News

**Dial-up**

Will the Chinese find evidence that we the US did land on the moon? Will the pictures from the Chinese be HD in quality? Also, will the Chinese take down the US flag?

By Mark Whittington
Link: Yahoo News

In an interview conducted by USA Today on the eve of what is hopefully the successful soft landing of the Mars Rover Curiosity, NASA administrator Charles Bolden's thoughts turned to a future manned mission to Mars.

Future missions to Mars to be international

Bolden emphasized that any future manned missions, whether to Mars or the moon, will have international partners, according to USA Today. Bolden is quoted as saying, "I have no desire to do a Mars landing on our own. The U.S. cannot always be the leader, but we can be the inspirational leader through international cooperation" in space exploration.

The dream of going to Mars

A human mission to Mars has been on NASA's wish list since just after the Apollo moon landing. The Space Task Group, which issued a set of recommendations to President Nixon soon after the Apollo 11 moon landing, suggested a Mars landing sometime in the 1980s. Though that plan went nowhere, humans to Mars has always been a feature of studies of future space exploration. Mars was the ultimate destination for both President George H. W. Bush's Space Exploration Initiative and President George W. Bush's Vision for Space Exploration. President Obama, soon after he cancelled the second President Bush's program, suggested that Mars was still an ultimate destination in a speech delivered at the Kennedy Space Center.
[snip]

China is considered a repressive, totalitarian regime and an opponent of the United States on Earth. A recent article in Foreign Policy warned of dire consequences if China should reach the moon before American astronauts return. If NASA were to receive an "unlimited budget" Bolden pledged to carry out President Obama's program, suggesting that he would not take advantage of the extra money to pursue further opportunities.

Mark R. Whittington is the author of Children of Apollo and The Last Moonwalker. He has written on space subjects for a variety of periodicals, including The Houston Chronicle, The Washington Post, USA Today, the L.A. Times, and The Weekly Standard.