OPINION:
Buzz Aldrin — Korean War veteran, Gemini 12 spacewalker, Apollo 11 moonwalker — just turned 90. You would not know it. The PhD in astronautical engineering is still active, eager and in the game. He has a message for America: Keep daring.
In a Washington, D.C., speech delivered late 2019, Mr. Aldrin argued America needs to take a page from Theodore Roosevelt — and our exceptional past. We need to “dare greatly,” chase outsized goals.
Mr. Aldrin’s argument is compelling. He saluted TR, the first president to fly, and reminded us — in TR’s words — “it is not the critic who counts, not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better … Credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena.” By extension — rewards come to nations that dare.
For two centuries, America has been an unrivaled paragon of daring, a pathbreaker, inventing new medicines, cascading technical breakthroughs, leading by doing. Americans went from pioneering flight to men on the moon in 66 years. No other nation has yet put humans on the moon.
Where are we today? That is, essentially, Mr. Aldrin’s question. He is hopeful, and a student of history. Five decades have elapsed since Apollo 11. He is clearly impatient to see America back on the moon — then human migration to Mars.
Notably, Mr. Aldrin’s ever-active mind identifies four “big steps,” prerequisites for the nation’s next “giant leap” into space. His recommendations are well-grounded.
First, he reminds us that much has changed since 1969, not least the emergence of private space companies. He makes clear this is good and should trigger higher “public-private” cooperation.
Mr. Aldrin’s pitch is America should push “daring in the public sector … to match daring in the private sector,” in effect reinforcing the Trump-Pence message. We should leverage American knowhow to get back to the moon, and on to Mars.
Second, he parts company with those who see space as a “zero-sum game.” He doesn’t just think; he knows identifiable advantages lie in international cooperation, not least planning travel to, permanence on, and exploration of the moon. He argues for “creating synergies in space at the international level.”
Marrying the two ideas, he sees value in an international, public-private “coalition” — an alliance of sorts between “top international space agencies” and “top private sector leaders” to “get the best of all parties” aligned. Goals would include returning humans to the moon, pressing on to Mars.
Interestingly, this is a clever way of pre-empting future space conflict, assuring agreement up front as spacefaring nations reach outward. Mr. Aldrin has often been ahead of his time. He wrote about the mechanics of orbital rendezvous — for his PhD thesis — long before it happened. He contributed to ideas like neutral buoyancy and space tourism. He may be ahead of the curve again. In effect, if Americans arrived on the moon “in Peace for all Mankind,” maybe we should embrace that same sentiment.
Third, Mr. Aldrin dares to say what few politicians and bureaucrats will — that federal spending during the past 50 years has often been misguided, wasteful, inefficient and subject to costly stop-and-start delays. He points to inertia created by bureaucracy, politics and corporate lobbyists as the cause.
Again, Mr. Aldrin’s premise is hard to contest. He echoes concerns first raised — about the combined influence of big government and big contractors — by President Dwight Eisenhower in 1961. Mr. Aldrin’s words resonate: “In my view, the military-industrial-space complex often acts on the notion that more spending is better, more profit the goal, and more time is just fine.” To this, he adds: “Those assumptions are all three wrong — efficiency is better than just throwing money and infrastructure at space; profit is fine and a valuable motivator, but was not the motivation that got us to the moon, that was national security, national pride and higher purpose.” Then: “Finally, time does matter.”
His words hang in the air, as he begins his ninth decade. They carry a certain staying power — and a certain sense of obligation to get on with what we started, to boldly engage a full-throttle effort to again inspire our drive for human space exploration.
Fourth, Mr. Aldrin argues Americans should embrace human space exploration, maximizing our record of thought leadership and action. He reminds us there are always “unanswered questions,” today relating to “life support, radiation and reentry speeds returning from Mars,” but unanswered questions existed even as he and Neil Armstrong headed for the moon.
His message seems to be: We are Americans, generous, exceptional, historically gifted, persistent if not destinated. We are a people not easily dissuaded, ready to take risks with purpose. Now is the time.
Once again, America needs to look up, return to the moon and pioneer Mars. We need to think bigger, work harder and take the next “giant leap.” Americans are thinkers and doers, personified by Buzz Aldrin himself, who remains active, optimistic and filled with insight at 90. He is right; it is time to dare.
• Kent D. Johnson, a former F-15E Strike Eagle and A-10 Warthog fighter pilot, a political-military adviser on the staff of the secretary of the Air Force and senior U.S. adviser to the commandant of the Royal Air Force think tank, is a defense studies adjunct at North Central Texas College.
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