Moon Walker Blames Last 5 Presidents for Space Gap

The lead America once held in space exploration has all but evaporated because the country’s last five Presidents lacked leadership in the field, according to a man who walked on the moon.

Former astronaut Charles (Pete) Conrad Jr. said that while America fails to establish long-term space goals, the rest of the world is fast catching up because other nations realize the benefits of operating in space.

No President since John F. Kennedy has set bold new space challenges for the country, Conrad said.

“We haven’t had a President fire us a good shot on what we ought to do in space since John F. Kennedy,” Conrad said in a recent interview in Huntington Beach.

Building Mars Data

Conrad, 57, who walked on the moon in 1969 and was commander of Skylab in 1973, believes the Soviet Union is ahead in some, although not all, key areas of space exploration.

The Soviets have had a space station for many years that provides valuable data on how to live for a long time in space, conduct experiments and make repairs needed for survival, he said.

“If you ask me who is building the data on going to Mars, I’d say they are,” Conrad said. “A trip to Mars takes roughly 450 days. They’ll have experience with man in space for 300 days if their current flight is successful. Our longest trip is about 85 days.”

The United States has had a space shuttle for years, although the program was grounded after the Challenger explosion in January, 1986. The Soviets are developing a manned reusable vehicle but do not have that capability yet, Conrad said.

He said President Reagan, who three years ago enthusiastically supported a manned space station and the creation of a commercial space industry, has not championed space lately, because attention has focused on the Middle East, arms talks and the Iran- contra affair.

The former astronaut is staff vice president for international business development at McDonnell Douglas Corp., which is bidding for space station contracts.

Conrad said that in 1965, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration was gearing up a launching capability to land on the moon by 1970, build a space station and put a man on Mars by 1983. Political support waned, however, as social legislation and the Vietnam War took center stage.

Criticized Nixon, Ford

“In 1967, President Johnson sort of said, ‘You boys stay on schedule for going to the moon but knock off the rest of the stuff because it doesn’t seem politically acceptable right now,’ ” Conrad said.

He criticized former Presidents Richard M. Nixon and Gerald R. Ford for bypassing what he described as more ambitious projects in favor of building a reusable orbiter. The shuttle program was then delayed and scaled back under President Jimmy Carter because of budget problems, he said.

Before the Challenger tragedy, the shuttle program had several significant successes in the 1980s, contributing to a revived interest in the U.S. space program. A presidential task force recommended in May, 1986, that the United States commit vast resources to colonizing the moon by 2005 and Mars by 2015.

“When I saw that report, I thought it was absolutely amazing,” he said. “Because 20 years later, the President’s group had concluded exactly what we were working on in 1965, but which we as a nation did not see fit to pursue.”

Launch capability is an example of America’s becoming just another competitor in a crowded field, he said.

“I think it is very important to this country to get the lead back and be the one that’s providing the services to get into space,” Conrad said.

“People around the world are determined to be in space, and they’re going to go there, either with us or without us.”

Outpost in Space

The Challenger disaster sidelined the United States’ primary ability to go into space until at least next spring.

Expendable rockets, forsaken in the 1970s in favor of the reusable shuttle, are again being built to put satellites into orbit, helping meet the nation’s launching needs.

NASA plans to issue multibillion-dollar contracts in November to begin building the nation’s first permanently manned outpost in space.

In April, Reagan approved a plan to divide the station development into two phases and scaled it back to cut costs. The station is to be inhabited by 1996 and completed much later, with contributions from Japan, Canada and European nations working with the European Space Agency.

NASA estimated the cost of building the station at $17.9 billion. The National Research Council put the cost at $27.5 billion.

The space station is needed, Conrad said, for materials processing and laboratory research that can only be accomplished in a zero-gravity environment. It would also be a staging point for exploration of deep space.

He said the American public and Congress would support broad space goals if they were championed by the President and he hopes that space becomes a major issue in the 1988 presidential election.

“I haven’t heard any of the potential candidates even mention space. But the campaign trail is one of the few forums that you can get these guys to commit themselves to anything,” he said.