Re: sci space policy targeted by disinformation experts?

Any aircraft can be flown with zero lift. Trim and thrust settings
during launch, during MECO and stage separation, and during throttle
up of the second stage, are all adjusted during ascent to achieve
this. As altitude is gained atmospheric factors become less important
as density falls. This is the case with the launch of the space
shuttle, as well as any winged booster.

25:1 is indeed a remarkable figure especially for this planform and
given its amazing performance during re-entry. Its better than the
shuttle, and the shape if developed into a two-stage fully reusable
system, would have greater cross range than the shuttle without heat
sheild tiles, without SSME, without SRBs. Basically F1s on the
Kerosene LOX booster, and J2s on the Hydrogen LOX orbiter. The same
airframe in both instances, size it for the payloads you want. 40
metric tons matches the shuttle pretty much. It was a
straightforward development of a program that was well advanced at a
time the call went out for a reusable spaceplane. This was it. It was
ignored.

Greening of our industry is best achieved by tapping into solar power
to produce hydrogen and with that synthetic hydrocarbons. The ISS
uses a sabatier reactor to turn CO2 into CH4. Zeolite catalysts
polymerize CH4 to higher alkanes like octane, the principal component
of gasoline. So, this is the way to green our industry, not cut-
backs. Lowering the cost of solar panels to 1% their current cost,
low-cost electrolyzers, low-cost carbon absorbers, achieve this. 3.34
billion tons of hydrogen made electrolytically with solar electriicty
and 30 billion tons of water, produces enough hydrogen to replace all
hydro-carbon fuels. Where hydro-carbon fuels are needed, solar
hydrogen may be used to create hydrocarbon from carbon-dioxde -
closing the now open ended loop.

The logistics of multiple stages can be a problem. Yet with
automation, they aren't much of a problem, especially if widely
dispersed as airports. The critical factor is thrust to weight. With
a thrust to weight of 4 you've got to manage engine mass. With a
thrust to weight of 70 not so much. With a thrust to weight of 1,000
- not at all. That's why I favor the development of MEMs based
rockets and jets. Scaling laws dictate that a MEMs based rocket or
jet will have thrust to weight of 1,000 or more. That's because the
weight of the parts, go down with volume, while the thrust of the
parts go down with area. So, an engine 1/10th the size of a larger
engine will have 1/100th the area, and 1/1000th the volume giving it
10x the thrust to weight. In fact, with rockets and jets the size of
pores on your skin, or hair follicles, thrust to weight is so small,
you can carry around millions of jets or rockets in a shaped skin, and
not carry much mass as all. The engines are controlled the same way
dots of color are controlled in your plasma screen flat panel
display. Instead of painting pictures, you paint thrust vectors
across the surface. Instead of colors, you have propulsive mode, one
set for subsonic jet fuel powered jets, one set for hypersonic
hydrogen powered jets, one set for hydrogen oxygen rockets in space.

I don't fault the USA for keeping some things private at this time.
The world is a dangerous place, and some things need to be kept
private. However, over-reliance on secrecy can cause its own
troubles. Disinformation isn't the huge problem some make it out to
be. It is merely a factor in controlling important information. No
amount of disinformation can stem the tide of a sea change in
conditions. In the 1950s whites in America had huge errors in their
judgments about blacks. The consensual reality in America was
diametrically opposed to the reality of race. Much evil was done in
the name of race. Yet despite the beliefs of the majority, Martin
Luther King prevailed. The errors and faleshoods accepted as fact
about race in America in the 1950s, could not withstand the reality.
Reality one out. No matter how hard fought the case for the lies. I
cannot imagin any disinformation campaign being as effective in
spreading lies about anything as the lies about race in the 1950s.
Yet, those lies could not withstand the reality of the value and
contributions of all races. So, I'm not overly concerned about
disinforomation, as long as we have some freedom to think and act as
free men and women.

I am mostly concerned about the false sense of security secrets give
those who create them. While great nations do have great secrets to
keep, too much reliance on secrecy limits the effort you can apply to
important secrets, while protecting all the lesser secrets. Further,
what was important to keep private in one era, may be best shouted
from the rooftops in another. Who makes this decision? How is it to
be made? This all requires deep strategic analysis, that is capable
of making massive changes in policy. This likely doesn't get done in
military circles, and the analysis cannot be done by temporary holders
of offices like elected officials - who are given partial mission
specific information in the context of a crisis. At root secrets are
the anathema of a free society, and once the classification bandwagon
gets started, its awfully hard to stop until the whole thing comes
crashing down. This is the common mode failure where the defenders of
liberty destroy liberty in their zeal using the wrong instruments to
achieve their goal - and looking at the defenders themselves is the
least likely failure mode to be seriously examined by those defenders.

Unlike some here I do not believe humanity is threatened by the United
States and its policies. Rather, the United States threatens its own
ability to lead by not taking the needs of the emerging global
community seriously, and seriously develop approaches to leadership
appropriate for the day and age it finds tself.

Much of our policies were created in the post world war two era
yeilding cold war strategies that had their desired effects. These
policies appropriate 60 years ago, are inappropriate today, and the
policies themselves are creating the major challenges facing our
nation today. This is my only beef with them. They don't work and
they no longer serve the nation. So, they should be scrapped and new
policies instituted more appropriate to our knowledge and situation
today.

I've given this a little thought and I believe it is time for the USA
to scrap its war footing and like Switzerland 500 years ago,
unilaterally end warfare and intelligence operations as a means of
executing national policy and interest. Military and intelligence
should be used only in defense of the homeland. The USA should also
normalize banking and trade policies that artificially favor it, and
begin to re-develop its manufacturing, mining, and farming sectors.
The USA should also stabilize its currency and set about to becoming
the world's defacto currency and banking system. The USA should
declassify all its classified material over the next 20 years, with a
special emphasis on licensing missile and nuclear technologies to
qualified US companies to achieve dominance in the energy and space
development sectors. Space based assets should be developed giving
the USA sound leadership in telecommunications, remote sensing,
ballistic transport, energy, and raw-materials from off-world.

.

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