Location
Radisson Resort at the Port, Convention Center, Martinique Room
Start Date
3-5-2001 1:00 PM
Description
Since the dawn of the space age, the United States and most other spacefaring nations have headed down an essentially constant path to space capabilities. Launch vehicles have been developed from longrange missiles, and have become increasingly larger and more complex to provide greater payload capability. Space vehicles have followed a similar course, increasing in size and complexity to provide more capability and to maintain that capability for longer periods of time. This path has resulted in systems which provide tremendous capability, but at the cost of large budgets, lead times of many years to achieve new capabilities or even to sustain current capabilities, and capabilities that are relatively static once placed into orbit. Months are needed to assemble and launch a rocket even if already produced, and most satellites have only enough fuel for station-keeping or changing orbital planes by a degree or two.
A number of organizations, within the U.S and internationally, are looking at new ways to provide capabilities from space. Many such concepts in some ways “go back to the future” as they call for smaller, less expensive, more operable systems. Thirty five years ago, launch rates were considerably higher at the Air Force’s two launch ranges, per-launch costs were lower as the systems were less complex, and military crews could perform some of the actual launches. Current technology provides the means to achieve considerable capability while returning to smaller systems with lower operations costs. While the capacity of any one launch vehicle or space vehicle may be less than that of one of our current launch vehicles or satellites, the overall capability provided could be greater and more militarily useful. The Military Spaceplane concept is one possibility. Conceived as a two-stage-to-orbit system of vehicles, some of which would be reusable, it provides relatively modest payload capabilities but is intended to lower the per-mission cost and to provide responsiveness unheard of in today’s systems. Certainly the Military Spaceplane is not intended to replace all of today’s launch vehicles and satellites, but may provide an opportunity to perform some of those missions more effectively and provide the ability to perform additional missions that cannot be performed today.
Paper Session III-C - The Case for a Military Spaceplane
Radisson Resort at the Port, Convention Center, Martinique Room
Since the dawn of the space age, the United States and most other spacefaring nations have headed down an essentially constant path to space capabilities. Launch vehicles have been developed from longrange missiles, and have become increasingly larger and more complex to provide greater payload capability. Space vehicles have followed a similar course, increasing in size and complexity to provide more capability and to maintain that capability for longer periods of time. This path has resulted in systems which provide tremendous capability, but at the cost of large budgets, lead times of many years to achieve new capabilities or even to sustain current capabilities, and capabilities that are relatively static once placed into orbit. Months are needed to assemble and launch a rocket even if already produced, and most satellites have only enough fuel for station-keeping or changing orbital planes by a degree or two.
A number of organizations, within the U.S and internationally, are looking at new ways to provide capabilities from space. Many such concepts in some ways “go back to the future” as they call for smaller, less expensive, more operable systems. Thirty five years ago, launch rates were considerably higher at the Air Force’s two launch ranges, per-launch costs were lower as the systems were less complex, and military crews could perform some of the actual launches. Current technology provides the means to achieve considerable capability while returning to smaller systems with lower operations costs. While the capacity of any one launch vehicle or space vehicle may be less than that of one of our current launch vehicles or satellites, the overall capability provided could be greater and more militarily useful. The Military Spaceplane concept is one possibility. Conceived as a two-stage-to-orbit system of vehicles, some of which would be reusable, it provides relatively modest payload capabilities but is intended to lower the per-mission cost and to provide responsiveness unheard of in today’s systems. Certainly the Military Spaceplane is not intended to replace all of today’s launch vehicles and satellites, but may provide an opportunity to perform some of those missions more effectively and provide the ability to perform additional missions that cannot be performed today.
