I was 8 years old when my parents called me home from a ferocious game of "kick the can" to watch a man from Ohio take a small step . . . onto the surface of the moon. For Neil Armstrong, for me and for millions of young people around the world, it was also a giant leap -- a purposeful and inspirational step, taken by a nation choosing not only to face the challenges of the future, but also to create challenges capable of defining how one nation can lead the world.
Flash forward 50 years, and space exploration continues to inspire children to become the scientists and engineers maintaining our nation's leadership in technical fields. Whether you're considering intellectual or economic achievements, space exploration plays a key role in making the United States a superpower. It enriches us still further by instilling pride in the nation. Space exploration is one of those rare government-supported efforts with virtually no downside. Our historic achievements in space continue to be worthy of pride and prove the United States can still do what no other nation can, even when events conspire to slow us down.
In general, our government gets this. We all know space exploration can't be cheap, but steady, modest support -- in good economic times and bad -- has brought enormous positive returns. Continuing support for planetary sciences has maintained our expertise and technological leadership. It has also allowed us to send rovers to Mars to discover incredible evidence of that planet's past habitability; to capture cometary dust and bring it back to Earth; to witness water geysers erupting on Saturn's moon Enceladus; and do dozens of other absolutely incredible things, all challenging and inspiring, that no other nation has done. Almost as amazing is that these incredible discoveries, so defining of our country's technological expertise, are supported by a tiny fraction of the federal budget -- about four hundredths of one percent.
Unfortunately, this may all change if we don't take action. The administration's proposed budget for the 2013 fiscal year -- now in front of Congress -- includes a devastating 20 percent cut to planetary funding. A cut of that scale will eliminate several Mars missions, break international agreements that jointly support other missions, eliminate any large-scale "flagship" missions for the foreseeable future and force us to abandon any plans to explore the potential habitability of the "water moons" Europa and Enceladus, circling Jupiter and Saturn.
Why is it so important to fix this? Can't planetary exploration handle a little of the economic hardship the rest of us are dealing with? Answering this requires appreciation of two facts.
First is that the proposed cut is hugely disproportionate. While other agencies are being asked to stay the course or slow their growth, planetary exploration is having its guts cut out, with seemingly little regard for its extraordinary long-term value.
Second, for planetary missions (like many things in life), timing is everything. Opportunities to economically launch spacecraft to Mars, a relatively close planet, come by every two years. Opportunities to launch toward outer planets, where spacecraft may need a little gravitational assist from other planets to get there, come along on decadal or even century time scales. Similarly, you can't switch a Mars rover back on once you've turned it off and allowed it to go cold.
In a nutshell, turning off funding now, even if you mean to replace it in the next budget, is likely to kill rather than delay any typical planetary project. It is the equivalent of axing a farmer's budget in planting season; even if you restore that funding mid-summer, the harvest just isn't going to be there.
Have we, as a nation, developed enough technology? Are we done with exploring? If your answer to these questions is yes, then the cut makes sense, as does the resulting step away from U.S. leadership in planetary exploration. But I sincerely hope your answer is a resounding "no." Space exploration is no fantasy; it is something our nation does at a level other nations can only envy, and it has paid us back a thousandfold with incredible discoveries, big dreams and inspiration for new generations.
Now is exactly the wrong time to trade big dreams and inspiration for short-term frugality, and I hope you'll join me in asking Congress to restore or expand NASA's planetary science budget.
Ralph P. Harvey is an associate professor in the Department of Earth, Environmental and Planetary Sciences at Case Western Reserve University.
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