on MSNBC. Interestingly, even Zubrin agrees that testing hardware on the moon is a good idea.

Contradictory rumors
Robert Zubrin, head of the Mars Society, a space advocacy group, said rumors are contradictory as to what mix of Moon/Mars the President will actually announce.

"NASA needs a goal, and that goal should be humans to Mars," Zubrin said. The goal needs to "real".

"It must be sufficiently imminent in character to force NASA to change its spending from its current random activity to focused action to develop, build and fly a coherent set of hardware to implement the program plan," Zubrin said.

Zubrin is author of the recently released book, Mars on Earth: The Adventures of Space Pioneers in the High Arctic (Published by J. P. Tarcher; September 2003).

Mars via the Moon
Using lunar missions as an intermediate milestone to test out and exercise a subset of the needed humans-to-Mars hardware — that approach is fine, Zubrin said.

However, commonality of hardware for both the Moon and Mars is essential, Zubrin emphasized. "This overall coherence needs to be designed into the program from the start," he said.

Some speculation has already surfaced that an Apollo 8-like — humans around Mars but not land -- is being discussed.

"The Mars mission must actually go to Mars. Missions that simply fly by Mars, go into Mars orbit, or to the Martian moons are insufficient," Zubrin stressed. "The purpose of sending humans to Mars is not to set a new altitude record for the aviation almanac. The purpose is to explore and pioneer a new world. This can only be done with astronauts on the Martian surface."

I completely agree that commonality of hardware between the moon and Mars is essential, otherwise the testing proves nothing and you've saved nothing. That doesn't mean 100% commonality because that isn't possible. For example, the Mars lander will need a heat shield that would be completely useless for the moon. However, the core systems for the Mars spacecraft can be used on the moon. You can also test ideas like building a habitat out of local materials, develop and perfect exploration techniques, etc.

The key point that the "Mars first" crowd seems to be missing, IMO, is that this is an opportunity to change the way we handle spaceflight at a fundamental level. From the article, with emphasis added:

Technologies and techniques
The Moon's value lies in its ability to give us both the theoretical knowledge and operational experience of living off-Earth and using space resources," said Paul Spudis, a senior scientist at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) in Laurel, Maryland.

"If I were advising the President, I would suggest that he declare that the mission of this new effort is to develop the technologies and techniques to mine, process, and use lunar resources, specifically, the hydrogen and oxygen of the lunar poles," Spudis told SPACE.com .

Spudis said that secondary objectives would be to develop the operational strategies using people and machines to maximize the efficiency and results of planetary (lunar) surface operations. "The final goal is to begin to establish an Earth-Moon transport infrastructure, based on the use of lunar resources."

Paradigm-shifting moment
"If we can go to the Moon and develop this transport system, we will have the ability to go anywhere in the solar system, not just Mars," Spudis explained.

Doing so, Spudis added, is a paradigm-shifting moment for the space program.

"If we can break the bonds of Earth and re-fuel our spacecraft, both interplanetary and Earth-orbital, our whole way of doing business in space will be forever changed for the better. Our limitations will no longer be driven by the capacity of our launch vehicles, but by our own imaginations," Spudis concluded.

"This thing is much bigger than a Mars mission. It is nothing less than a revolution in how we will live and operate on the New Frontier, Spudis concluded. "It's very exciting, and good for the country! I can't wait for the real announcement!"