Star Wars – in Congress

The real Star Wars movie is occurring in Congress, and it is PG13.  As Han Solo famously said, “I have a bad feeling about this.”  Maybe this is a prequel to the conflict that will occur in space sometime after 2020, but here it is, raw, powerful and scary.  If Congress does not restore to the American military unfettered access to now famous RD-180 Russian rocket engines, there is reason to believe that America will not have reliable, cost-effective, heavy-lift launch capacity until well after 2019.  What does that mean?  If means that we Americans could have no way to get critical national security assets into the proper orbit – to protect ourselves.  Now, there is a drama in the making. 

According to a recent Space News article, for reasons that seem increasingly hard to square with national security, “U.S. Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) has asked the chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee, Sen. Thad Cochran (R-Miss.), to reject the idea of inserting a provision into a must-pass federal spending bill that would give the U.S. military access to a controversial Russian rocket engine until an alternative becomes available.”  What?    

{mosads}Yet, on the other side of the Universe, Sen. Richard Shelby (R-Ala.) is defending the cause of unbroken American access to deep space by the American military, with existing heavy-lift launch assets, including unfettered American access to the vaunted RD-180 Russian launch engine.  If this seems a pitched battle, it is. McCain wants to hold Russia’s feet to the fire for any number of missteps by President Putin.  But Shelby is hunting bigger game.  He is arguing that America’s national security – all else aside – needs to be assured.  And he is right.

As Space News reports, “McCain, who chairs the Senate Armed Services Committee, supported a provision in the National Defense Authorization Act of 2016” to limit American access to the unique Russian engine.  That idea reversed a longstanding policy – at the highest levels of both governments – to share certain technologies, and to specifically allow American satellites to outer orbits with the Russian engine powering American Atlas V rockets.  In effect, Shelby and others are saying, enough.  It matters far more that we get these assets to space, than whose engines they fly on. 

Of course, we will eventually want an American-made engine – but that will be another perhaps even decades to design and deploy – so that begs the immediate question.   How do we preserve our heavy-lift for deeper space?  Obviously, by preserving long term access to the RD-180s, until the moment when we have an alternative. 

Through another lens: Would the average American quit one job without another to feed his family?  No, of course not.  So should Congress give up a launch capacity that assures – or helps to assure – our national security before we have a replacement?  Of course not.  Let us hope that this version of Star Wars ends with the universe at peace, or at least with our current, reliable, cost-effective and proven heavy-lift launch capacity intact. 

The truth seems to be that easy answers do not exist to current foreign policy and national security dilemmas.  But there are some battles not worth fighting, and this battle – one with ourselves – fits that definition.  Why would we impair our own national security if we can preserve it?  And why would we spurn what has made us safe, until we have an alternative that exists in fact?  The battle may be joined now, and yet the Omnibus is the place to get it resolved – in America’s favor in space, with Shelby’s language.  Then, we can all go to the movies.  What do you say? Let’s get a good feeling about this.

Mosbey is a retired USAF colonel, university instructor and researcher in national security and military matters, currently completing a PhD in Russian geopolitical issues.