From: gary@ke4zv.uucp (Gary Coffman)
Newsgroups: talk.politics.space,sci.space
Subject: Re: Pres Debate & military spending
Date: 16 Oct 92 03:40:16 GMT
Reply-To: gary@ke4zv.UUCP (Gary Coffman)
Organization: Gannett Technologies Group

In article <35835@cbmvax.commodore.com> ricci@cbmvax.commodore.com (Mark Ricci - CATS) writes:
>carlosn@hue.Princeton.EDU.commodore.com writes:
>>is hard to convert from potato chips to computer chips in time of war  
>>(paraphrase)  Well, we all know (at least those of us who read these groups)  
>>that one of the technologies that is most closely related to the military is  
>>space. It is time to get the word out. We have to let the next administration 
>>know that one of the most logical (and probably easiest) transformations would
>>be from military hardware to space hardware.  In fact many of the people  
>>working on one are working on the other
>
>Transforming the defense contractors into space contractors, which many of 
>them are anyway, is no transformation at all.  You're simply substituting one
>government nipple for another.  The companies need to get away from the 
>government, not latch onto another part.

Unfortunately, the aerospace industry is ill equipped to operate when
separated from the government teat. There's little consumer demand for
$800 toilet seats, or $120 million dollar ex-ballistic missiles. The
companies don't have a clue how to make $19 Walkmans, or even $2 million
dollar sewage treatment plants. Their corporate culture isn't setup to
handle such concepts. A much reduced Boeing might survive on airliner
sales, but have you looked at the airline industry lately? They aren't
in a position to be buying a lot of airplanes. If the government money 
goes away, these companies, and their military capabilities, are going 
to go away. Perot's right, they can't be just thrown on the consumer market, 
they'll die.

>>The possibilities are there... spy-technology to remote sensing, hypersonic  
>>research to civilian aircraft, etc. All these seem painfully obvious, in fact 
>>almost too ovbious to be brought up.  But the fact is that it is not really  
>>happening, defense workers are loosing their jobs, and the space budget is  
>>going down.  Take a recent example, to save jobs Bush agreed to sell F15 to  
>>Saudi Arabia, a highly contraversial decision. How about if to save those 
>>same jobs the same money had been used for a space program tha M-D might be 
>>involved in.  Some of the money goes to retraining, some to the actual 
>>project.  It sounds logical, but it is not being done.  

The Saudis don't seem interested in spending their money on space hardware.
They want fighter planes and they're willing to pay top dollar. No US
government money is involved in the F15 sale, so there's no money to be
diverted to space.

>The transformation should be for these high-tech firms to produce high-tech 
>products that the marketplace wants, not just the federal government.  This is
>how the expertise and the training they have can be put to the best use for 
>them and for us.  Making space doodads instead of military doodads is not the 
>solution no more than selling weapons for the sake of keeping defense workers 
>employed in key states is. 

The question is, though, just what high tech consumer goods do these 
companies know how to produce, and more importantly, *market*? And,
how much of their military capabilities will they preserve for the
day when the world heats up again, as it will? We're told that an
Iowa class battleship can't be built today because no company has
the technology to do it. It's been lost as the shipyards and steel
companies have converted to civilian markets. We're told that we
can't rebuild the Saturn V because the subcontractors went bankrupt
during the funding cuts of the 1970s. Can we afford to let this happen
to our aerospace companies?

>When you have a $400 billion deficit and a $4 trillion debt, there is no 
>peace dividend, just bills due.

Actually the Federal government is in better shape than most consumers.
They spend 35% of their income servicing the debt. How many of you
spend less than 35% of your incomes on house notes, car notes, and
consumer debt? The US government owes four times it's annual income.
How many of you living in $200,000 houses and driving $40,000 cars
can say you owe less?

Gary