, and that the country is in danger of slipping into chaos. The article quotes an Afghani military leader: "'There is no real administration all over Afghanistan, no army, no police.... The people do not want the Taliban, but we have to unite and build, but we are not.'"

I've been reading stories like this for months. I realize that it's a bumpy road to freedom and democracy and cold beer for all, but if Afghani farmers must resort once again to opium production to survive, and the Taliban is able to harrass travellers, isn't that a bit more of a gaping, axle-eating pothole?

Tomorrow will mark the one-month anniversary of Johnny-Two Cents, The Weblog, as an idea. The real anniversary will fall on Saturday, but I'm busy tomorrow and Saturday (I do have a life outside the inter-web, you know!), so today is the day.

Forty-one thousand words in thirty days. Not too shabby. Of course, that's only 82% of One Standard Den Beste.