NASA's Artemis Program Updates and Discussion Thread 5

[clongton]

I don't expect Musk to even mention SLS.

Unless Trump asks him. In which case I expect Musk would give him his honest opinion.

[clongton]

For instance, NASA has been restricted from assuming that refueling in space could be used, so reusable space-only transportation systems could never be considered that could have been dual use for MSR and future human missions.

Artemis is just the latest iteration of the very short sighted architecture that serves the bureaucracies that run this country and not the best interests of this country and I do not believe that anything substantial or meaningful will come from it short of lining the pockets of unnamed entities and persons. Quite frankly, the architecture stinks. Accordingly:

I have always been a proponent of in-space refueling. I even started a refueling thread many years ago, but after a few comments it got no traction. I also have believed for a very long time that fully reusable, in-space-only spacecraft is the only way to go for interplanetary transportation. For this specific post let's call that spacecraft a Cruiser. Starship can be the means to get to LEO (or a Lagrange station) where it will dock with a  Propellant Depot, refuel and then dock to the Cruiser,  and the crew transfers into it. It remains docked to the Cruiser all the way to Mars or Lunar orbit where it becomes the lander, while the Cruiser remains in orbit. Reverse it all for the return trip.

Think of taking a cab from home to New York's airport, boarding an airliner, flying from New York to Dallas, and taking a cab to the final destination. After the stay in Dallas, taking a cab back to the airport, reboarding the airliner, flying back to New York, the taking a cab home. The cab is Starship and the airliner is the Cruiser. You wouldn't take a cab from New York to Dallas and back, would you? Same, Same.

Of course, building such a Cruiser and bringing it to operational status, while it is the most efficient use of Time, Talent and Treasure (TTT), is unlikely to happen so long as long term planning is constrained by an Administration's term(s) in office. So I have hope for what Starship could be; ground to orbit transportation at both ends of the journey, while the journey itself would be aboard a spacecraft designed specifically for that role. And that constraint is why I have come to believe that, that is something that NASA will never be able to accomplish and only a privately owned and well financed company, like a SpaceX or a Blue Origin, will ever be able to create such a Cruiser and architecture.

Unless the Chinese, who have been doing long term planning for millennia, embarrass the living crap out of us by just doing themselves what we should have been doing all along.

[clongton]

There is no quid pro quo.

We don’t know that and likely never will know that. 

With respect:
If it is unknown and is likely unknowable, then perhaps we shouldn't use that term, specifically because of the thought or image that plants into people's minds.

[VSECOTSPE]

Washington power politics is what it is.  Not sure there’s a shorter, better term than quid pro quo.  You-scratch-my-back-and-I’ll-scratch-yours is too long.  Synonyms like exchange, trade, and barter are mercantile in nature, which is not what this is about.  Maybe “deals” (as in “The Art of...”) would work.  But I think some folks would still take offense and play “see no evil, hear no evil” even when political figures have publicly admitted that money and support has changed their views.  Sometimes folks just need to believe that certain favorite political or business figures are above such power politics.

[yg1968]

Smith’s blog quotes John Logsdon, researcher and observer of White House space policy for a half century, who states:  “Space was an area of policy stability during the first Trump administration. With Elon Musk likely in a position of influence, that is not likely to be the case this time around.” 

Yes, I saw Logsdon's quote. I wasn't sure whether he meant this as a positive or as a negative. I am assuming as a negative but if that is the case, I disagree with him. I think that Trump's new Administrator is likely to be pro-commercial as was the case with Bridenstine.

In the policy section, KSC Sage said that people at KSC are nervous about the future of SLS Block 1B. So we will see what happens with SLS (https://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index.php?topic=61826.msg2639514#msg2639514). I don't think that the report of Musk's Blue-Ribbon committee will talk about SLS directly but it may say something like the government should be buying services from the private sector instead of competing with the private sector or something along those lines. In any event, Musk will chair the commitee but he won't be the only one on the Committee, so space will not be the focus of the report.

[yg1968]

Washington power politics is what it is.  Not sure there’s a shorter, better term for quid pro quo.  You-scratch-my-back-and-I’ll-scratch-yours is too long.  Synonyms like exchange, trade, and barter are mercantile in nature, which is not what this is about.

I used an alignment of interest which is a better term because that really describes what it is. Musk specifically said that he didn't ask for anything in exchange for his endorsement of Trump (so essentially no quid pro quo) and I believe him when he says that. Having said that, there is also an alignment of interest which is impossible to deny: human exploration of Mars (in the next few years), a pro-commercial NASA Administrator and deregulation and other stuff that is not space related. I suppose that you could argue that the Committee itself is quid pro quo but again there is also an alignement of interest on that issue (reducing government waste). 

[JIS]

I have always been a proponent of in-space refueling. I even started a refueling thread many years ago, but after a few comments it got no traction. I also have believed for a very long time that fully reusable, in-space-only spacecraft is the only way to go for interplanetary transportation. For this specific post let's call that spacecraft a Cruiser. Starship can be the means to get to LEO (or a Lagrange station) where it will dock with a  Propellant Depot, refuel and then dock to the Cruiser,  and the crew transfers into it. It remains docked to the Cruiser all the way to Mars or Lunar orbit where it becomes the lander, while the Cruiser remains in orbit. Reverse it all for the return trip.

Starship propellants depot is such cruiser. Reusable Starship HLS is going to be refueled at NRHO and it can be done only by Starship propellants depot derivative. So such a capability is already being planned within Artemis project.

[Coastal Ron]

Smith’s blog quotes John Logsdon, researcher and observer of White House space policy for a half century, who states:  “Space was an area of policy stability during the first Trump administration. With Elon Musk likely in a position of influence, that is not likely to be the case this time around.” 

Yes, I saw Logsdon's quote. I wasn't sure whether he meant this as a positive or as a negative. I am assuming negative but if that is the case, I disagree with him. I think that Trump's new Administrator is likely to be pro-commercial as was the case with Bridenstine.

I think it is important to remember that those of us that have supported SpaceX over all these years are "pro-commercial", regardless who we voted for in this election, and no doubt there are many that were not ardent SpaceX supporters, but support other aerospace entities, that are pro-commercial too.

But the Artemis program was created on the foundation of the SLS and Orion MPCV programs, both of which were created by Congress.

So it doesn't matter what any Administration wants, it matters what Congress will do. And if there are jobs on the line with any changes, then members of Congress will push back on the changes. And the Trump II Administration can't be seen as a job killer, so they are going to have to work really hard to figure out how to be "pro-commericial" if the want to kill two high profile, high revenue, high-tech manufacturing programs (i.e. SLS and Orion).

Oh, and SLS production is done pretty close to the district House Speaker Mike Johnson comes from (and in the same state), so any changes to the SLS program will have intense scrutiny from the start.

[VSECOTSPE]

Yes, I saw Logsdon's quote. I wasn't sure whether he meant this as a positive or as a negative.

The implication is negative.  Logsdon is mostly old school and institutionalist.  He’s no Republican or Trump fan, but he respected the work that Pace (who is Logsdon’s successor academically) put in under Trump I.  He’s worried that Musk’s influence at the top of Trump II could undo that work and more.

In the policy section, KSC Sage said that people at KSC are nervous about the future of Block 1B.

Artemis III is the logical off-ramp if Artemis is reformed or redirected.  Whatever exact form that kind of scenario takes, if Musk weighs in or Trump just has his way this time on Mars, there will be winners and losers.  If they’re not taken care of (like in my Scenario 1 above), some of those losers could be in the NASA workforce.  That’s not fair to them.  But neither is Musk responsible for the couple decades of extremely poor leadership and gross mismanagement that led the old STS workforce into the dead end that is Orion/SLS.  Absent turning US civil human space flight into another long-term, uncompetitive, Amtrak-like subsidy, the chickens were always going to come home to roost at some point on Orion/SLS.

I agree with Logsdon that Musk’s influence at the top and Trump’s less bridled second-term have the potential to be more disruptive for the space sector than anything we’ve seen in a long time.  I’m also no Trump fan and don’t think that the hyper-rich buying their way into the system is healthy for the system on principle.  But I disagree with Logsdon when it comes to disruption of Artemis and US civil human space flight more generally.  These programs are a couple decades overdue for a complete makeover, mainly because other, parochial actors bought into and captured the US civil human space exploration program.  Disruption in this sub-sector, even with some hard hit losers, would be on net good, even if it’s really bad elsewhere.

Even with all the potential for change, whether Trump II actually prioritizes and can pull off a reform or redirect scenario when it comes to US civil human space exploration is far from clear.  Again, the past couple decades of history says bet on the no-change or reform-and-abandon scenarios.  We should not ignore the new possibilities that the election opened up, but we should also be aware that our speculation may just be sound and fury that signifies nothing.

Time will tell.

[OTV Booster]

What Musk needs most from Artemis is cadence.  Cislunar cadence is what allows SpaceX to develop, refine, and cost-reduce all the refueling tech that's needed to enable any BEO market.  At least for the time being, Artemis is the only program that's generating any BEO demand, so he at least needs to speed it up, and likely expand it.

Yes and no.  It’s a good point that Artemis is the only customer for Starship tankers.  StarLink doesn’t need that capability.  But StarLink is throwing off so much cash that StarLink will be able to self-fund Starship Mars variant development as a non-profit offshoot of the core business.  In terms of overall funding or demand, Artemis is really riding StarLink’s coattails rather than driving Starship development.

Two things:

1) I'd guess that the investors would be very happy to see some free cash flow.  Some may have a form of the martian monomania, but most of them want SpaceX to be viable and dominant for decades.  That would militate toward having some pay-fors supporting the BEO work.

2) There's nothing better for riding down the cost curve than actual operational campaigns.  Maybe Mars will get front-burnered by Trump II, or maybe Trump II will merely interpret OST Article IX in a way that lets SpaceX send as many Starships to the martian surface as it likes.¹  But even then, what do they practice on when the Mars window is closed?

Yes, they could in theory just launch prop to a depot and let it sit there until it boiled off.  But that's a non-trivial expense, even if it's a bearable one.²  It's much better to use Artemis, at a higher cadence, to cover the costs.  Unlike Mars ops, the the orbital mechanics give you a nice, smooth operational picture.

...But I’d also point out that Musk donated ~$120M to the Trump II campaign, not to congressional appropriators campaigns.  Boeing, LockMart, NG, and AJR donated to congressional appropriators.  And have large workforces/numbers of voters in the districts/states of those appropriators.  Musk has bought a lot of access and influence with the Trump II White House.  Whether that translates to much access and influence on the Hill remains to be seen.  There will probably be a honeymoon period between Trump II and Congress, especially if the Republicans remain in control in the House.  But parochial interests will eventually rear their heads and assert themselves.

Most of the pork is flowing to Republicans.  Republicans are terrified of incurring Trump's annoyance, because they've seen what happens to those who do so.  So if the administration tells them to take one for the team, they will.

Somewhere up-thread, you stated that it would take the White House getting involved to shake the stranglehold SLS and Orion had on their budgets.  We've just come up with a pretty plausible scenario where Elon's quid pro quo is to get the White House involved.

____________
¹It did occur to me that getting the White House to weigh in on relaxation of Cat IV planetary protection is another easy favor to grant.  No doubt the State Department will scream bloody murder, but Trump is unlikely to have a... nuanced... take on the expenditure of space soft power.

²I'll be interested to see how keen Elon is to go balls-to-the-wall on Mars colonization now that he's found himself some new hobbies on Earth.  No doubt he's still interested, but he seems now to want to do some terrestrial social engineering.  That's not particularly cheap.

Yes, multiple depot campaigns will pay down the cost.


As a mental exercise how much would it cost to build and launch a StarShip ready James Webb using comparable or better electronics, sensors and mirrors but heavier and more robust mechanicals? Or a robust 40t planetary probe? Hell, the data bandwidth will be the limiting factor. Hmmm, a new job for the StarLink team.


Once SS is delivering StarLinks and the depot is proven, mass BEO enables rather than limits. When the idea sinks in, plus some lead time, I think we'll see non Artimus depot use.

[OTV Booster]

For instance, NASA has been restricted from assuming that refueling in space could be used, so reusable space-only transportation systems could never be considered that could have been dual use for MSR and future human missions.

Artemis is just the latest iteration of the very short sighted architecture that serves the bureaucracies that run this country and not the best interests of this country and I do not believe that anything substantial or meaningful will come from it short of lining the pockets of unnamed entities and persons. Quite frankly, the architecture stinks. Accordingly:

I have always been a proponent of in-space refueling. I even started a refueling thread many years ago, but after a few comments it got no traction. I also have believed for a very long time that fully reusable, in-space-only spacecraft is the only way to go for interplanetary transportation. For this specific post let's call that spacecraft a Cruiser. Starship can be the means to get to LEO (or a Lagrange station) where it will dock with a  Propellant Depot, refuel and then dock to the Cruiser,  and the crew transfers into it. It remains docked to the Cruiser all the way to Mars or Lunar orbit where it becomes the lander, while the Cruiser remains in orbit. Reverse it all for the return trip.

Think of taking a cab from home to New York's airport, boarding an airliner, flying from New York to Dallas, and taking a cab to the final destination. After the stay in Dallas, taking a cab back to the airport, reboarding the airliner, flying back to New York, the taking a cab home. The cab is Starship and the airliner is the Cruiser. You wouldn't take a cab from New York to Dallas and back, would you? Same, Same.

Of course, building such a Cruiser and bringing it to operational status, while it is the most efficient use of Time, Talent and Treasure (TTT), is unlikely to happen so long as long term planning is constrained by an Administration's term(s) in office. So I have hope for what Starship could be; ground to orbit transportation at both ends of the journey, while the journey itself would be aboard a spacecraft designed specifically for that role. And that constraint is why I have come to believe that, that is something that NASA will never be able to accomplish and only a privately owned and well financed company, like a SpaceX or a Blue Origin, will ever be able to create such a Cruiser and architecture.

Unless the Chinese, who have been doing long term planning for millennia, embarrass the living crap out of us by just doing themselves what we should have been doing all along.

You lost me. IIUC, you propose the SS (the taxi) launch to and mate up with a cruiser (the airliner). Throw in a refueling. Then both taxi and airliner go to mars and the taxi lands. Then the taxi launches and hooks up with the airliner. Throw in another refueling. The taxi and airliner both come back to earth and the taxi (SS) lands.


An alternative. Send an SS to mars and let it hang out at the orbital taxi stand. Launch the cruiser and refuel. Go to mars. Transfer the crew to the taxi and land. Launch the taxi to the orbital taxi stand, transfer the crew to the cruiser. Leave the taxi at the stand and let the cruiser come back alone. Leave the cruiser on orbit and send up a taxi to get the crew. Wash, rinse, repeat.


The refueling at the mars end could go several ways but suffice it to say it must be done whatever the mechanics.

[Paul451]

You lost me. IIUC, you propose the SS (the taxi) launch to and mate up with a cruiser (the airliner). Throw in a refueling. Then both taxi and airliner go to mars and the taxi lands. Then the taxi launches and hooks up with the airliner. Throw in another refueling. The taxi and airliner both come back to earth and the taxi (SS) lands.

Also, the taxi carries the airliner to the airport (LEO), as well as all the fuel for depot (which the taxi also carries to the airport), to fuel the airliner that carries the same taxi to Mars.

I've never understood why people think that hub'n'spoke transport systems are even remotely a good metaphor for spaceflight. And believe in that metaphor with such conviction that they let it dictate their architecture.

[Paul451]

There are reports that Elon Musk was on the call between Trump and the Ukrainian President. This follows reports that Musk has been having direct discussions with Putin.

Not relevant directly to space (and I'm certainly not suggesting that people debate Ukraine-policy on this site!) but it does suggest that Musk has purchased significant influence with Trump, to the point of have a direct role in foreign policy and military policy. Space policy is a minor side-discussion by comparison.

[spacenut]

I agree with clongton about a large in space spacecraft.  Large and robust to last for decades.  I think it should have a habitation ring to provide artificial gravity for long deep space travel.  Then use a fully fueled Starship for landing and returning to orbit of the large spacecraft.  This large spacecraft should be nuclear powered whether pulsed as being studied now or nuclear electric ion propulsion.  This could explore to Mars and beyond to the asteroid belt and to the moons of Jupiter and Saturn.  It could carry enough equipment to establish a colony.  Heck, it might even have multiple Starships docked for transporting equipment, supplies, and people to a colony. 

This type of spacecraft could be built using Starship, in LEO, instead of a space station.  It might take 10 years or more, but in the long run it could be used longer than Starships. 

[yg1968]

There are reports that Elon Musk was on the call between Trump and the Ukrainian President. This follows reports that Musk has been having direct discussions with Putin.

Not relevant directly to space (and I'm certainly not suggesting that people debate Ukraine-policy on this site!) but it does suggest that Musk has purchased significant influence with Trump, to the point of have a direct role in foreign policy and military policy. Space policy is a minor side-discussion by comparison.

I am not sure that is what it means. This isn't the first time that Musk talks to Zelensky as it relates to Starlink. Ukraine relies a lot on Starlink, so it was relevant for Musk to talk to him again on this topic. It also contradicts the narrative that Musk is pro-Putin and anti-Ukraine which is the non-sense that keeps being repeated by some in the main street media.

[rcoppola]

I suspect Artemis will essentially become the Starship / HLS proving ground. Full re-use, fluids storage and transfer, comms, ECLSS, landings, etc. has to all be done for Mars anyway. So Artemis 1,2,3,4 seem assured on SLS. Gateway, EUS, MLT-2 will be cut. Orion moved to Vulcan (or New Glenn) so Blue can fulfill their HLS contract while SpaceX pushes on to Mars. imo.

[DanClemmensen]

I suspect Artemis will essentially become the Starship / HLS proving ground. Full re-use, fluids storage and transfer, comms, ECLSS, landings, etc. has to all be done for Mars anyway. So Artemis 1,2,3,4 seem assured on SLS. Gateway, EUS, MLT-2 will be cut. Orion moved to Vulcan (or New Glenn) so Blue can fulfill their HLS contract while SpaceX pushes on to Mars. imo.

There are only two remaining SLS Block 1 (for Artemis II and III). Artemis IV would require Block 1B, which requires ML-2 and EUS. I think/hope that SLS/Orion will be cancelled after Artemis III at the latest. Ideally they will be cancelled after a completely pointless uncrewed Artemis II.

[OTV Booster]

For instance, NASA has been restricted from assuming that refueling in space could be used, so reusable space-only transportation systems could never be considered that could have been dual use for MSR and future human missions.

Artemis is just the latest iteration of the very short sighted architecture that serves the bureaucracies that run this country and not the best interests of this country and I do not believe that anything substantial or meaningful will come from it short of lining the pockets of unnamed entities and persons. Quite frankly, the architecture stinks. Accordingly:

I have always been a proponent of in-space refueling. I even started a refueling thread many years ago, but after a few comments it got no traction. I also have believed for a very long time that fully reusable, in-space-only spacecraft is the only way to go for interplanetary transportation. For this specific post let's call that spacecraft a Cruiser. Starship can be the means to get to LEO (or a Lagrange station) where it will dock with a  Propellant Depot, refuel and then dock to the Cruiser,  and the crew transfers into it. It remains docked to the Cruiser all the way to Mars or Lunar orbit where it becomes the lander, while the Cruiser remains in orbit. Reverse it all for the return trip.

Think of taking a cab from home to New York's airport, boarding an airliner, flying from New York to Dallas, and taking a cab to the final destination. After the stay in Dallas, taking a cab back to the airport, reboarding the airliner, flying back to New York, the taking a cab home. The cab is Starship and the airliner is the Cruiser. You wouldn't take a cab from New York to Dallas and back, would you? Same, Same.

Of course, building such a Cruiser and bringing it to operational status, while it is the most efficient use of Time, Talent and Treasure (TTT), is unlikely to happen so long as long term planning is constrained by an Administration's term(s) in office. So I have hope for what Starship could be; ground to orbit transportation at both ends of the journey, while the journey itself would be aboard a spacecraft designed specifically for that role. And that constraint is why I have come to believe that, that is something that NASA will never be able to accomplish and only a privately owned and well financed company, like a SpaceX or a Blue Origin, will ever be able to create such a Cruiser and architecture.

Unless the Chinese, who have been doing long term planning for millennia, embarrass the living crap out of us by just doing themselves what we should have been doing all along.

You lost me. IIUC, you propose the SS (the taxi) launch to and mate up with a cruiser (the airliner). Throw in a refueling. Then both taxi and airliner go to mars and the taxi lands. Then the taxi launches and hooks up with the airliner. Throw in another refueling. The taxi and airliner both come back to earth and the taxi (SS) lands.

An alternative. Send an SS to mars and let it hang out at the orbital taxi stand. Launch the cruiser and refuel. Go to mars. Transfer the crew to the taxi and land. Launch the taxi to the orbital taxi stand, transfer the crew to the cruiser. Leave the taxi at the stand and let the cruiser come back alone. Leave the cruiser on orbit and send up a taxi to get the crew. Wash, rinse, repeat.

The refueling at the mars end could go several ways but suffice it to say it must be done whatever the mechanics.

More thoughts on this. Mostly SX oriented.


This might just squeak into the first mission but probably not. There's a rough development roadmap that's emerging for a mars mission. The detail gets a little clearer with each SS launch. The 'cruiser' would be a whole new element to design and test unless it's based on starship, and if that, what's the point?


An SS variant 'cruiser' would offer only marginal advantage but a clean sheet design has promise of massive operational improvement. For now ISTM better to follow the emerging roadmap using the elements being considered. Keep the cruiser idea alive, do some noodling on it when possible. Once Mars ops start kick it up to a higher priority. The engineering assets will start shaking loose about then.


A cruiser works for cargo too.

[VSECOTSPE]

I used an alignment of interest which is a better term because that really describes what it is.
Musk specifically said that he didn't ask for anything in exchange for his endorsement of Trump (so essentially no quid pro quo) and I believe him when he says that.

Trump stated, publicly, that he changed his opinion on EVs to bring Musk on board.  Trump and Musk had opposing EV viewpoints before Musk came onboard, not a pre-existing “alignment of interests”.  Whether or not Musk asked for Trump to change his opinion, Trump moderated his opposition to EVs in exchange for Musk’s campaign support.  That’s a clear quid pro quo. 

This is often how power is expressed in politics.  Someone, usually lower on the totem pole, thinks they know what someone in power wants.  So they make it happen in order to garner the powerful individual’s support elsewhere, whether or not the powerful individual asked for it.

For his part, Elon has requested at least one quid pro quo so far.  He’s asked to have two of his closest SX staff installed at the Defense Department:

The most concrete evidence of Mr. Musk’s efforts to reshape the agencies he does business with are his efforts to install his employees in the Defense Department. People familiar with those efforts said Mr. Musk recommended two SpaceX employees — a retired Air Force general and a government-affairs executive — as possible hires.

Among the SpaceX executives who have been recommended by Mr. Musk, Gen. Terrence J. O’Shaughnessy, an adviser who is retired from the Air Force, and Tim Hughes, a government affairs executive, are among Mr. Musk’s closest advisers, according to one of the people briefed. Mr. Hughes did not return a request for comment and Mr. O’Shaughnessy could not be reached.

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/11/06/us/politics/elon-musk-trump-benefits.html

We may see similar moves at NASA.

Having said that, there is also an alignment of interest which is impossible to deny: human exploration of Mars (in the next few years), a pro-commercial NASA Administrator and deregulation and other stuff that is not space related. I suppose that you could argue that the Committee itself is quid pro quo but again there is also an alignement of interest on that issue (reducing government waste).

There’s a difference between broad agreement on regulation or waste generally and... specific regulatory court cases being dropped, specific regulatory applications being accelerated, specific regulations being brought under review, specific programs being recommended for defunding, specific changes in programmatic direction, etc.  The latter are all examples of quid pro quos.  Given what’s already happened, it’s naive not to expect Musk to use the influence he bought with his $120M contribution to Trump’s campaign to obtain some more of these quid pro quos.

Whether a specific quid pro quo is bad or not is in the eye of the beholder.  Most of us here would probably support Musk asking for the defunding of, or changes to, certain NASA programs.  However, the appropriators and parochial interests behind those programs in their current incarnations would probably cry foul about Musk buying influence.  (Of course, they would be throwing stones through glass houses.)

I am not sure that is what it means. This isn't the first time that Musk talks to Zelensky as it relates to Starlink. Ukraine relies a lot on Starlink, so it was relevant for Musk to talk to him again on this topic.

The reporting on the call depicts it as fairly innocent.  Zelensky called to congratulate (and no doubt curry favor with) Trump.  Musk was in the room at Mar a Lago so Trump put him on, and Zelensky thanked Musk for StarLink support.  The discussion seems to have ended there.

It also contradicts the narrative that Musk is pro-Putin and anti-Ukraine which is the non-sense that keeps being repeated by some in the main street media.

That’s not a made up mainstream media “narrative”.  Whether we call it anti-this or pro-that, there’s no doubt that Musk publicly...

Lobbied against the last Ukraine aid bill:

Businessman Elon Musk appeared in a live conversation on X on Feb. 12 along with Republican senators and former presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy, where the participants broadly argued against the passage of $60 billion in U.S. aid for Ukraine.

https://kyivindependent.com/elon-musk-republican-senator-lobby-against-passage-of-ukraine-aid/

Expressed concern for Putin that he would be killed if he was not allowed to prosecute his war against Ukraine:

Musk said Putin risked being "assassinated" if he were to back off the fight in Ukraine.

https://www.businessinsider.com/elon-musk-end-ukraine-aid-no-way-hell-putin-loses-2024-2

Repeatedly proposed ceding Ukrainian territory to Russia:

Billionaire tech executive Elon Musk triggered the ire of Ukraine and its supporters on Monday after he suggested in a Twitter poll that the country should cede the strategically important Crimea region to Russia and make other concessions as part of a peace deal.

https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/tech-news/musk-suggests-ukraine-cede-crimea-draws-rebuke-zelenskyy-rcna50528

Regardless of what we think of Musk’s public positions and actions (something to be debated elsewhere), it’s hard to see how the press could report them as anything other than anti-Ukraine and pro-Putin.  And it’s not just the press.  The Pentagon is concerned.  Even Nelson has argued that Musk’s conversations with Putin should be reviewed:

NASA Administrator Bill Nelson on Friday called for an investigation into a Wall Street Journal report that SpaceX founder and Donald Trump ally Elon Musk and Russian President Vladimir Putin have been in “regular contact” since late 2022.

https://www.cnn.com/2024/10/25/politics/elon-musk-vladimir-putin/index.html

Accusing news organizations of making up a “narrative” when they’re just reporting Musk’s statements on Ukraine and actions with Putin is blaming the messenger.

Lastly, if you want to use the term “alignment of interests”, this is an actual example of one.  Trump, Vance, and Musk share similar views regarding Russia’s war on Ukraine.

FWIW...

[VSECOTSPE]

As a mental exercise how much would it cost to build and launch a StarShip ready James Webb using comparable or better electronics, sensors and mirrors but heavier and more robust mechanicals?

At the risk of going off-topic, SS or other cheap heavy launch probably doesn’t change much with regard to the costs of modern, large space observatories.  At the wavelength-level of precision these modern observatories need, lightweight mirror mass is driven as much or more by the need to avoid deforming the mirrors during manufacture in Earth’s gravity, rather than by launch mass constraints.  In the case of JWST, the cost of the instruments and electronics were driven by near-absolute zero thermal requirements, not launch constraints.  When an observatory’s budget is measured in the billions, even going from a $200 million launch vehicle to a $20 million launch vehicle doesn’t really change the observatory’s economics.

Launch folks or folks who have only worked the software end of spacecraft (like Casey Handmer in a recent blogpost) like to project a revolution in space-based research observatories because the payload mass, payload volume, and launch cost of something like SS is supposed make these observatories so much simpler.  But these observatories are complex and costly because they’re cutting-edge scientific instruments designed to do groundbreaking work at the bleeding edge of research.  It’s like saying that a next-generation supercollider’s complexity and cost is driven by the size of the semi-trucks used to deliver its components.  No, a next-gen supercollider is complex and costly because it’s a research instrument that has never been built before.

Or a robust 40t planetary probe? Hell, the data bandwidth will be the limiting factor. Hmmm, a new job for the StarLink team.

LVs would probably not be the principle constraint to a future of multi-ten ton planetary missions.  We’d likely run into problems first with university instrument teams that could actually use that much mass, adequately sized test facilities (therm/vac, vibe, etc.) for spacecraft that large, power systems that could support that much mass, EDL systems that could deliver that kind of mass to the surface, etc.

NASA had the National Research Council look at this back in the Ares V days.  And the bottom line is that the only sorta affordable science missions that could use that kind of capability were ones that had an enormous amount of dumb propellant mass to get out of the ecliptic or to reach the outer edges of the solar system in a professional lifetime.

I’d also argue that there are certain heliophysics and astrophysics mission concepts that propose using constellations or swarms of many, mass-produced, small spacecraft, not terribly dissimilar from StarLink.  I actually worked on one for a bit.  Those might also benefit from cheap, heavy launch.

But cheap, heavy launch is unlikely to change the nature of most space observatory and planetary probe missions.

FWIW...