Space Launch System - Orion
Discussion
I think there is far too much talk about perceived "risk aversion". The reason why Apollo was willing to take risks was because it was a programme run on a war footing. In this case, the war was The Cold War but as far as time pressures and budgets were concerned, it was very similar to the crash programmes insitigated in World War 2.
What is interesting is that one of the main reasons why the moon landings ended with Apollo 17 (and not Apollo 20 as originally intended) was that President Nixon did not want any Apollo astronauts killed on his watch. "Risk Aversion" was already built into Apollo - it just needed a couple of years to raise its head. Once the stated programme goal (landing a man on the moon and returning him safely to the earth) had been achieved, the President was not terribly enthusiastic for NASA to keep pushing their luck. Apollo 13 showed how risky the whole project was.
Artemis/Orion has not been funded nor has it been placed under time pressures the way Apollo was. In fact, it has been a very low priority as far as Federal funding is concerned so has been hampered by lack of interest from those in charge of the funding coupled with vaccilation over what the programme aims are. Those are the real reasons why Artemis/Orion has moved so slowly.
If China anounced tomorrow that they were planning to land a human on the moon within 5 to 10 years - and demonstrated the mission architecture (i.e. they weren't just expressing a wish but showing how they intended to do it), I am sure the US would respond and funding for Artemis would become more of a priority.
What is interesting is that one of the main reasons why the moon landings ended with Apollo 17 (and not Apollo 20 as originally intended) was that President Nixon did not want any Apollo astronauts killed on his watch. "Risk Aversion" was already built into Apollo - it just needed a couple of years to raise its head. Once the stated programme goal (landing a man on the moon and returning him safely to the earth) had been achieved, the President was not terribly enthusiastic for NASA to keep pushing their luck. Apollo 13 showed how risky the whole project was.
Artemis/Orion has not been funded nor has it been placed under time pressures the way Apollo was. In fact, it has been a very low priority as far as Federal funding is concerned so has been hampered by lack of interest from those in charge of the funding coupled with vaccilation over what the programme aims are. Those are the real reasons why Artemis/Orion has moved so slowly.
If China anounced tomorrow that they were planning to land a human on the moon within 5 to 10 years - and demonstrated the mission architecture (i.e. they weren't just expressing a wish but showing how they intended to do it), I am sure the US would respond and funding for Artemis would become more of a priority.
Perhaps. The underlying difference between then and now was that the Cold War was in full swing and there was genuine concern about Communism becoming even more dominant than it appeared to be at that time. That view was held by most of the Western world but most acutely in the US. Apollo has always to be seen in that context.
We may not be close to where we were Cold War wise (epecially compared to the late 1950s early 1960s) but the geo-political landscape has changed quite a bit since the original Constellation programme was announced almost twenty years ago.
I think we are far more wary of China and its technological and global ambitions than we were even ten years ago.
We may not be close to where we were Cold War wise (epecially compared to the late 1950s early 1960s) but the geo-political landscape has changed quite a bit since the original Constellation programme was announced almost twenty years ago.
I think we are far more wary of China and its technological and global ambitions than we were even ten years ago.
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