Wednesday, President Bush announced the first official update to the National Space Policy in over a decade. Unsurprisingly, the standoffish document (download it here) is garnering negative reactions for its "with us or against us" treatment of space militarization. Most notable among these reactions was the one communicated by former vice president Al Gore during his lunch address at Thursday's Wirefly X Prize Executive Summit in Las Cruces, New Mexico. Here's a bit of what he had to say:
“Very few people have analyzed the insides of this new space policy. I urge all of you who are interested in space to analyze it very carefully. It has the potential, down the road, to create the [same] kind of fuzzy thinking and chaos in our efforts to exploit the space resource as the fuzzy thinking and chaos the Iraq policy has created in Iraq. It is a very serious mistake, in my opinion.
“We in the United States of America may claim that we alone can determine who goes into space and who doesn’t, what it’s used for and what it’s not used for, and we may claim it effectively as our own dominion to the exclusion, when we wish to exclude others, of all others. That’s hubristic.”
In the document's most telling passage, the United States pledges its commitment to the "use of outer space by all nations for peaceful purposes." Sounds pretty reasonable, right? Next sentence: "Consistent with this principle, 'peaceful purposes' allow U.S. defense- and intelligence-related activities in pursuit of national interests." The idea seems to be that everyone should use space peacefully, but if we happen to deem it necessary to destroy another nation's communications satellites with any one of the numerous anti-satellite weapon systems the U.S. is currently developing, well, tough cookies. Watch PopSci's exclusive video of Gore's speech below. —John Mahoney and Megan Miller
People!
I don't understand! You appear to be intelligent but can't you see past the bipartisan BS? Politicians disagree on every issue but the main idea of reading these clips is to surmise the true meaning of the issue.
The USA, my beloved country, has overstepped it's bounds by declaring the wild, wild, west of the outerspace as it's own. However, it has done so on your behalf and for your security. Although I don't agree with Bush's arogance or Gore's dismal grasp of intellectual concepts, I do agree that we should stake our claim and warn all countries that might attempt to gain an upper hand in this new territory that we will defend our liberties and our borders.
Be that as it may, it IS setting the same stage as the Middle East. Not as of 5 years ago, but as of 25 years ago, when we decided to join the party in Iran.
Can't we all just get along?
Posted by: Mike | December 06, 2006 at 12:15 AM
Have any one read the US Space policy and China Space policy?
Let's look at it from an outside point of view. The US has military bases in every part of the war. When to war in every continent with the most country around. Has an active spy program against other country? Run by a bunch old white neocon The US being the richest country in the world haven't done shit to help out people from the other part of the world to win over the goodwill of the people. Haven't assert world leadership through benelovent examples?
Yet, the US is trying to be ruler and law maker of the world. Only stupid people would not be suspicious.
Posted by: An Outside point of view | January 19, 2007 at 08:58 PM
Can any of those defending Bush administration give me answers for following questions.
What if another country, Russia or China, follows US step and creates a similar space policy? How would you feel about it? What if Bush decides to put nuclear wapon in outer space? Should/would other countries stop it/shoot it down? Or, what if other countries put nuclear wapons in space? What should/would Bush administration do?
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