As usual with Heppenheimer, there is no there there, but ...

"Before federal bureaucrats such as Mueller could grapple with human destiny, they first had to face the more prosaic question of what NASA would do after landing astronauts on the moon. The first significant interest in this issue came in January 1964, when President Johnson, in office for barely two months, sent a letter to NASA Administrator James Webb.

The background to this letter involved a program of the Atomic Energy Commission called NERVA (Nuclear Engine for Rocket Vehicle Application) that was developing a nuclear-powered rocket engine. While NASA did not need it for Apollo, such an engine might prove useful indeed in any follow-on program of piloted flight to Mars. The program had strong support from Senator Clinton Anderson (D-New Mexico), chairman of the Senate space committee; it also had the support of Webb. Its opponents, however, included President Kennedy's science advisor, Jerome Weisner. Weisner convinced Johnson to ask NASA to identify the future missions that would require NERVA's power.

Johnson took up this and other issues in his letter to Webb. Could NASA list possible space objectives beyond those already approved? What supporting research and development would these new goals require? How much of NASA's current work, particularly in the development of launch vehicles such as the Saturn V, could support such future programs?

An old hand at Washington politics, Webb smelled a rat. He later described this as "part of a power play rather than a desire for proposals. It was an effort to put us on the defensive and to make us commit ourselves to certain missions which they could then attack." Accordingly, Webb did not reply immediately, but set up a committee that proceeded to take its sweet time in preparing a response. Meanwhile he mollified Johnson with interim replies, listing possible future missions but declining to choose among them. 64

Events that summer showed that Webb was wise to be cautious. As far back as 1962, the Future Projects Office at NASA-Marshall had contracted with several major aerospace firms for initial studies of piloted planetary missions, including landing on Mars. These studies continued during subsequent years. Then, in mid-1964, the new presidential science advisor, Donald Hornig, asked Webb to present an estimate of the cost of a piloted Mars landing that might follow Apollo.

The initial estimate, internal to NASA, was $32 billion. An internal review added $5 billion for program contingencies and forwarded the total of $37 billion to Webb. He accepted some further additions that hiked the cost to $50 billion, and gave this figure to Hornig. Hornig doubled it to $100 billion, on his own initiative, and gave this new estimate to a Congressional committee. The next day, newspapers quoted one congressman as stating that the piloted Mars mission would cost $200 billion, amounting to 40 years of NASA's budgets at the 1965 rate of $5 billion per year. In the words of an observer, "In only one week, a well developed estimate of $37 billion was multiplied into a $200 billion program." 65

A year after receiving his initial request, Webb finally gave a full reply to Johnson's letter in a report written in February 1965. It amounted to a verbose exercise in saying little that was new or significant and saying it at considerable length, while offering no targets for skeptics. The report reviewed recent and current NASA activities in detail, and included three single-page lists of future possibilities. These lists resembled pages from a book index, lacking any trace of description, estimated cost, schedule, or priority. In an outstanding display of political adroitness, the report called for "a continued balanced program" that would "not impose unreasonably large demands upon the Nation's resources." No one could oppose such recommendations; they were on a par with supporting motherhood and apple pie.

Webb's report drew questions within the Senate space committee, which complained that "alternatives are presented, but no criteria are given as to how a selection would be made." That was just as Webb intended; he was not about to take the initiative in offering a plan that critics could attack. He would have been quite willing to have the President take the lead, as Kennedy had done in supporting Apollo in 1961. Johnson, however, also preferred to keep his options open. In March 1965, he told his advisor Jack Valenti that he did not intend to make a new Kennedy-style commitment in space: "I think I would have more leeway and running room by saying nothing, which I would prefer." 66

The historian Arthur Levine notes that two years later, Webb explained to him just why he had finessed Johnson's initial request:

First, the announcement by NASA in the mid-1960s of a long-term goal [manned Mars flight- ep] would make the agency vulnerable. It would provide ammunition to critics, who would be able to shoot down the proposed program as being too expensive or impractical, thereby raising the possibility that long-range technology developments tied to the announced goal would be cut out. This in turn would cripple the agency's ability to support the Apollo and other advanced missions that depended on a strong base of advancing technology.

Second, should NASA announce a long-term post-Apollo goal [manned Mars flight - ep], critics would claim that the lunar landing was simply an interim goal, subordinate to the new effort. For example, if NASA announced that the post-Apollo goal should be a manned Mars landing, the Apollo program for a moon landing would be relegated to a secondary position. This would raise the possibility of cutting support for Apollo, thus jeopardizing the program or stretching it out. In the event of subsequent change in national opinion on the worth of the long-range goal, both the lunar landing and the more distant goal might never be realized.

Third, the major effort required for planning, proposing, and defending a new long-range goal [manned Mars flight] would tie up the energies of top NASA leadership and key scientists and engineers, diverting them from concentrating on making Apollo a success. 67

The last point addressed the fact that there was no consensus, even within NASA itself, as to NASA's next goal. George Mueller, head of the Office of Manned Space Flight, had his eye on a piloted mission to Mars. The two most powerful center directors, Von Braun at NASA-Marshall and Robert Gilruth of the Manned Spacecraft Center, preferred a different objective: a space station. Mueller also liked space stations and was well aware of their usefulness as preparations for Mars. Von Braun and Gilruth, however, saw space stations as major elements of a program that, diverging sharply from one that would aim at Mars, would focus on activities in Earth orbit.

Nevertheless, during 1965 and 1966, the beginnings of a post-Apollo future began to take shape. [Note how Heppenheimer misses or glides by the key date of July, 1965. H. can get published only if he does not explicitly comment of manned Mars flight. ep] Not surprisingly, its major features were in line with the initiatives that Webb had suggested in his report to Johnson. Apollo Applications emerged, strongly backed by Mueller. For Mars, attention focused on an ambitious automated mission called Voyager that would orbit that planet and then send craft to land on its surface, looking with instruments for signs of life. Plans for Voyager flourished for a time. While initial designs called for use of the Saturn I-B, in October 1965 its officials decided instead to try for the much larger Saturn V. 68

In addition to this, even though Webb was unwilling to carry through a serious plan for NASA's future, the President's Science Advisory Committee (PSAC) proved willing to do it for him. This blue-ribbon panel was potentially a source of clout; it operated within the Executive Office of the President, and received support from another White House group, the Office of Science and Technology. In February 1967, the PSAC issued a major report, The Space Program in the Post-Apollo Period. John Newbauer, editor of the trade journal Astronautics & Aeronautics, wrote that it "should prove the pivot for policy discussions for some time to come." He described it as "the most cohesive and solid appraisal of space-program goals since the Space Act itself," which led to the founding of NASA in 1958. 69

The PSAC report did not endorse anything so specific as piloted flight to Mars. Nevertheless, it proposed an organizing theme: "a program directed ultimately at the exploration of the planets by man." The report defined this as "a [99] balanced program based on the expectation of eventual manned planetary exploration." The program would pursue several intermediate goals including continued lunar missions by astronauts; long-duration piloted flights, at first through Apollo Applications and later in a true space station; and "a strongly upgraded program of early unmanned exploration of the nearby planets."

The PSAC was certainly not in NASA's pocket; its report pulled no punches. It criticized the Apollo Applications wet workshop: "some doubts arise about man's ability to carry out extensive construction efforts in space. The requirement that man actually construct his laboratories in space in these initial applications may constitute a serious impediment to their development." A true space station might represent "a more effective use of funds." The panel endorsed building a single wet workshop, if only as an initial step: "The launch vehicle and spacecraft for this experiment are already on order, and the opportunity for 28- and 56-day flights in 1968 should be taken."

In other areas, the report was more favorable: "In the period after the initial two Apollo lunar landings we recommend that a sustained program of lunar exploration... continue manned expeditions at the rate of between one and two per year." The PSAC recommended "that the Saturn V vehicle continue to be produced," and that "the post-Apollo Saturn V production rate be fixed at 4 systems per year."

On Voyager: "We recommend an expanded commitment to the Voyager planetary lander program, pointing toward a soft landing of a Surveyor-type module on Mars in 1973." As a prelude to Apollo, a program called Surveyor was seeking to conduct soft landings of automated spacecraft on the moon, and had scored its first success the previous June.

On a space station:

"We recommend that programs of studies and advanced developments be initiated promptly with the objective of a launch in the mid 1970's of the first module of a space station for very prolonged biological studies of man, animals, and other organisms in earth orbit. Such a station should be designed with consideration of its possible role in support of earth orbital astronomy."

On future launch vehicles:

"The payload capabilities of the [Saturn I-B] are not significantly superior to those of the Titan III-M, while the launch costs of the [Saturn I-B] are about [100] double those of the Titan III-M.... Because of the continuing requirements for manned and man-attended systems we visualize that an important problem will be posed for a long time by the cost associated with taking men to and from orbit.... For the longer range, studies should be made of more economical ferrying systems, presumably involving partial or total recovery and reuse. 70

The report did not give NASA everything it might have wanted, even in dealing with projects that were achievable in the short-term. It endorsed only a modest Apollo Applications effort, as noted. It ignored NERVA, though that program was proceeding smartly with its nuclear engine and offered a promising source of propulsion for a piloted mission to Mars. The PSAC also recommended delaying a commitment to a true space station until 1971 or 1972, although its advocates hoped for such a decision as early as 1968. 71 By endorsing construction of this station "in the mid-1970's," and by openly embracing Mars as a long-term goal, [This is an inference by Heppenheimer unsupported by the facts: there is no endorsement of manned Mars flight. ep] the PSAC endorsed a program that went well beyond what NASA in fact would be able to pursue.

While Mars was in the ascendancy at the PSAC, [again, Heppenheimer's inference - ep]NASA's hopes were about to prove star-crossed. The agency had been charging ahead with Apollo; in January 1967 it had a Saturn I-B on a pad at Cape Canaveral that was being readied to launch a mission into orbit. Late that month, the astronauts Gus Grissom, Ed White, and Roger Chaffee were conducting a pre-launch exercise atop that rocket, within their spacecraft. A fire broke out; the men could not escape, and they perished before help could reach them. 72"

end Heppenheimer quote.

In constrast to Heppenheimer, the key here is the return of the Mariner IV images in July, 1965, not the Apollo I fire of 1967. The Soviets had a manned Moon program which was known to both Johnson and Webb, and which the US had to beat, but there is no executive plan for manned Mars flight after July, 1965. Sine there is no goal of manned Mars flight, and thus no need for heavy lift launchers, the cancellation of Saturn production begins with Sec Def Harold Brown under Johnson.

ep