I’ve to leave for a friend’s summer cottage in a bit.
Meanwhile, I give you people who to refer to; people who “get it”:
Clark Lindsey at Rlvnews, Jon Goff at Selenian Boondocks, Rand Simberg at Transterrestrial Musings, Monte Davis (get him to testify please!!), probably Henry Spencer as well. I’m quite sure Jeff Greason in the panel is one of those people.
They understand that Progress is not just a thirty year old Russian spacecraft – it is something we need in order to be spacefaring (which we are not currently). They can use my vote.
ESA’s Jean Jacques Dordain stressed yesterday how important it is to have continuity and how one can’t stop operations when one has development.
Hence one should not even *start* operations at a too early point. It leads to problems – it’s a constant money sink if your running costs for operations are extremely high – it actually leads to less total operations after a short while. Say, if you have a moonbase that is extremely costly to keep up, just as a sort of Apollo age national prestige relic – you have less money for developing a cheaper and sustainable way to actually get there.
One must crawl, then walk, then run. It serves a purpose.
Until next week, enjoy the midsummer weekend!