I see that President Trump has signed a declaration to form a Space Force. Evidently it will be a sub-unit of the US Air Force. Much like the Marine Corps is a part of the Navy.
I have not had a chance to think this through. I hope that the Pentagon has. It adds another Joint Chief and another undersecretary, plus I assume a bunch of worker bees.
I wonder what the uniform will look like? Also, some wags are noting that there is no Air in Space, so why should it be part of the Air Force?
The Air Force already has a Space Command, so it makes sense to put it there.
ReplyDeleteFrom the previous pronouncements I had seen, it sounded like it would be a co-equal service and to me that would be overkill. I'm glad to hear that it will be officially part of one of the existing forces.
I wouldn't mind seeing it as part of the Navy, but that would never happen - the Air Force's lobbyists are too good!
I would have suggested that the Air Force has more aerospace experience . . . but a bit of thought and online searches showed me that's not the case.
ReplyDeleteFor near-Earth missions you could make a strong case for either, maybe a bit more for the USAF. But I'd think when we get to the point of long-term remote missions, the USN has a lot more experience in both logistics and (possibly) personnel issues; in a lot of ways, a spacecraft on a long deployment is more like a submarine than anything airborne, or even a surface ship.
Not that we're likely to see long-term deployments in the immediate future, or while our current president is in office - even if President Trump wins a second term I'd expect it to take longer than six years before we've the infrastructure in place.
What do you mean there's no air in space? There's even an air in space museum. It's in Washington D.C. ;p
ReplyDeleteIf it were actually something that's going to produce a deployable force it should definitely be Navy. Closest thing to a submarine. But it's really just about combining efforts under a single umbrella as I understand it.
ReplyDelete".....in a lot of ways, a spacecraft on a long deployment is more like a submarine than anything airborne, or even a surface ship."
ReplyDeleteBio of a Space Tyrant series. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bio_of_a_Space_Tyrant