Space Invades, Strip Mine the Moon

U.S. eyes space as possible battleground

No country depends on space and satellites as its eyes and ears more than the United States, which accounted for as much as 95 percent of global military space spending in 1999, according to the French space agency CNES.

"Yet the threat to the U.S. and its allies in and from space does not command the attention it merits from the departments and agencies of the U.S. government charged with national security responsibilities," a congressionally chartered task force headed by Rumsfeld reported 10 days before Bush and he took office in 2001.

Huh? If we control 95% of military space, exactly what threat is there "in and from space"? The Russians? Aren't they supposed to be an ally now that the cold war is over? The Chinese? Again, if they're a threat to us, why do they have most favored nation status? Terrorists? Yeah...they have the technology.

"I think the new initiative is driven by a desire to beat the Chinese to the moon," said John Pike, director of GlobalSecurity.org, a defense and space policy research group.

Umm…shouldn't someone in the Bush maladministration know that we already beat the Chinese to the moon…over 30 years ago!

The moon, scientists have said, is a source of potentially unlimited energy in the form of the helium 3 isotope -- a near perfect fuel source: potent, non-polluting and causing virtually no radioactive by-product in a fusion reactor.

"And if we could get a monopoly on that, we wouldn't have to worry about the Saudis and we could basically tell everybody what the price of energy was going to be," said Pike.

Now I understand why Bush wants to go to the moon so bad: monopolize an energy market. Although, he couldn't find oil in Texas, so what do you think his chances are of finding helium 3 on the moon?

Gerald Kulcinski of the Fusion Technology Institute at the University of Wisconsin at Madison estimated the moon's helium 3 would have a cash value of perhaps $4 billion (2.23 billion pounds) a ton in terms of its energy equivalent in oil.

Scientists reckon there are about one million tons of helium 3 on the moon, enough to power the earth for thousands of years. The equivalent of a single space shuttle load or roughly 30 tons could meet all U.S. electric power needs for a year, Kulcinski said by e-mail.

$4 billion? That's pocket change! With just the latest installment of the war in Iraq costing $87 billion, I don't see how $4 billion is really worth chasing after. Besides, that number seems a bit low. If there is enough helium 3 on the moon to power the earth for thousands of years, I would think that be worth just a touch more than $4 billion.

How does the saying go? "Earth first, we'll strip mine the other planets later". Not that I think we shouldn't make use of a "clean" source of energy that could be found on the moon, but we've got several options for clean, reusable fuel right here on Earth.