Letters to and from the Space Frontier Foundation concerning Mars Direct

To the Reader:

     I am acquainted with Dr. Robert Zubrin, and have attended many of his lectures on Mars Direct,
with the very first Mars Conference held in 1998 In Boulder, Colorado.  In a nutshell, Dr. Zubrin
states that
we should proceed directly to Mars first, with full government funding as the Apollo program,
and then work our way back to the Moon from there.

     Zubrin promotes this as "A space program you can believe in."

     I've often given this a lot of thought, but then I decided to inquire Rick Tumlinson and Jeff Krukin,
and the Space Frontier Foundation, about this proposal.  Here is my letter and response.

     P.S.  I now believe and Krukin and Tumlinson are correct on this.  Read these letters to see why.

To:  Jeff Krukin, Rick Tumlinson:

     Could you tell me what you think of Dr. Robert Zubrin's proposal of Mars Direct,

which he explains in his book, "The Case for Mars?"

     Is it a good idea?  Should we try to pursue it?

Can we combine it with other ideas, perhaps your own?

     Please reply to this, I would really like to know.

I am in the process of rewriting my proposal, 

"A Permanent Moon Base and A Mission to Mars"

in which I am incorporating your ideas, and possibly

Dr. Zubrin's.

     Please let me know of your opinion.

Alastair Browne

RickTumlinson	6/29/12
to William, Jeff, me

Will Watson passed this on to me.
I consider Mr. Zubrin to be a very smart fellow, I have known him since he began working on Mars ideas and as Executive Director of FINDS gave him the first $100k to start the Mars Society (as a means of pushing NASA and gov. programs out of LEO to make way for commercial space). His ideas have a strong kernel of reality and possibility, but reliance on his Mars Direct scenario would be a recipe for disaster, and yet another dead end in space - which I will not stand for.

Jeff Greason and I are discussing and will possibly be proposing a much more robust, sustainable and leveraged approach tentatively called (5 Steps to Mars) that would create an infrastructure, develop long term resource utilization and support the growth of human outposts and societies from LEO to the Moon, Free Space and the Mars neighbourhood (including Ph/D.)

Rick Tumlinson

Jeff Krukin
to Rick, William, me

Hello Alastair,

Thank you for reaching out to Rick and myself.

I have not read Zubrin's books because I do not believe it is wise, effective, or efficient to bypass our near-space neighborhood and proceed directly to Mars in an economically and politically unsustainable manner.  The engineering is not the issue, the reduction of transit time is not the issue (although it is certainly desirable and there are other proposals for that along with Mars Direct).  Sustainability is the issue (as it is on Earth), for without that there will be no expanding presence of human beings throughout our Solar System.

Our species must explore, settle, and develop space in an evolutionary step-by-step manner, much as our ancestors did in wind-powered ships that needed to reprovision from land as they moved further into the world's oceans.  We are at this same phase as we move into the solar system.  First the Moon and asteroids and the LaGrange points, then Mars, then beyond.

None of the world's political systems will support the decades-long infusion of tax dollars needed to maintain far-flung space outposts that sustain a handful of people, let alone large colonies.  The initial enthusiasm and excitement wanes, and this is obvious from history.  Were this not the case, every national space agency would have more funding than it knew how to use.  Do you see this anywhere?  Can you imagine this happening?  Are there any arguments that can be made for this that have not already been made... and failed to generate the needed government funding over the long-term?

The path to Mars begins with a permanent Moon base, as you indicate in your proposal title.  But that, too, will only happen if it is economically sustainable, if that base produces something of value that can be sold.  In other words, while it may begin as a "base" it must transition to a colony that exports goods and services and earns a profit.  And then the colony becomes a city that becomes part of humanity's economic sphere and helps us push beyond itself and on to Mars.  And because that city becomes self-sustaining, it can support the scientists who want to perform their science and exploration locally (vs. robotically and remotely).

And yet, we must do something even before we have that permanent Moon base/colony.  We must have reliable, cost-effective, and economically sustainable Earth-to-orbit transportation, something that governments cannot provide because they are not designed to lower the cost of products and services.  As companies like SpaceX, Orbital Sciences Corp., Sierra Nevada Corp., Virgin Galactic, Masten Space Systems, Armadillo Aerospace, XCOR Aerospace, and others learn to develop and profit from orbital and suborbital space vehicles, we will learn how to create profitable business that will support a profitable Earth-space transportation infrastructure that will take us to Mars.  This will not happen quickly enough for Zubrin and others, but this does not concern me.  Meeting the artificial deadline of "I want to see this in my lifetime" is a disservice to the needs of humanity, which includes opening the space frontier as I have described above for access to resources.  Punching to Mars will not accomplish this, and so it is irrelevant.

I hope this is helpful.

Ever forward,

Jeff