September 1971
From The Space Library
Dr. James C. Fletcher, NASA Administrator, said in interview published by Air Force Magazine that NASA planned to let hardware contracts for space shuttle by spring 1972, contingent on White House approval. NASA had decided in summer to extend preliminary design contracts by four months to "look more intensively at alternative configurations," examining phased approach for building reusable upper stage first and testing and using it with interim expendable booster, instead of developing reusable booster at same time. Reevaluation of design concepts was stirred by need for additional analyses and research and by need to trim expenditures "in a given year." NASA's viewpoint on space in this decade was "to bring the pro-gram down to earth, both figuratively and literally. We must ask ourselves the question: Is what we are doing useful in alleviating our problems on the ground?" Crucial criteria of each prospective space program were "whether it will pay for itself by doing useful work; whether it can be expected to produce valuable scientific knowledge that can only be obtained from space; whether it is important to national security; and whether it will catalyze valuable new technologies or lead' to other practical results." For shuttle "answers to all these questions is 100 percent affirmative." (AF Mug, 9/71, 53-61)
Communist China's technological progress was described by Bernard T. Feld in Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists: "The inescapable conclusion that the Chinese had mastered the difficult technologies of U-235 separation and hydrogen bomb production was somehow sublimated in the conviction that they would be much slower in mastering intercontinental ballistic missile technology. This conviction, advanced in the teeth of evidence-after all, the Chinese invented the rocket was reinforced by reports of widespread technological disruption in the Cultural Revolution. Their two successful launchings of space satellites, the last one weighing around 480 pounds [218 kg], in March 1971, should have disabused even the most skeptical or prejudiced. In any case, there are a sufficient number of recent eyewitness accounts by Westerners of Chinese scientific achievements in various fields to dispell any notions of Chinese technical inferiority." (Bull of Atomic Scientists, 9/71)
- August
- September
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30
