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The U.S. Should Support a Commercial Mir Space Station – U.S. Should Endorse Russian Efforts to Keep Space Station in Orbit
Los Angeles, CA, January 27, 1999 – The Space Frontier Foundation, a space policy organization, called on NASA and U.S. government officials to endorse a recently announced Russian plan to keep the Mir space station in orbit through 2002 using private funds.
"If Russia finds commercial means to keep Mir in orbit, the U.S. will achieve its originally stated goal for working with them to build the International Space Station (ISS)," stated Foundation president Rick Tumlinson.
"It keeps their space team intact, paid, and in Russia. It will mean fresh cash flow for their hard-pressed high technology sector, and can also act as a test case for commercialization of human space activities – something NASA says it wants to do with ISS," Mr. Tumlinson explained.
"All of this without U.S. taxpayers footing the bill."
The Foundation led the fight to "Keep Mir Alive" since plans were unveiled to bring it down, thus clearing the way for the U.S.-led International Space Station.
The Foundation believes the only way to open space to large numbers of people is using the free enterprise system as the driver – rather than relying on taxpayer-funded government operations – to increase the volume of space-based commercial human activities and bring its associated costs down.
"One building does not a frontier make," Tumlinson observed. "The ISS must not be an end in itself, but a catalyst around which other activities can take root. Mir and ISS represent the first two buildings for our first human community beyond Earth."
The Foundation feels NASA should endorse this new effort, provided Energia (the Russian firm that operates the Mir) can obtain the $150 million per year needed to keep it operating – without using U.S. funds provided for their work on ISS.
"If Russia can use commerce to take Mir off the financial books when it comes to carrying out their contracted work on ISS, NASA Administrator Daniel Goldin could call this a victory for the American free enterprise system," Tumlinson added.
"NASA's reaction to this plan will tell us a lot about whether they believe their own rhetoric about opening the space frontier to the people of Earth – or whether it's just propaganda."
The Space Frontier Foundation is a national space policy organization dedicated to opening space to human settlement as soon as possible.
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| The Space Frontier Foundation is an organization of people dedicated to opening the Space Frontier to human settlement as rapidly as possible. Our goals include protecting the Earth's fragile biosphere and creating a freer and more prosperous life for each generation by using the unlimited energy and material resources of space. Our purpose is to unleash the power of free enterprise and lead a united humanity permanently into the Solar System. |
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The High Frontier is Gerard K. O'Neill's masterpiece. This new 3rd Edition Includes an introduction by Freeman Dyson.
Click above to order The High Frontier from Amazon.com . |
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