Ex-NASA executive Charles Miller’s recent (Wall Street Journal, 2/3/12) op-ed on returing to the Moon was particularly interesting for its explicit linkage to commercial space and national security.

In the short term — As I commented last year in Space News (6/29/11) — such front-burner aspects of a Moon program will be trumped by the slow economic recovery.

President Obama’s cancellation of Constellation — the U.S. program to return to the Moon by 2020 — was not a big surprise. It appears to be merely a speed bump on the road to near-term international commercial and scientific development of Earth-Moon space and even humans to Mars.

For more perspective on a Moon base, Click: Is the Moon a “Golden Oldie” or a “One Hit Wonder”?

In 1990, Lawrence Livermore scientists proposed an inflatable base on the Moon within a decade that would become self-sufficient, require only 60 tons of hardware transported to the Moon, and cost only ~ $ 11 B.
Click

Miller makes the Moon base cost-effective by reducing Earth launch costs by a factor of 10+ to $ 500 per pound and achieves this by focusing on development of a totally reusable spaceplane. The technology requirements remind Miller of the X-37, an unmanned Mach 25 resuable spacecraft that launches like a rocket and lands like an airplane similar to the Space Shuttle.

According to Miller, reusable spaceplanes are the key to commercial space.

The nation that builds the first true reusable spaceplane will be in a position to dominate the much broader commercial space industry … such as satellite servicing, tourism, and medical breakthroughs from zero-gravity research.

The X-37 began as a NASA project in 1999 but was transferred to DARPA in 2004 where it became a secret program. Recently the X-37B spaceplane celebrated one year in orbit although its mission is classfied as is its return date.

In 2010 Tom Burghardt (Space Daily; May 11) asserted that the X-37 will help achieve Air Force Space Command’s stated goal of “space dominance” that includes,

a johnny-on-the-spot weapons platform to take out the satellite assets of an enemy, or as a launch vehicle that can deliver bombs, missiles or kinetic weapons anywhere on earth in less than two hours.

Miller confirms that our critical strategic assets in space (e.g. comsats, surveillance satellites) are currently vulnerable to potential anti-satellite weapons being developed by China (successfully tested in 2007) and even North Korea and Iran, but that spaceplanes “will transform national security” by their ability to rapidly replace such orbiting assets, and thus reduce the incentive to attack them in the first place.

Traditionally, the Moon has been viewed as the most secure location for Earth surveillance, as expressed in 1984 by the famous physicist Edward Teller at the Lunar Bases and Space Activities of the 21st Century Conference. (I also spoke at this event on importing water from the moons of Mars for use in the Earth-Moon system.)

Teller stated he would like to see an outpost on the Moon (~12 people) as soon as possible. As a “special proposal” he recommended that,

Surveillance of the Earth — permanent continuous surveillance that is hard to interfere with — is an extremely important question, important to us, important to the international community, important for peace-keeping … It is in everyone’s best interest to have observation stations that are not easy to interfere with.

Teller also suggested that in the name of global peace, Earth surveillance images obtained from Moon orbit should be made “universally available.”

More recently (1/6/12), Apollo 17 astronaut Harrison Schmitt — the first scientist on the Moon — sees the current status of civilian space as a geopolitical crisis for America.

America’s eroding geopolitical stature, highlighted by the July 21, 2011, end to flights of the United States Space Shuttle, has reached crisis proportions. Obama Administration officials now spin the nebulous thought of Astronauts flying many months to an undetermined asteroid in 2025 as an actual “National Space Policy”. On the other hand, Republican candidates for President have not yet recognized the importance of international civil space competition in the federal government’s constitutional function to provide for the nation’s “common defence”. Candidates appear to be uninterested in having the United States lead deep space exploration, including establishing American settlements on the Moon …

Meanwhile, China is building a major new deep space launch facility in Hainan and developing new rockets and spacecraft to take over the exploration of the Moon from the United States and the free world.

Given the geopolitical significance of the Moon in the coming mid-decade Maslow Window, I have surveyed several friends in the military and NASA communities, and none claims knowledge of any studies of potential national security applications of a Moon base done over the last 10-15 years.

The closest I could come was a chilling Moon-related military scenario in George Friedman’s (Stratfor.com) book The Next Hundred Years (2009); he agrees with Teller’s opinion of the value of Earth surveillance from the Moon and suggests that, “Sustaining and defending a base on the Moon will actually be easier than doing the same for orbital systems.”

Although no specific references are provided, Friedman insists that:

These forecasts are based on real technology, reasonable extrapolations about future technology, and reasonable war planning.

In Friedman’s mid-21st century scenario, both Japan and Turkey — two key space powers by then — become understandably threatened by powerful U.S. command and control “battlestars” in Geostationary orbits that can very rapidly direct a variety of weapons — advanced versions of the X-37, lasers, hypersonic missiles — at any point on Earth or in space.

By this time many nations will have bases on the Moon, however Japan and Turkey build an underground base on the Moon’s farside where they secretly use lunar materials to develop, build, and launch missiles to attack the Battlestars in Earth orbit.

I won’t give away how the story ends here. However, it is unlikely that “secret” military activities could go unnoticed for long on the anti-Earth side of the Moon. For example, many astronomers have already chosen the Moon’s farside as the best location for a radio observatory in this part of the solar system.

The current issue of Foreign Affairs (March/April, 2012) featues “The Case for Space” by astronomer Neil deGrasse Tyson of the Hayden Planetarium in New York. In 2004 he was appointed by President Bush to the “Moon, Mars, and Beyond” Commission, so he is familiar with the range of arguments relevant to U.S. space exploration policy.

Neil deGrasse Tyson, Ph.D. believes we should spend more time and money reaching for the stars.
Click

How Much is a New Planet Worth?
Tyson initially grabs our attention by asserting that a manned mission to Mars would “surely cost hundreds of billions of dollars — maybe even $ 1 trillion.” This is a surprising number since the whole 1960s Apollo Moon program cost ~$ 150 B in today’s dollars. To approach $ 1 T you would have to look at a multi-decade program of manned Mars missions, which is not currently in the cards. Zubrin has recently shown how we can fly to Mars by 2016 for far less than the Apollo program.

On the other hand, in 2009 I estimated — based on cost ratios of pre-Maslow MEPs to the major Maslow MEPs over the last 200 years — that the coming Maslow Window (expected by mid-decade) will feature a total MEP expenditure of between $ 1 and 3 T (current USD). But this could include a variety of projects such as manned Mars, lunar bases, and space-based solar power infrastructures.

Because of their large costs, importance to national prestige, and use of high technology, major space programs become political issues, and Tyson highlights what he sees as the end of “immunity to partisanship” of the space program after 2004 when the Shuttle Columbia was lost. It got worse when President Obama took office in 2009. Partly due to his space policies and other controversial issues, Obama is the most polarizing president on record according to Gallup; his rating of 68 (the difference between the percent of Democrats and Republicans who approve of his job performance) is the highest on record for a president’s 3rd year, as were his partisan gaps for his first and second years (65 and 68).

Tyson notes that in the end, Obama’s suggestions for manned Mars missions in the 2030s have not been taken seriously because

When a president promises something beyond his years in office, he is fundamentally unaccountable … The only thing guaranteed to happen on his (Obama’s) watch is the interruption of the United States’ access to space.

While Tyson’s focus on politics is understandable, it misses the real point: Economics is the fundamental problem.

Doesn’t anyone watch Animal Planet anymore?
The last time I checked, when the main waterhole is drying up, disputes become common and everyone tends to be edgy about everything.

The same is naturally happening with the economy today. Negative animal spirits call into question positive visions of the future like space.

Tyson naturally believes — and he is right — that a visionary U.S. space program is the solution to motivating youth and revitalizing the American education system, as well as stimulating innovation and the economy. And most importantly:

The United States will once again witness how space ambitions can shape the destiny of nations.

But he does not emphasize that the fundamental reason we have been trapped in Earth orbit for 40 years (since Apollo) is because of the lack of a JFK-style economic boom that created exuberance by increasing prosperity to virtually every group in society and dropping unemployment to nearly zero.

Two hundred years of macroeconomic and political patterns as well as current global trends suggest we’re on trajectory for the next 1960s-style golden age of prosperity, exploration, and technology… to begin by mid-decade.

The political realignment that began in 2008 is continuing and will determine its exact timing.

Yesterday we celebrated the 50th anniversary of the first American to orbit the Earth. On February 20, 1962, John Glenn carried the hopes of Americans with him as he did 3 revs, inspired the Australians in Perth to turn their lights on as he passed over them, survived a faulty sensor indicating his heat shield might be loose, and became a national hero at the level of Charles Lindbergh.

John Glenn and JFK (right) admire the Mercury capsule which Glenn rode into orbit in 1962.
Click

Earlier as a Marine pilot, Glenn completed the first transcontinental supersonic flight from California to New York in 3 hours 23 minutes. And in 1959 he became one of the original 7 NASA astronauts.

Glenn’s orbital flight in 1962 got the U.S. back ino the Space Race, but it came after 2 Soviet cosmonauts had already orbited in 1961. This international competition had been noted by Missiles and Rockets, The Missile/Space Weekly in their year-end editorial for December, 1961:

With still a long way to go, we now are back in the race with the Russians with the avowed intent of catching and passing them.

Eventually the U.S. did reach the Moon first (in 1969), but the irony of the current situation, where the U.S. must hitch a ride with the Russians to send its astronauts to the International Space Station, is not lost on Glenn:

Back in those days, one of the major driving forces in support of the program was the fact that we were in competition with the Soviets.

And yet here we are these 50 years later, (paying) 60-some million dollars per astronaut to go up there and back. And this is supposed to be the world’s greatest space-faring nation.

That part of how we’ve developed I don’t agree with at all. I don’t think the shuttle should have been canceled until we had a replacement for it.

The 1961-2 geopolitical chronology is amazing for its intensity and juxtaposition of several powerful wildcards and soon-to-be tipping points:
Click Geopolitical.Chron.1961.62

For example, the founding of the Peace Corps, the first human in space, and the Bay of Pigs invasion all occurred within about 6 weeks of each other. Within only 3 months of establishment of the Peace Corps the first American had gone into space, and JFK committed the U.S. to send men to the Moon and had offered to cooperate with the Soviets in a joint Moon program.

Six months after Glenn’s flight the Russians were building secret missile bases in Cuba which triggered the Cuban Mission Crisis in October, 1962. During this event Khruschev threatened a “world nuclear missile war.”

This type of rapid-fire, potentially threatening action is to be expected from a “critical state” after decades of self-organization of the international economic system. Something analogous to the early 1960s critical state — involving the Middle East, North Korea, and others — is apparently rippling through the world today.

Just as the 1960s Cold War led to the first Space Age, 200+ years of macroeconomic and technology development patterns suggest it’s likely the currently approaching “critical state” will trigger the new international Space Age.
CLICK: Are Stratfor’s “Generational Shifts” like “Falling Grains of Sand”?

Congratulations to Yuri Gargarin’s family and friends, and the Russians for their magnificent achievement on April 12, 1961, when Gargarin (1934 -1968) became the first human to venture beyond Earth’s armosphere into outer space.

Cosmonaut Yuri Gargarin was the first human to go into space, and so began the Modern Age in the early 1960s.
Click

It’s hard to overstate its significance. The Wall Street Journal (4/12/11) called it

the start of the modern age … that astonished the world.

In the framework of 21stCenturyWaves.com, this transformative event is a spectacular slam dunk: It kicked off the 1960s Apollo Maslow Window in grand style. Indeed, its singular importance and precise timing was one of the key factors that initially suggested to us the existence of Maslow Windows.

As we approach the 2015 Maslow Window — by analogy with Gargarin’s start of the “Modern Age” almost one long wave ago, and similar rhythmic, twice-per-century epochal events over the last 200+ years — we expect to enter a new Golden Age of Prosperity, Exploration, and Technology at least comparable to the 1960s Apollo Maslow Window.

In addition to a Grand Alliance for Space , the new Space Age may also feature a commercial race to space!

For example, Clara Moskowitz (Space.com, 4/11/11) suggests that space tourism may be the ticket.

Fifty years after the Soviet Union beat the United States to send the first human into space, a new space race is heating up. This time, the players are not nations — rather, they’re commercial companies that aim to send the first paying passengers to space on private spaceships.

In an impressive demonstration of early ebullience, George Whitesides of British billionaire Richard Branson’s Virgin Galactic , agrees that we’re approaching a new Golden Age.

I really believe that we’re at the edge of an extraordinary period of innovation which will radically change our world.

For $200 K per person you can join over 400 others who have reserved their suborbital adventure into space (about 100 km up). Virgin Galactic says regular tourist launches will begin in 2012; Branson and his family intend to be on the first one.

If you’d like a career flying tourists to the edge of space as a Pilot – Astronaut during the new Space Age, Branson is hiring right now.

The Journal of the British Interplanetary Society (Vol. 63, No. 2, 2010) highlights a fresh perspective on near-term lunar development. In fact, the authors assert that

Action taken in the next few years can lead to the gradual, steady expansion of commercial, market-based activity on the Moon and in the neighborhood between the Earth and the Moon.

How soon will lunar hotels accommodate serious fun-seekers from Earth?
Click .

Economists Wei Lin (Xiamen Univ., China) and Kruti Dholakia and Euel Elliott (both of UT at Dallas) imagine a bright future for international development of the Moon — potentially including lunar resources, human colonization, space-based solar power, asteroid mining, fusion energy — but wisely counsel that such endeavors,

…require a long-term perspective.

This is good advice, not only because of their multi-century timeline — 2020 to 2150 — estimated from NASA and other sources, but because of predictable long-term economic trends as well as wildcards.

For example, they list 2020-2030 as the time when human flights resume to the Moon and scientific explorations expand. But the first permanent lunar base (including first colonization and in situ resource use) dos not occur until after 2030 (-2050).

This creates a potentially serous timing issue because the 2015 Maslow Window is likely to end abuptly by the mid-2020s due to long-term economic and geopolitical forces. The last time this happened was in the late 1960s when 3 Apollo Moon missions were canceled by President Nixon in response to

…budget exigencies during a time of rising domestic turmoil over the Vietnam War…

Unfortunately, over the last 200+ years (back to Lewis and Clark), this is the typical pattern for termination of an Apollo-style golden age of prosperity, exploration, and technology: a rapid economic downturn accompanied by a major, international war.

Every effort should be made to accelerate initial colonization activities on the Moon. Because unless a human outpost can be established in deep space (i.e., a Moonbase or Mars system colony) by the early-to-mid 2020s, we risk being trapped in LEO for several decades after 2025, like we have been since 1972.

Citing the International Space Station as an admirable model for international cooperation in space, and the continuing effects of the 2008-10 financial crisis, the authors suggest that,

Rising powers like China and India are seemingly well placed to assume a more prominent role given their growth rates and their ability to weather the economic crisis compared to the West.

For example, China is apparently moving ahead with landing humans on the Moon by the early 2020s. And while the authors neglect the stunning global boom expected near 2015, they do suggest an intriguing “paradigm shift” regarding the increasing fraction of commercial versus government (as during the 1960s Cold War) activities in 21st century space.

Whether our next “Sputnik Moment” will be triggered by expanding international commercial activities in space rather than a 1960s-stye geopolitical compettion acted out in space, is not clear. But it will likely begin with smaller Sputnik Moments in education, international economics, and in military technology that are already taking shape.

I greatly enjoyed George Friedman’s new book, The Next Decade (2011). A New York Times best seller, it’s sort of a more focused, near-term sequel to his blockbluster, The Next 100 Years (2009).

Satellites that collect solar energy in space and beam it to Earth should begin to impact our growing energy use by 2015.
Click

Friedman’s section on technology and demographics is both simple and powerful, and reflects basic principles regarding economic cycles and prosperity that also guide us here at 21stCenturyWaves.com.

…economic expansion and contraction are driven … at a deeper level … by demographic forces and by technological innovation.

The challenge for the next decade will be that “breakthrough technologies” — the ones that stimulate prosperity by meeting key societal needs — will be in short supply.

Friedman blames the financial Panic of 2008 and the great recession of 2008-10 for reducing investment in new technologies and making people unusually risk-adverse. Plus a major engine of technological development — military needs during major wars — has not been activated by the pre-Maslow conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Friedman forecasts that financial stresses will subside after 2015 (as the next Maslow Window opens) but,

Given the lead time in technological development, the next generation of notable technological breakthroughs won’t emerge until the 2020s.

While Friedman’s picture is reasonable, it’s likely he underestimates the Great Boom of 2015 that’s expected to trigger a golden age of prosperity, exploration, and technology comparable to the Kennedy Boom of the 1960s. The reason is we haven’t seen a financial Panic/Great Recesson sequence like our current one in over 100 years!

Back then it began with the Panic of 1893 and the Great 1890s Recession. They were followed in 1899 by one of the most spectacular recoveries and ebullient decades (i.e., the Peary/Panama/T. Roosevelt Maslow Window) in the history of the U.S..
Please see (especially Fig. 4): “The Economics of Ebullience Points to a Sparkling New Global Space Age.”

Because of the close connection of energy availability with economic growth, and the fact that most increases in energy use have come from developing countries, the question of what will power technological innovation in the next decade assumes center stage.

Increased oil use will not be able to meet global energy demands of the next decade, and Friedman concludes that the only viable choices are coal and natural gas. And while the U.S. has large domestic supplies of both, the trick is…

The president must choose the balance between the two available fossil fuels, coal and gas. Then he must tell the people that these are the only choices. If he fails to persuade the public of this, there will not be energy for the technologies that will emerge in the next decade.

One of these new technologies is space-based solar power. Friedman believes that energy needs in the future will be driven by desalination of ocean water associated with increases in global standards of living and growing industrialization, and the best long-term solution is collecting solar energy in space and beaming it to Earth.

Progress is occurring. For example, a Southern California company, Solaren Corp. has contracted with Pacific Gas & Electric to sell it 200 megawatts of power per year starting in 2016 (Wall Street Journal, 9/27/10), after testing systems in space during 2014. While the Switzerland-based Space Energy Group’s business plan features a solar satellite in orbit in 3 years. And in 2009, Japan announced a new $ 21 B space solar power initiative.

However, Friedman warns that the U.S. government is currently funding worthy research into key technologies for cures of degenerative diseases and for robotics,

But the fundamental problem, energy, has not had its due.

Former NASA engineer Homer Hickam recently asked, “How about a Moon base?” (Wall Street Journal, 12/14/10).

In 1984, the great NASA Administrator during the first human missions to the Moon (1968-70), Tom Paine (left, w Pres. Nixon) said “The Moon will never motivate the American prople again.” Was he right? Is the Moon a One Hit Wonder?
Click

The author of Rocket Boys (1998) and Back to the Moon (1999), Hickam feels that currently, NASA is up to … “Not much.” Because last year Obama sent

Mr. Bolden, the ex-astronaut, to Capitol Hill with a plan to cancel every one of NASA’s astronaut-related programs.

Hickham likes the Moon for all the usual reasons.

It’s close, it’s loaded with resources, and we can get there with existing technology.

Why not build a 21st century Moon base …

like the National Science Foundation’s South Pole Station, and invite the world to join us.

We’ll give our technological prestige a sorely needed boost, and something else will also happen: New and wondrous products based on NASA requirements for metallurgy, composite materials, solar arrays, computers and batteries will boost our economy, just as the technologies of the Apollo mission did.

Oh by the way, it won’t cost “vast amounts of money.”

Can you feel it?
That’s what we call “ebullience” — the key driver of great explorations like Apollo, and macro engineering projects (MEPs) like the Panama Canal.

And Mr. Hickham, not surprisingly, has identified himself as among the elite early ebullients in the world today. We call them “early ebullients” because they are anticipating a trend that will sweep the world around 2015 — based on macroeconomic data and global trends over the last 200+ years — much like Apollo captured global headlines in the 1960s.

As an ebullience junkie myself, I personally find Hickam’s enhtusiastic Moon base idea almost irresistible. It’s spirit reminds me of the 1990 plan of Lawrence Livermore National Lab, “The Great Exploration Plan for the Human Exploration Initiative,” by three sensational physicists: Rod Hyde, Yuki Ishikawa, and Lowell Wood.

Speed was essential; the whole permanent base would take less than a decade to create, with its first inflatable hab modules in place on the Moon by 1997.

You’ve got to love their ebullient theme (circa 1990): “We already have in hand what we need for the Great Exploration of the inner solar system.” And the controversial cost estimate was great too — only $ 11 B — that’s less than $ 20 B in 2009 USD, compared to about $ 150+ B (2009 USD) for the entire Apollo program.

So simple, inexpensive starter-homes on the Moon are possible today. But the real question is: Will the American people get as excited about it as Homer and I are — or was Tom Paine correct?

This is where the long-term, empirical approach of 21stCenturyWaves.com can provide unique insights.

How Maslow Windows Work
Over the last 200+ years Americans and many others have gone exploring whenever they could afford it. These transformative, great explorations — always accompanied by MEPs and sadly punctuated by a major war — have clustered exclusively around rhythmic, twice-per-century major economic booms, such as the Kennedy Boom in the 1960s.

During the major booms, affluence-induced ebullience catapults many to higher levels in the Maslow hierarchy. Their momentarily expanded worldviews — due to elevated Maslow states — make great explorations and MEPs seem not only intriguing, but almost irresistible. Trends associated with these “Maslow Windows” provide insights to our future.

The chronology of great explorations is as follows:
Late 18th/Early 19th Century Maslow Window: Lewis and Clark
Mid-19th Century Maslow Window: Dr. Livingstone (equatorial Africa)
Early 20th Century Maslow Window: N and S Polar Expeditions
1960s Maslow Window: Apollo Moon missions

It’s clear that great explorations of new, interesting geographical sites progress from more-to-less accessible regions, consistent with the technologies of the times. For example, President Theodore Roosevelt could not outfit Adm. Peary to explore the Moon, but he did encourage him to reach the North Pole. And John F. Kennedy chose to go to the Moon — rather than Mars — because he thought it would be a challenging, yet doable global demonstration of America’s technology and economic system.

Where Will the Next Great Exploration Be?
A reasonable forecast for the next great human exploration during the 2015 Maslow Window would be Mars colonization. No one’s ever been there and it’s the next accessible (beyond the Moon) new site of interest. Plus it’s the most Earth-like world.

But suppost Mars colonization does not begin after 2015? What then?

Over the last 200+ years each Maslow Window has featured a “great exploration.” If the 2015 Maslow Window doesn’t have one it would be the first time in over 200 years that’s happened.

What about the Moon? We know it has major commercial and scientific potential, but could the Moon again have the power to rivet the attention of the global public like Apollo, the polar expeditions, Dr. Livingstone, and Lewis and Clark did generations before? Will the public see the Moon as an Earth-style “golden oldie” (i.e., a pleasant memory) with real potential for more excitement, or a “one hit wonder.”

Does the Moon Have the Right Stuff?
As we saw above, over the last 200+ years the great explorations on Earth opened up spectacular new geographic vistas through a succession of quantum leaps from Lewis and Clark to (ultimately) the polar regions. And like the Earth, the Moon has many tantalizing surface locations awaiting intrepid human explorers.

But here are 3 reasons why the Moon may become a “one hit wonder” and prove Tom Paine’s forecast correct.
1) The Moon is subtle. The Moon is a small, airless, dry (at least on the surface!), impact crater-dominated world with a month-long day-night cycle. It’s omnipresent shades-of-gray color scheme completes its alien, repetitive presentation, at least to public eyes.
2) Space technology and the “Been there, done that” Syndrome. Since the 1960s the Moon has been studied in surprising detail with satellite technology, and we have a fair idea of what’s there — at least on and near the surface. So relative to pre-1960s Earth — when many regions were truly unknown — robotic and human exploration of the Moon has accelerated our understanding such that it may not provide another riveting, Apollo-style transformative milestone for public enjoyment.
3) Apollo 11 was a hit. During the 1960s Apollo program the Moon was a One Hit Wonder. Although the first humans on the Moon (Apollo 11) made a big splash globally — as did Apollo 13 because lives were threatened — subsequent Apollo landings featuring spectacular geologic sites were greeted by an increasingly distracted public.

On the other hand, here are 3 reasons why the Moon might again acquire the wonder and excitement required for a great human exploration.
1) Star Trek — The Next Generation. A new generation of young people, who are unaware of Dr. Paine and did not personally witness Apollo, are increasingly excited about exploring and developing the Moon.
2) ISS and Interspace:. Many of these folks are in countries (like China and India) with growing space programs and dynamic economies. International cooperation and competition — based on the International Space Station model — may focus attention on lunar exploration starting from an Antarctica-style base like that advocated by Hickham.
3) “Potential for cultural shock and social disorientation…”. According to Dr. Heywood Floyd at the American lunar base in Clavius (“2001: A Space Odyssey”, 1968), describing the alien monolith recently excavated on the Moon. Anything even remotely like this and you know the answer.
Click 2001′s Monolith on the Moon

The Tentative Bottom Line
Based on its questionable ability to motivate, Apollo-style the new Space Age, the Moon is probably a One Hit Wonder, although it will become much more than just a Golden Oldie (a pleasant memory). Indeed, the Moon is a scientific bonanza and has long-term potential for multiple MEPs supporting its future role as a major commercial, energy, and tourist center.

But barring some civilization-altering discovery on the Moon, the next great exploration will likely be in the Mars system.

Two key indicators to watch are plans for an international Moon base and a successful Russian/Chinese Phobos-Grunt mission. They’re important because they point in different directions.

All this talk about “Sputnik Moments” may seem very historical — in the most obscure sense of the word — to Millennials and others who didn’t actually live it.

For example, even Democratic strategist Dan Gerstein recently criticized Obama’s insightful allusion to Sputnik by claiming that…

Most people under 40 have no idea what Sputnik is. It’s an un-innovative way to talk about innovation.

Fifty-three years ago the surprise Soviet launch of “one small ball” became the “shock of the century” and instantly transformed U.S. education.
Click

Some historical perspective on Sputnik is sketched HERE, but before we focus on that, let’s describe China’s great accomplishment. Almost exactly one long wave after Sputnik, according to Chester Finn of Stanford’s Hoover Institution (Wall Street Journal, 12/8/10),

The United States was once again in “the middle of the pack.”

It’s hard to imagine how distraught Americans were about Sputnik in 1957, but as I wrote 2 years ago in Math and Science Education Perspectives,

Only 10 days after Sputnik the New York Times identified U.S. education as the problem, because Soviet science students were better motivated and given more prestige. Scholastic Magazine chimed in by announcing a “classroom Cold War” with the Soviets. Indeed, within a few months a Gallup poll reported that 70% of respondents believed that U.S. high school students should become more educationally competitive with their Soviet counterparts!

It’s a key forecast of 21stCenturyWaves.com that major elements of this Sputnik-related history are likely to repeat.

As we approach the 2015 Maslow Window, legitimate public concerns about the state of education will skyrocket because of anxiety over America’s ability to compete with the rest of the world in space and technology. And it’s already begun.

See #3 in: “DecaState of the Wave — 10 Space Trends for the Decade 2010-2020″.”

Finn doesn’t see this quantum leap in China’s educational performance as a fluke at all. Indeed, he feels China will be able to replicate it with “10 cities in 2019 and 50 in 2050. Or maybe faster.”

China has delivered a Sputnik-style wake-up call to “those who think American schools are globally competitive.”

We must face the fact that China is bent on surpassing us, and everyone else, in education.

Does President Obama read 21stCenturyWaves? Should we appoint him as an Honorary Contributing Editor?

Well, based on his major theme today — encouraging Americans toward a new “Sputnik moment” — at the North Carolina Research Triangle, it’s possible.

Today President Obama used the lessons of Sputnik to point to the 2015 Maslow Window.
Click

Referring to the surprise Soviet launch in 1957 of Sputnik — the first artificial Earth satellite — that shocked the world and triggered the 1960s Space Age, Mr. Obama asserted

That was a wakeup call. Once we put our minds to it, once we got focused, once we got unified, not only did we surpass the Soviets — we developed new American technologies, industries, and jobs.

Although the President apparently gets it, FoxNews.com (12/6/10) is lost…

President Obama is trying to inspire America’s next technological wave by referring back to a 50-year-old achievement by a defunct nation — Sputnik.

Even some Democrats shun Sputnik. According to Democratic strategist Dan Gerstein,

“Most people under 40 have no idea what Sputnik is,” Gerstein said. “It’s an un-innovative way to talk about innovation.

Maybe to some short-term thinkers, it seems unstylish, old, and defunct, and maybe the internet and Facebook have more contemporary sex appeal … but Sputnik is the key to understanding our future.

Sputnik opened the last truly transformative decade. For the first time in human history a man left the Earth and walked on another world. The stunning virtues of democracy and free markets were demonstrated and became clear to all. The Kennedy Boom — up to that time the greatest economic expansion in history — “lifted all boats” and triggered JFK’s Camelot zeitgeist.

According to the editors of the academic journal, The Sixties,

No recent decade has been so powerfully transformative in much of the world as have the Sixties.” (The 1960s decade) has become plainly iconic … It continues to not only define us but remains urgently with us.

So Obama was right to appeal to Sputnik’s compelling symbolism.

Maybe more right than he realizes, because while Sputnik opened the last truly transformative decade, it wasn’t the first, by any means.

Every 55-60 years — over the last 200+ years — there is a Sputnik/Apollo/JFK-style decade, featuring extraordinary clusters of great explorations (e.g., Lewis and Clark), macro engineering projects (e.g., Panama Canal), and sadly, major wars (World War I).

These “Maslow Windows” are driven by major economic booms associated with a long business cycle discovered in 1989 that’s documented back almost 200 years, and is correlated with the Strauss and Howe generational cycles. In response to increasing affluence, many ebulliently ascend Maslow’s hierarchy where their momentarily expanded worldviews make great explorations and MEPs seem not only intriguing, but almost irresistible.

Long wave timing points to 2015 for the next 1960s-style Maslow Window, a golden age of prosperity, exploration, and technology.

But there is one key difference between Sputnik and today.

Republican strategist Pete Snyder points out that — in contrast to the prosperous post-WW II expansion and the 1960s Kennedy Boom — the financial Panic of 2008 and overwhelming security threats have definitely gotten everyone’s attention in recent years. In response to Obama, he asks

We need something else to wake us up?

While Snyder’s facts are correct, he exposes not a weakness in Obama’s call-to-action, but an amazing strength.

The Panic of 2008 signaled a return to a familiar, multi-century pattern: financial panic/great recession pairs that — within 6 to 8 years — lead to a great economic boom which ignites the next Maslow Window.

Based on macroeconomic patterns of the last 200+ years and current global trends, this is how Obama’s message of today will likely materialize by 2015.

** Special Thanks to Contributing Editor Olivia Wolfe who suggested this topic. **

With a global recession, the continuing threat of global terror, and a polarized political season, it’s easy for Americans to assume problems are many and solutions are few. And for some, this brings into focus the question of American decline.

However, in a special edition of Foreign Affairs (November, December, 2010) on “The World Ahead”, Joseph S. Nye, Jr. of Harvard takes a longer-term and broader perspective than most “declinists” and concludes that America is well-positioned to succeed in the 21st century.

Will the spectacular foreign policy and technological success of the International Space Station inspire the United States, and other global leaders, to pursue a united, global approach to human settlement of the solar system?
Click

Nye’s approach is broadly consistent with 21stCenturyWaves.com’s view that current trends favor America as a key leader in the new (post-2015) global Space Age over the next 20+ years, and beyond.

America’s Future Decline Has Been Greatly Exaggerated
Nye disposes of alleged parallels between the United Kingdom’s decline and the U.S., and notes that, despite its global empire and naval supremacy, by World War I the UK was not the global leader in GDP or military spending.

He suggests that belief in U.S. decline is psychological and not unusual in history. For example, Charles Dickens once observed that

If its individual citizens are to be believed, (the U.S.) always is depressed, and always is stagnated, and always is at an alarming crisis, and never was otherwise.

Nye mentions that belief in America’s decline rose after Russia launched Sputnik in 1957. This was the seminal, Cold War event that launched the first Space Age and triggered the extraordinary, Camelot-style Apollo Maslow Window .

China’s Future Ascent Has Been Greatly Exaggerated
Although Goldman Sachs projects that China’s GDP will surpass America’s in 2027, Nye points out that, even if true, China will lag in GDP per capita long after 2030.

A complicating factor is that macroeconomic trends over the last 200+ years indicate that the 2015 Maslow Window should close by 2025 (if not before) and that by 2027, economies may experience severe long wave-related downturns similar to 1973.

In the coming decades, not only will China feel a competition from Japan and India — both with good U.S. relations — but, according to Nye,

Whether China can develop a formula that manages an expanding urban middle class, regional inequality, rural poverty, and resentment among ethnic minorities remains to be seen.

Indeed, Stratfor continues to forecast that by 2015 China will experience a major Japan-style economic collapse.

In any case, a weakened China would not be a positive development either on Earth or in space, as I indicated in a 2008 post: “10 Reasons Why China is Good for Space”.”

American Demographic Decline and Economic Stagnation?
Unlike China and most of the developed countries of the world who’s populations are seriously aging, America’s history of immigration is the key. According to Nye …

With its current levels of immigration, the United States is one of the few developed countries that may avoid demographic decline and keep its share of world population…

Indeed, Singapore’s Lee Kuan Yew believes it’s “Sinocentric culture” will make China less competitive and unable to surpass the U.S. in the 21st century, because the U.S. can

attract the best and brightest from the rest of the world and meld them into a diverse culture of creativity.

This is underlined by the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor who’s 2009 survey ranked the U.S. #1 in opportunities for entrepreneurship because of its

favorable business culture, the most mature venture capital industry, close relations between universities and industry, and an open immigration policy.

However, a stagnating U.S. economy would be a “showstopper” according to Nye.

Identified recently by both the current U.S. Secretary of State and the Chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff as a threat to U.S. national security, the growing U.S. national debt will reach 100% of GDP by 2023 — a particularly vulnerable time near the expected end of the 2015 Maslow Window. Plus, as debt-to-GDP ratios grow, so do interest rates which limit private investment and slow economic growth.

To cure the debt, Nye recommends “spending cuts and consumption taxes that would pay for entitlements” post-recession. In fact, both long- and short-term trends in a variety of sectors point to a major economic boom by 2015.

National Power is “Like Calories in a Diet…”
More is not always better.”

The United States’ power is not what it used to be, but it also never really was as great as assumed.

Nye cites post-WW II when the U.S. was the dominant economic and military superpower in the world but could not stop the “loss” of China, or “roll back” Communism in Eastern Europe, etc. etc…

This is important because mistaken beliefs about national decline and/or power, “can lead to dangerous mistakes in policy”.

Historically, American power is based on “alliances rather than colonies.” Therefore, in the 21st century…

The United States is well placed to benefit from such networks and alliances, if it follows smart strategies.

A good example is the international, technological marvel known as the International Space Station. With a little luck, ISS could inspire a truly global 21st century approach to human settlement of the solar system.