HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
Newsgroups: talk.politics.space
Date: Fri, 21 Aug 1992 16:55:28 -0400 
From: "Arun K. Gupta" <ag3l+@andrew.cmu.edu>
Subject: Reverse Engineering


The claim was made in WL's article that reverse engineering a space
vehicle to a ballistic missile is possible. All the examples given,
however were the other way round -- the ballistic missile was reverse-
engineered into a launch vehicle. Are there any examples the other way
round ?

Secondly, the claim was made that making a launcher into a missile is
easier than the other way round ? Is that true ? My own speculations are
(i) a missile would have to survive re-entry.
(ii) a missile would have to be much more precisely guided and controlled.
After all, its no disaster if a satellite orbit is five miles on either side
of nominal (or is it ?), but even with a small nuclear warhead, five
mile radius would count as a miss for a missile (wouldn't it ?).
(iii) a missile would have to have a long shelf-life, might have to
be designed to survive the EMP from nuclear blasts and so on.

Can knowledgeable people comment, please ?

-arun gupta
ag3L@andrew.cmu.edu
From: gary@ke4zv.uucp (Gary Coffman)
Newsgroups: talk.politics.space
Subject: Re: Soyuz as ACRV
Date: 23 Aug 92 10:26:39 GMT
Reply-To: gary@ke4zv.UUCP (Gary Coffman)
Organization: Gannett Technologies Group

In article <174oidINNqra@agate.berkeley.edu> gwh@soda.berkeley.edu (George William Herbert) writes:
>In article <1992Aug21.121815.11564@ke4zv.uucp> gary@ke4zv.UUCP (Gary Coffman) writes:
>>NASA is a popular political whipping boy in Congress. How many times
>>[...]
>>Fred has been downsized how many times? And Fred's schedule has been
>>stretched out how many times? NASA has gone to Congress with funding
>>requests for Fred and come back with a half a loaf how many times?
>
>You might notice that NASA's percentage of the federal budget hasn't
>dropped in ten or fifteen years now (if I remember correctly).

NASA's budget has been fairly stable at around $15 billion while the
federal budget has skyrocketed. From 1% of the federal budget, NASA's
share has dropped to 0.15% this year.

>NASA's funding for Freedom got cut repeatedly because they went
>asking for stupendous increases without selling it to congress
>very well.  And so congress said no.  If NASA hadn't gone on 
>assuming that they would sell it "next year" and get the budget
>increases they need (*), this would never have happened.  They
>would have either reprioritized things to afford Freedom (ugh),
>cut Freedom's cost from the conceptual stage on, or given up.

This is true. NASA has consistently under-budgeted major programs
in the hopes of getting new start money that can later be increased.
This strategy has depended on Congress' reluctance to kill on going
programs and is similar to the low ball bidding practices of aerospace
companies. This worked at one time, but is no longer a good strategy
for dealing with Congress.

>* Interesting exercise: get the NASA future program guides for say
>1984 thru today.  See how many of them predict significant increases
>in the NSAS budget, starting next year or the year after.

Yes, they were predicated on NASA's share of the federal budget
remaining a constant percentage of the budget. This hasn't happened.
NASA was operating under the defense/aerospace model for many years.
This model has not been fully operative in the case of NASA because
it's core constituency is not as solid as the constituency for
defense. Even defense's constituency is shrinking now that the Red
Menace is history. NASA needs to start offering realistic budgets
and timetables in it's proposals, and show the courage to cancel
programs when Congress only offers half a loaf.

Gary
Newsgroups: talk.politics.space
Date: Sat, 22 Aug 1992 13:28:30 -0400 
From: "Arun K. Gupta" <ag3l+@andrew.cmu.edu>
Subject: Re: Summary: Russian-Indian deal


Let me try to explain what I find so troubling. My field of expertise
is theoretical high energy physics. I know very little about rocketry,
missiles, treaties and the like.

But it took me only a few hours in the library to find out that most
of an article supposedly meant to enlighten was mainly junk; the one
reason I undertook the check was because of a strange chance -- one
mis-statement about where the SLV is built.

I also noted the tone which was to paint the Russians as waffling on an
agreement they were party to, and the Indians as spreading false rumors.

And it is on the basis of discussions like these that support is
generated for applying sanctions or the starving out of a people (the
Iraqis) and so on.

About the "nationalistic defensive zealotry" I would like to ask you:
if it so necessary for the United States to continue testing its nuclear
arsenal, with all its experience, experimental data, computer simulation
abilities, and unmatched technological prowess,

why is it then so plausible that techno-midgets like India and Pakistan
should have a huge arsenal with one and no tests respectively ?

The only answer that I have is that it gives the US government an
excuse to meddle in the affairs of other sovereign countries. (Note:
this *is* talk.politics, so this is not inappropriate to this group.)
I should say that this is a conclusion that I've resisted in many
arguments that I've had, but am being pulled to this conclusion slowly
and reluctantly.

The great strength of the American system is that Americans require that
their government be acting on high principle. The weakness is the
ability to rationalize away actions taken on pragmatic rather than moral
grounds, and to resist close examination.

The Gulf war was sold as a war for liberty, freedom, for liberating
the Middle East from the threat of Saddam's nuclear weapons, but in
reality it was for oil. The point being that Americans would support
a war based on the first but not on the last. Now an administration
that lied about Iran-Contra, lied about its pre-war relations with
Iraq, and its role in arming Iraq, wants us to believe on its say-so
that Saddam Hussein was indeed close to nuclear weapons (one justification
for the war, given that its now obvious that the war wasn't about liberty--
Kuwait was returned to its dictatorial Emir, and wasn't about getting rid
of Saddam, he shows signs of outlasting George Bush).

A similar self-righteous picture is being painted on the sanctions
on the Russian-Indian rocket deal. The MTCR states that the final
sale decision is the sole decision of the sovereign state involved,
but the US is not respecting this, is it ? ( I am assuming here that
Larrison represents the typical information that a defense-aerospace
person here has. ) and so one must make it seem that Russia is waffling !

Anyway, enough said. I do hope that I am wrong about this.

-arun gupta
ag3L@andrew.cmu.edu
From: gwh@soda.berkeley.edu (George William Herbert)
Newsgroups: talk.politics.space
Subject: Re: Soyuz as ACRV
Date: 22 Aug 92 06:58:21 GMT
Organization: Dis-
NNTP-Posting-Host: soda.berkeley.edu

In article <1992Aug21.121815.11564@ke4zv.uucp> gary@ke4zv.UUCP (Gary Coffman) writes:
>NASA is a popular political whipping boy in Congress. How many times
>[...]
>Fred has been downsized how many times? And Fred's schedule has been
>stretched out how many times? NASA has gone to Congress with funding
>requests for Fred and come back with a half a loaf how many times?

You might notice that NASA's percentage of the federal budget hasn't
dropped in ten or fifteen years now (if I remember correctly).

NASA's funding for Freedom got cut repeatedly because they went
asking for stupendous increases without selling it to congress
very well.  And so congress said no.  If NASA hadn't gone on 
assuming that they would sell it "next year" and get the budget
increases they need (*), this would never have happened.  They
would have either reprioritized things to afford Freedom (ugh),
cut Freedom's cost from the conceptual stage on, or given up.

-george william herbert
gwh@soda.berkeley.edu etc.

* Interesting exercise: get the NASA future program guides for say
1984 thru today.  See how many of them predict significant increases
in the NSAS budget, starting next year or the year after.
Newsgroups: talk.politics.space
From: strider@acm.rpi.edu (Greg Moore)
Subject: Re: NASA spinoffs
Organization: The Voice of Fate
Date: Wed, 19 Aug 1992 00:21:32 GMT

In article <1992Aug17.215011.3044@aio.jsc.nasa.gov> cessna@kn5f.jsc.nasa.gov (Mark Taylor Evert) writes:
>
>The need to secure objects temporarily in 0G led to the invention of 
>Velcro which has found a multitude of uses on earth.
>
	Sorry, but the reality of this is even better.  It was invented by
a doctor who came upon the idea after hiking through a bunch of 
burdocks.

>Mark T. Evert
>Friendswood, TX
>
>My opinions are my own.


-- 
<------------------------------------------------------------------------->
Greg d. Moore                  |  Strider@acm.rpi.edu
Green Mountain Software        |  "All that is gold does not glitter."  
Carpe Diem                     | 
Organization: Physics, Carnegie Mellon, Pittsburgh, PA
Newsgroups: talk.politics.space
Date: Thu, 20 Aug 1992 15:15:26 -0400 
From: "Arun K. Gupta" <ag3l+@andrew.cmu.edu>
Subject: Re: Russia/India Sanctions (more)


Continuing to check out Wales Larrison's post: 

Question: when did the Soviet Union sign the Missile Technology Control
Regime ?

>Final Notes -  it should be noted the Soviet Union was one of the
>signatories to the MCTR. 

I'm looking at "Arms Control and Weapons Proliferation in the Middle East and 
South Asia", edited by Shelley Stahl and Geoffrey Kamp. (St. Martin's Press NY,
1992) 

The book merely says that "The Soviet Union took a substantial step toward this
aim [non-proliferation of missile technology]  in 1990 [Feb. 10, 1990]
when Soviet
President Mikhail Gorbachev announced Soviet support for the principles and
export restrictions of the MTCR -- negotiated in 1987 between the United States
and a number of  other western countries to restrict the export of
technologies 
needed to build ballistic missiles locally. (And  in July 1991 the
Soviet Union joined 
with the other permanent members of the UN Security Council in calling for
elimination of all weapons of mass destruction etc.  says the book.(I'm
including this 
so that you see how recent the book is.)

The book also says that the Americans would like the Soviet Union to sign the 
treaty (but it hasn't.)

A check on Newspaper Abstracts on the local library computer (1989 to present)
doesn't show any item that the Soviet Union ever signed the treaty. The item
below is the closest  from that database:

>Author       McManus, Doyle
>Title        Baker to Seek Soviet Halt of 3rd World MISSILE Sales
>Source       Los Angeles Times,  May 9, 1989,  I, 7:1
>Abstract     Secretary of State James A.  Baker III plans to challenge the 
>            Soviet Union to join a Western effort to halt the sale of a 
>             balastic MISSILE TECHNOLOGY to Third World countries.
>Subjects     International relations-US; Nuclear weapons; TECHNOLOGY; 
>             Developing countries
>PersonalName Baker, James A III
>ISSN         0458-3035
>Place Names  Union of Soviet Socialist Republics; USSR
>Article Type News
>Length       Medium (6-18 col inches)

Given that varied sources such as the Economist, Nature, New Scientist, Flight
International say, just like the book above that the Soviet Union is *not* a 
signatory to the MTCR, I need much than a say-so that the Soviet Union is
indeed a signatory.

Finally, I'll take the opportunity to ask one more question:

The Flight International story on the sanctions on Russia and India states that
liquid hydrogen has *never* been used on a missile. Is this true or not ?

*************

I'm sorry if I seem extremely rude; but the only way I know to check a whole 
bundle of facts such as presented in the articles here is to first check
the facts that
are most accessible to me.  I've been wondering about the liquid hydrogen claim
made above for two months now, and don't know how to check it. MTCR (and
where the SLV is built) are easier. 

-arun gupta
ag3L@andrew.cmu.edu





Organization: Physics, Carnegie Mellon, Pittsburgh, PA
Newsgroups: talk.politics.space
Date: Sat, 22 Aug 1992 12:52:00 -0400 
From: "Arun K. Gupta" <ag3l+@andrew.cmu.edu>
Subject: Re: Summary: Russia-India deal


>To assume Indian bomb design has stood still is questionable. Nuclear
>weapons would serve as a proper counter to Chinese aggression.

No one is assuming that bomb design is standing still. My question,
which you have failed to answer is: is it true (as per books, the references
to which I can dig out if you are sufficiently interested) that one cannot
be certain of a plutonium bomb without testing (as compared to a uranium
bomb ?)

>Implosion weapons (plutonium bombs, if you prefer) are more technically
>challenging, but not that difficult. It is widely assumed several nations
>(including Pakistan, Israel, and South Africa) have built weapons
>without "public" testing. 

Yes, but Pakistan, Israel and South Africa all have uranium enrichment
technology which India doesn't have. Please answer the question above.

>If you have bomb-grade fissionables stockpiled, you can put together a
>weapon in far far less than six months. It has been suggested India is
>playing the same semantic games Israel does, and may only take a
>screwdriver to assemble the all the (stockpiled and machined) parts. 

Same response.  Please answer my first question above.

>Trying to paint Mr. Larrison as a tool of the Evil First World Propaganda
>Machine is, well, amusing. 

Well, you misunderstand me.  I think I made a convincing case that 
Mr. Larrison doesn't know what he is talking about.  I do recognize
the right of the American government to protect what it considers to
be its vital interests.  

Let us not however, obscure its motives in claiming that the Russians
are waffling on a treaty (to which they are not a party, and even if they
were, the treaty makes it clear that sanctions are inappropriate). Let us
not cast aspersions on the ISRO by claiming it is spreading false rumors.

After all, the credibility of the organizations involved is of crucial 
importance to whether the sale should be allowed or not.

Moreover, I think I have made a case that `it is so because I say so' such
as 

>If you have bomb-grade fissionables stockpiled, you can put together a
>weapon in far far less than six months.

need a little more corroboration, especially in the light of all the mis-state-
ments that Mr. Larrison made, and the politically-charged atmosphere
that surrounds all these issues.

If you don't understand this, then the Republican and Democratic 
campaigns are looking for people just like you. :-)

-arun gupta
ag3L@andrew.cmu.edu

Newsgroups: talk.politics.space
From: schroede@bnlux1.bnl.gov (gary l. schroeder)
Subject: "Race to the Moon" 
Organization: Brookhaven National Laboratory, Upton, NY 11973
Date: Fri, 14 Aug 1992 13:34:34 GMT


On Monday night, A&E shows "David L. Wolper Presents" which I usually
don't watch because it usually deals with Hitler and WWII in general.
However, this week's documentary was called "Race To The Moon" and was
filmed in the interim period between the Mercury and Gemini programs.
It had some very interesting b&w footage that I had never seen before
including what the MOCR looked like when it was under construction.  The
interesting part of the film was all of the discussion generated by the
debate over whether or not spending 30 billion on the project was
ethical or necesary.  I felt as though I were watching some kind of
fascinating Alternate Earth interviews mostly because the arguments
against were just the same then as they are now!  "We need to spend that
money on the homeless, on cures for [disease X], it has no scientific
justification", etc.  Fascinating.  These arguments were just as invalid
then as they are now.  Lesson learned:  history truly does repeat
itself.  Sometimes it's even so close as to be an instant replay of the
past.  Have we learned nothing?

This film should be required viewing for not only the politician who
decides the fiscal future of space projects, but for the American public
as well.


-- 
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Gary Schroeder	                |  Warning: prolonged exposure to this
schroede@bnlux1.bnl.gov         |  .sig may cause retinal damage and 
Brookhaven National Laboratory  |  blistering skin rashes.
From: gary@ke4zv.uucp (Gary Coffman)
Newsgroups: talk.politics.space
Subject: Re: NASA spinoffs
Date: 18 Aug 92 15:04:50 GMT
Reply-To: gary@ke4zv.UUCP (Gary Coffman)
Organization: Gannett Technologies Group

In article <1992Aug17.173703.5046@brtph560.bnr.ca> ritz@brtph95.bnr.ca (Charles Ritz P215) writes:
>
>   Just what are the useful 'spinoffs' of the Apollo program.
>How much of the $ 24 billion spent on Apollo went to developing
>these wonderful new technologies?  Was the accelerated develop-
>ment of these 'spinoffs' really worth $ 24 billion (in 1960s
>dollars, around $ 100 billion in today's dollars)?  Could the
>'spinoff' technologies been built, at a much lower cost, without
>the Apollo program, e.g. is it really necessary to send a
>man to the moon in order to develop teflon?

No it wasn't necessary to send a man to the Moon to develop
Teflon. Teflon was developed by Dupont in 1935.

Spinoffs are by nature products that would not have been developed
as rapidly or at all if there were not some forcing function to
make it happen. The classic example from the space program is
microelectronics. Circuitry on a chip was developed to meet the
needs of a highly mass sensitive problem posed by spacecraft.
When it was realized that standard chip designs were cheaper to
produce than the equivalent hand wired component level circuitry,
consumer and computer uses were found for the devices. It was not
known a priori that chip level products would be cheap to produce.
It's unlikely that development would have been attempted without
the driving need of space hardware for mass reductions *at any
cost*. Thus this is a true spinoff, a use totally incidental to
the original development requirement.

Gary
From: ag3l+@andrew.cmu.edu (Arun K. Gupta)
Newsgroups: talk.politics.space
Subject: ISRO
Date: 23 Aug 92 15:33:17 GMT
Organization: Physics, Carnegie Mellon, Pittsburgh, PA



The Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) is functionally
quite different from NASA. NASA plans, directs and conducts R&D,
but the manufacturing is turned over to contractors. ISRO however
does most of its own manufacturing. This is necessary because of
India's tiny high-tech. industrial base. You can't aget any more
rocket from Hindustan Aeronautics Ltd., than you can buy an auto-
mobile from Napa Auto Parts. I think that shutting down HAL would
cause the schedules to slip but would not stop the launchers --
ISRO has the manufacturing capabilities.
If the missile programs are successful and the Agni and Prithvi
go into production, then presumably it will be done by HAL or
something like it. It will mark the beginning of a truly
indigenous aerospace industry in India. At that time, it would
also presumably be efficient, economically and otherwise to
cut off ISRO's manufacturing capabilities. I think that ISRO
could make on its own the projected need for India's satellite
launchers.



About the involvement of the civilian and defence sides: the
defense r&d organization had a non-productive missile program
for a long time. After the first successful launch of the SLV
by ISRO, the leader of the team transferred to the defense org.
Presumably, there he brought in the SLV technology, and under
him, the DRDO began showing its first real successes.(BTW, he
has now moved to an advisory post in the Indian Govt., you
would have seen that if you read misc.news.southasia (about a
month ago.))  There is this link between the defense and civilian
rocketry programs in India, but not as alleged in the factories
of HAL.

Hope this leads to better understanding.
-arun gupta
From: gwh@soda.berkeley.edu (George William Herbert)
Newsgroups: talk.politics.space
Subject: Re: bush is an idiot
Date: 16 Aug 1992 08:29:33 GMT
Organization: Dis-
NNTP-Posting-Host: soda.berkeley.edu
Summary: not quite so clear cut but I agree...

In article <1600000001@igc.apc.org> mwgoodman@igc.apc.org (Mark Goodman) writes:
>You both have it wrong.  India wants to use a high specific-impulse
>former Soviet CRYOGENIC LIQUID FUEL ROCKET MOTOR to improve the
>performance of its ASLV (Advanced? Space Launch Vehicle).  This type
>of motor is extremely ill-suited for use on ballistic missiles.  No
>one who knew how to make solid fuel motors -- as India does -- would
>use it.

Bingo.  However...

>Furthermore, India and Glavkosmos offered to allow the United States
>to verify that the rocket motors were not being used for ballistic
>missiles.  This would have set an extraordinarily useful precedent.
> 
>Instead, the United States blew it and simply reinforced the widespread
>view that export control laws, which are supposed to be based on military
>security concerns, are really just a cover for a western technology
>cartel.

It is not quite that simple... even a cryo engine can be reverse engineered
to better understand the engineering of combustion in rockets in general.
(Such as Solids).  Thus, _any_ transfer can be said to contain some
information content useful for ballistic missiles.

However, I do agree that the reason that this was opposed was that
the US was either trying to cover its technological lead or due to
massive mishandling in the state Department etc.  I sincerely believe
that the Indians will use the engines as advertised, and wish them
luck with them.  The US should give up and acknowledge that states
with existing ballistic missile technology won't gain much from
a space-specific bit of technology.


-george william herbert
gwh@soda.berkeley.edu  gwh@lurnix.com  herbert@uchu.isu92.ac.jp until 28 aug
From: kjenks@gothamcity.jsc.nasa.gov
Newsgroups: talk.politics.space
Subject: Re: Whither a Lunar Base (was: Energiya's role in Space Station assem)
Keywords: lunar base
Date: 19 Aug 1992 02:39:05 GMT
Organization: NASA/JSC/GM2, Space Shuttle Program Office
Originator: kjenks@krakatoa

I started it:
>>P.S.  Richard, I note that you're posting from Canada.  When is YOUR
>>country going to start a lunar base?

In article <1992Aug18.134610.22285@csi.on.ca> richard@csi.on.ca (Richard Martin) writes:
>I *did* say WE.  One should note that Freedom is an international
>space station.  Canada has a population of about 27 million.  As far
>as resources go, Canada doesn't really _need_ to go to the moon in
>the near future.  [...worthy Canadian contributions deleted...]
>i                    Canada contributes as Canada
>can (alliteration!).  I think that any moon base will have to be
>international, for financial, logistical, and political reasons.
>Richard.

Oops.  I didn't mean to imply that Canada wasn't pulling its fair
share.  I really meant to imply, "Since my country's Congress shows no
interest in funding a lunar base, can I grub money from your country?"
Which is, you see, a big difference from implied Canada-bashing.

-- Ken Jenks, NASA/JSC/GM2, Space Shuttle Program Office
      kjenks@gothamcity.jsc.nasa.gov  (713) 483-4368

     Aldrin: "Contact light.  Okay, engine stop.  ACA out of detent."
     Armstrong: "Got it."
     Aldrin: "Mode controls, both auto.  Descent engine command override,
       off.  Engine arm off...."
     CAPCOM: "We copy you down, Eagle."
     Armstrong: "Houston, Tranquility Base here.  The Eagle has landed."