You may ask, so what? One so what is that some other nation, like China, may be the first back to the Moon. A friend of mine,♠ someone who is a student of China (The People's Republic of China or the PRC), made these comments, which he agreed I could share:
The psychological impact of China's landing a man on the Moon will be enormous in three audiences:The United States doesn't have to lead the world. The problem is, our own view of freedom and the rights and responsibilities of citizens is not the same as the views of all other nations. Our view is preserved by our system of checks and balances, but also by the fact that others, with a few exceptions, are willing to let us peacefully go about our business. If we begin to appear weak, we will find that others will not respect us and that eventually they will try to push us around. History is filled with examples.It will be a rather different world, the morning after. And it will be in the mind, not the physicality, that it will be different.
- In China. It will show that they have truly achieved what the CCP has implicitly sought, to move China back to center stage. The past 200 years or so will be shown to be an aberration, and it will be the Chinese Communist Party that will have righted that wrong.
- The rest of the world. American exceptionalism, often pooh-poohed here, is something very real. There is a reason why people CHOOSE to emigrate here. Should the PRC be able to put a man on the Moon while the US is still years away from being able to do so, we can assuage ourselves w/ the litany of "we did it decades ago," but there will be the perception, per bin Laden, of who is the winning horse and who is the losing horse.
- The United States. Some people think the Chinese will land at Tranquility Base, roll up the US flag, and plant the Chinese flag. Would that they did! But they're hardly likely to be so provocative. And what will that end of American exceptionalism do here? What will be the impact on the American President who "lost" the Moon, or on the constant refrain, "we put a man on the Moon, why can't we solve X"? I suspect it will raise real doubts, in a way that not even Sputnik did. (And we now have the new history of the space race which argues that Ike wanted the Soviets to fly Sputnik first, to avoid all those annoying legal issues of overflight rights.)
Peaceful competition in space is better than military competition here on earth. Let us get back in the space race.
Regards — Cliff
♠ The author of the remarks is Dean Cheng, who recently served as CNA Corporation’s Senior Asia Analyst. He now is a Research Fellow on Chinese military and security affairs at the Heritage Foundation.
5 comments:
I think in terms of military strategy and tactics, he who holds the high ground has a battlespace advantage. Orbital space to include the moon is certainly, figuratively and literally, military high ground.
We have long ago forgotten the real meaning of Roosevelt's admonition that we must "walk softly but carry a big stick." Today, we barely crawl......and our big stick is simply splinters. We are on the eve of becoming a mere part of the "New World Order."
I personally think it sad that so many good men, patriots all, have given their all for something that our government bolstered by out society is simply giving away with not so much as a whimper.
Let's raise taxes to pay for it!!!
Oh, wait. Grover Norquist says, NO!
There seems to be a disconnect here. How many "welfare queens" do you think add up to a space program? Or do we need to start axing Social Security to give you guys a full fledge America Exceptionalism woody?
Utter lack of consistency in "conservative" logic on your parts. I've heard that we have a "spending problem" in Washington. Or, do you just get to kick Eric Cantor's blather aside when it doesn't fit your cherrypicking parrot points that subsidize the aerospace industry?
I don't think that we have to spend more money in space, but we do need to get focused. In fact, NASA has already laid off about 4,000 folks down in the Cape Canaveral area, so thing are actually becoming less expensive, severance and unemployment benefits not included.
And, the DoD budget could contribute to keeping us in space.
So, I don't think it is about raising taxes or taking money away from other programs, but more about using wisely the money we have. That and having a vision. Blogger Tom Ricks may think President Kennedy was the worse President in the last century (he is wrong, it was Woodrow Wilson), but one thing President Kennedy did was give us a vision and a goal in space. His (Ricks') poll is here, I think.
Regards — Cliff
How is this for a goal - Rebuild the Middle Class?
I realize you agree. We just vary on what the approach should be.
Food for thought: Trickle down is dead becuase globilization allows America's uber-rich, ..er, um... I mean "job creators" to take their investment overseas.
Trickle down is now, trickle across.
I agree with Cliff in re getting focused with the money we have....and frankly...THAT is the spending problem in a nutshell...for all the Federal spending programs..... many, many of which are duplicates of many others. In re space, we have a robust "space command" in the DoD and could easily use that as a conduit for any future space program growth....surely the military can't do any worse than NASA or the AAAS or other gov't or quasigovt entities.
As things stand today, any future space related acquisitions will likely be money in the Chinese bank anyway. When you look at component manufacture in the "aerospace industry" a disproportionate amount of it is provided by Pacific Rim companies....especially Chinese.
I personally think it is important to at least maintain parity with other world powers....China rapidly becoming...or already having become one...if not "the."
I don't think the issue is liberal or conservative in terms of ownership of "right thinking."
BTW....."taxation" is going to go up...regardless of who does what to who in the next few weeks...or year to come. It's only a matter of what envelope the increase goes into......direct tax, increased interest cost, lost opportunity costs, etc. ad nauseum.
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