It's normal to develop some black technology in the future, right?

Chapter 361 Single-digit Number of Failures
As soon as Musk's tweet was released, American netizens quickly responded and questioned whether Musk's SpaceX could still complete such a mission.

"Elon, it would be more realistic to send the starship to Mars first."

"SpaceX should be thinking about landing on the moon before the damn Chinese, not orbiting the moon."

"Elon, be realistic. We've seen your plans go wrong too many times."

Musk's ambitions for the lunar space station are met with doubts from American netizens.

This is mainly because after the successful completion of the Starship's reusable mission, Musk and NASA plan not only to complete the delivery of cargo to the moon in 2026, but also to launch the first Starship to Mars.

However, until 2027, the American people who were full of expectations did not see this scene happen.

Musk would not admit that it was SpaceX's fault, and he put the blame on NASA: "Starship technology is mature enough, and we could have gone to the moon or Mars a long time ago.

However, because NASA's orbital propellant warehouse has not been completed, SpaceX is unable to send the starship to more distant destinations as originally planned."

Everyone is capable of passing the buck. It's not SpaceX that's at fault, it's NASA that's at fault.

Such an answer may fool netizens, but it cannot fool the congressmen in Washington.

Although the gentlemen were not professionals, they were still shocked by the rapid progress of China's aerospace industry and how America would catch up and take the lead in the moon landing race.

After all, the lunar space station is not the moon landing. As long as America can complete the manned moon landing before China, America will still win.

"Elon, can't Starship go to the moon?" a lawmaker asked during a special hearing on Capitol Hill.

Sometimes people don’t really want to know the answer, they just want to confirm that they are not lagging behind China in the space race, and want to find comfort in this fact.

Just like American supporters on the Chinese Internet need to rely on SpaceX's achievements to prove that America is still far ahead of other countries in high-end manufacturing and is at the top of the blue planet, what they need is to win, not how much interest they really have in aerospace.

"With the thrust of the Starship, it is completely possible to go to Mars or the Moon, but it has no way to come back.

The biggest advantage of a starship is that it can return to Earth, which helps reduce overall costs.

As a 5000-ton rocket, if the Starship is a disposable rocket, it will be too expensive.

According to the original plan, we needed to use the orbital propellant depot in low-Earth orbit to refuel it.

After refueling, go to the moon and then launch back from the moon.

NASA keeps telling us that the Orbital Propellant Depot will be completed soon, but we never see a timeline for when it will actually be completed.”

The orbital propellant depot project, which was officially launched in 2010, still encountered frequent problems until 2027, so much so that after comparing SpaceX and NASA, people wonder whether SpaceX is too good or NASA is not good enough.

"After consuming most of the fuel, the Starship will not be able to return without refueling," Musk said.

NASA Administrator Nelson immediately said: "There are many technical problems that are difficult to solve at the moment.

We have completed several docking tests in low-Earth orbit, but the main problem is that the cryogenic propellant will gradually evaporate in space, which has not been solved.

But once we solve this problem, we will send the starship to the moon as soon as possible. And the cryogenic propellant warehouse plan is jointly responsible by us and SpaceX."

Nelson finally added, don't put all the blame on me, this is not a NASA project alone.

Speaking of the cryogenic propellant program, this is a program with a very long history, dating back to the 60s.

In 1969, NASA proposed a plan called the Space Transportation System, which hoped to develop a reusable manned spacecraft for continued travel to the moon and even Mars.

The entire plan includes a space station in a low-Earth orbit of more than 6 kilometers, which can accommodate 12 to 50 people, a space station in lunar orbit that can accommodate 100 to people, and spacecraft to help humans travel between the Earth, the space station, the lunar space station and the moon.

The spacecraft adopts a modular design, combining multiple units or using multi-stage propulsion to cope with large-scale transportation missions. The spacecraft will be supported by propellant depots in low-Earth orbit and lunar orbit.

The whole plan looks familiar. It can be said that SpaceX is now resurrecting NASA’s aborted plan fifty years ago and implementing it with 21st century technology.

One of the key technologies is propellant. Fossil fuel propellants have an upper limit. From a cost perspective, it is impossible to increase them indefinitely. This requires something to complete the increase of propellant in the middle of the process.

In NASA's design, it is an orbital cryogenic propellant depot.

Docking itself is not difficult. A complete technical plan was proposed in 10. For example, China also conducted an in-orbit refueling test of satellite to satellite in 16.

But the difficulty lies in the evaporation of the propellant. As mentioned earlier, the propellant is low-temperature. Low-temperature propellant will evaporate at a slow rate, and the less propellant is left, the slower it evaporates.

This is the problem that has NASA stuck.

"Nelson, my opinion is that we don't need to wait until the cryogenic propellant warehouse is perfect before doing it, but we should launch it first. Even if there is a risk of evaporation, it will not affect our use of it to go to the moon and then return." Musk said.

Musk's principle is to adopt radical solutions and he never worries about failure.

If the risk of propellant evaporation is not considered, then the technical principle is equivalent to multiple starships working together to go to the moon.

It is equivalent to starship B completing part of the journey, and then starship B refuels starship A, starship B returns to the earth, and starship A continues to the moon.

This technical route is definitely feasible, but why NASA has not adopted it before and has kept postponing its implementation?

The fundamental reason is that they can get money by delaying the delivery. SpaceX relies on NASA orders, and NASA relies on federal funding. The continuous delays, coupled with the unsuccessful promotion of the space program and the huge threat posed by the University of Tokyo in the space field, are a sure-fire way to get money from Congress.

After all, it is the livelihood of millions of canal workers.

In April 2021, NASA launched a bidding for suppliers of lunar lander vehicles. The project was handed over to Musk's SpaceX, and Blue Origin was not selected.

The cryogenic propellant warehouse is an important part of the proposal put forward by SpaceX. Blue Origin chose to protest to the Federation, arguing that the space propellant in the Starship's technical plan has not been verified at all and is completely a fantasy.

Blue Origin believes that SpaceX obtained this order based on fantasy, which seriously violates the principle of fair competition. It says that their technical solution has been rigorously demonstrated and asks the federal court to terminate the contract between NASA and SpaceX.

Blue Origin's lawsuit caused the entire plan to be delayed by half a year.

Even though Blue Origin directly sued NASA, NASA later gave the order for the lunar return capsule to Blue Origin in order to appease Blue Origin.

If it is really for the development of space, NASA should give all orders to SpaceX instead of trying every means to support SpaceX's competitors.

"Nelson, is it time for us to go to the moon?"

“If we’re just talking about going to the moon, our technology is already mature.

But if we want to build a system for regular round-trip travel between the moon and the earth, there are still a few technical difficulties to overcome. "We should strive to build a regular round-trip system between the earth and the moon at one time," murmured Nelson.

"No, Nelson, it is more important to strive to be the first in the moon return project with China," said a congressman.

Musk added: "If we can communicate with LightMe Aerospace and use LightMe to complete the addition of cryogenic propellant, I think the overall cost will be lower.

We can consider cooperating with the Light Armor, as this is a good opportunity to observe the internal structure of their so-called port compartment."

Musk's proposal was immediately opposed by the congressmen, and everyone's almost subconscious reaction was that it was not possible.

"If the technology is already mature, then there is no need for us to cooperate with Light Armor Aerospace. This is indirectly helping Light Armor to prove their port's hub status in the round trip between the Earth and the Moon.

Although we have now allowed Light Armor Aerospace to enter the American market, Light Armor Aerospace is still our main competitor and we should not provide them with support in this regard." The quick-witted congressman has found a legitimate reason for the refusal.

Stimulated by the successful entry of the Light Mech into orbit, Washington reached a decision to land on the moon this year at all costs.

If possible, it would be best to send astronauts to the moon this year.

As the Orion spacecraft is not mature enough, we will use the Dragon spacecraft to send the astronauts up.

At least we must prevent the outside world from thinking that America has fallen behind China in technological competition.

In the long technological competition between America and China, China has been the perennial pursuer, so people have enough tolerance for it.

In other words, apart from the Chinese people, the people and capital of other countries have enough tolerance. Even if you can't be first, they will think you are great if you can be second.

But America cannot do this. America's backwardness means that its past technological leadership has been shaken, and that the royal power of the trinity of science and technology, military and finance is declining.

In the past, China's technological leadership was only focused on single-point breakthroughs, which has had such a serious impact on America.

This year, not only did Guangjia Aerospace launch the Guangjia, but China Aerospace also plans to build a space station on the moon. America cannot accept that it could have been ahead but was deliberately falling behind because of the conservative bureaucracy.

In the face of the success of the Light Mech, there was also extensive discussion on Musk’s base Twitter.

“Essentially, all of NASA’s tremendous success with its new big space programs—reusable first stages, reusable super-heavy launch vehicles, reusable spacecraft, low-orbit satellite internet constellations—can be attributed to one company: SpaceX.

Companies like Orbital Sciences and Boeing have been awarded NASA contracts with the same price as SpaceX to launch cargo and crew to the International Space Station, but the rockets developed by both companies are only useful for NASA contracts; they have little commercial potential to be self-sustaining.

Boeing even made a famous joke about sending crew members to the International Space Station but not being able to bring them down.

The situation is similar for China Aerospace, as all of their large-scale projects come from one company, Guangjia Aerospace.

One thing that makes China Aerospace smarter than NASA is that they will not give orders to organizations other than Guangjia Aerospace, while NASA always tries to give orders to Boeing, Orbital Sciences and Blue Origin.

How can we have more SpaceX and less Boeing/Orbital Sciences when NASA is doing the contracting? Should there be more consideration of the potential for commercial spinoffs?
These large defense contractors have never been able to exceed expectations, and companies like Boeing often surprise people. They are Boeing, how could they make such low-level mistakes?
I think the fundamental difference between us and China is that NASA's funds are wasted on these inefficient contractors."

“You are right, and this is clearly reflected in the commercial space station project. Small start-ups have the energy and passion that large companies cannot have.

Blue Origin only knows how to emphasize to everyone that our technology comes from Light Armor Aerospace, we are Light Armor Aerospace's only partner in America, and we are full of potential. They bought a room in the space station from Light Armor Aerospace and advertised it heavily on their official website. However, the damn NASA really gave them expensive deep space research and development project orders just because they had a room on the Light Armor.

A large number of Kilometer Aerospace members come from NASA, and they have a large number of engineers who have participated in the International Space Station project. Because of this, NASA will choose to give them the space station order without hesitation, and they are completely waiting for NASA's orders to survive.

On the contrary, like Vast, they hope to develop the smallest space station module without any NASA funding, and are committed to building a space camping cabin, and through cooperation with SpaceX, to achieve the lowest cost space tourism project. Their entire team is full of passion. "

"If NASA wants to become great again, what it should do is to throw all projects to SpaceX and let SpaceX continue to expand. Even if NASA bureaucrats do nothing, the cost will be lower than if they work."

"When I saw the Light Armor go to space 32 kilometers away, I was probably as shocked as my Chinese classmates three years ago when they saw the returning starship being caught by a pair of 'chopsticks'."

"Like Elon Musk, Wright is blessed by God. I never thought that launching a rocket could be as easy as drinking water. If they fail once, they will try again. If they succeed, their failure redundancy is in the single digits, which was unimaginable before the birth of SpaceX and Light Mech Aerospace.

I have always suspected that they have similar high-precision simulation software in-house, and the results produced in the simulation software are consistent with the real world.”

(End of this chapter)