NASA / CLOSE CALL : Bush Lets Space Agency Remain in Orbit, Scrubs External Review

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration has quietly survived a crisis that insiders say could have devastated the agency, destroying morale and driving out its most talented managers and scientists.

The problem for NASA came when both congressional critics and the staff of the National Space Council, which is chaired by Vice President Dan Quayle, privately urged a sweeping investigation of alleged mismanagement at the space agency.

President Bush last week forcefully rejected the calls. Instead of ordering an outside investigation of NASA’s current problems with the space shuttle, the Hubble telescope and the proposed orbiting space station, Bush took a far more modest step: He asked NASA Administrator Richard H. Truly to appoint a panel to review the agency’s long-term goals.

BACKGROUND: Speculation that a major investigation was forthcoming had been fed by a recent story in the weekly trade newspaper Space News. According to the article, Bush planned a massive NASA reorganization and a fundamental review of the nation’s space priorities. The article also said that the President blamed current NASA management--rather than faulty technology or overambitious goals--for the agency’s troubles.

The story was broadcast by two television networks, which also reported that Truly was considering resigning over the apparent vote of no confidence by the White House.

NASA officials were quickly assured by the White House that the story was groundless. NASA executives became convinced that the tale originated with the staff of the National Space Council, which has clashed with senior NASA managers over who should have primacy in setting Administration space policy.

The space council is an interagency group including Truly, several Cabinet members, Budget Director Richard G. Darman, White House Chief of Staff John H. Sununu and National Security Adviser Brent Scowcroft. It is chaired by Quayle and has a staff of about a dozen professionals ensconced in the Old Executive Office Building adjacent to the White House.

“That’s the only group to benefit; they were the perpetrator of a lot of this,” said a senior NASA official, who insisted on anonymity. “They’re searching desperately for a role.”

That role could have been dramatically enhanced had the White House created--under the aegis of the space council--a new high-level panel to investigate all aspects of current and future NASA operations.

“Bush realized that NASA couldn’t stand another investigation” following the massive shake-up of the agency after the Challenger disaster, the senior NASA official said. “It would end the agency.”

ROLE DENIED: A space council official, who asked not to be named, insisted that the trade newspaper story had not originated there and that the council staff was not aiming to “take over” NASA. Despite disagreements with agency managers over a number of space programs, the official said, the space council supports the overall management of NASA.

Quayle himself met with Truly last week and declared afterward that the Administration has “complete confidence” in the NASA administrator and dismissed rampant speculation that the White House would launch a major probe of the space agency.

“There is no White House investigation of NASA, nor will there be one. We’ve got a challenge to move this space program forward, which we will,” the vice president said.

On Wednesday, Quayle announced that veteran aerospace executive Norman R. Augustine, former head of Martin Marietta Corp., had been selected to head an independent committee that will review the space agency and report to Truly.

PROBLEMS MOUNT: Meanwhile, NASA’s problems continued to mount--a hydrogen leak delaying the planned flight of the Atlantis space shuttle was disclosed Wednesday--and NASA critics were openly skeptical of the agency’s planned internal review.

“The real question now is, is the organization performing up to standards that could and should be expected? I feel it’s not,” said John Logsdon, director of the Space Policy Institute at George Washington University here. “They should be looking at the whole organization, its structure and way of doing business and whether they are appropriate for the missions proposed for the next decade and beyond.”