User:Mdelaney

First let me explain something about myself. I was born and raised in Ireland, I lived and worked in the USA for about 10 years. I returned to Ireland primarily for family reasons. This gives me an unusual perspective on some things, having seen them (to some extent) both from inside and outside.

Just so nobody gets the wrong idea from some of the responses I write on Lunarpedia, I am not anti-NASA, I'm just not spellbound by NASA or most of the models and plans for returning to the Moon presented by them. I believe there are other models we should examine in the pursuit of our goal.

Over the last several years I've seen many ideas bandied about. From preserving the status quo to making NASA the space equivalent of the FAA, and everything in between. All of these ideas have pros and cons and should be examined.

NASA needs to be seen for what it is, a very staid conservative government body that's treated as a political football and generally made to wait around for the money it needs to to the jobs it's told to do only to discover that the politicians have moved the goalposts if they ever do get the funding. NASA should also be viewed as a near-corporate entity, their plans may not be for our lifetimes, but the lifetime of NASA.

NASA has done many great things and will continue to do so, but while some of those great achievements could only have been executed by a government body, some could have been carried out by private companies had they been given the chance.

It is also important in 2007 to realize that there are now several countries with astronaut corps. The EU has expressed an interest in getting properly involved in the ESA space programs. The ESA will have Soyuz launch capability from it's own facilities starting in 2008. The launch infrastructure has been designed so that it can be smoothly adapted for human spaceflight.

So from 2008 it looks like manned launch capabilities will exist for USA, Russia, EU and China and I'm sure the Indians are not far behind. The recent visit of HM Queen Elizabeth II to Goddard Space Flight Center may be an attempt to foster more British interest in space.

I do not subscribe to "Space Exploration" in the NASA or Star Trek mold. Exploration is a means to an end, not an end in itself as depicted by NASA and Star Trek.

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