▶ 0:18:37Chair Cruz: Good morning. The senate committee on,, science, and transportation will come to order. Today we will discuss nasa's progress and the path forward on the first comprehensive nasa a the first comprehensive nasa reauthorization bill since 2017.
▶ 0:18:57Chair Cruz: When I was chairman of this committee's space subcommittee we worked on several pieces of legislation signed into law by president obama and president trump. Continuing that bipartisan tradition, this past march, my colleagues and I together introduced a short-term nasa authorization bill.
▶ 0:19:18Chair Cruz: All of these efforts reveal a important truth, there exists a strong bipartisan consensus in congress for backing the critical mission of nasa. When it comes to the final frontier, we are not republicans or democrats. Rather we are americans first.
▶ 0:19:40Chair Cruz: And all of us know that for our nation to continue doing incredible things in space, we must rely on and empower nasa's ingenuity and determination. Nasa has always been one of america's greatest engines of innovation. From apollo to artemis, from the space shuttle to the international space station, our space program reflects the very best of american leadership.
▶ 0:20:09Chair Cruz: I look forward to continuing that tradition by working and enacting into law a longer-term reauthorization of nasa with my colleagues. This is a pivotal moment for our nation's space program. America must maintain leadership in low-earth orbit. While also embarking on a new era of exploration with artemis. Make no mistake, we are in a new space race with china.
▶ 0:20:38Chair Cruz: If we fail, there will be a bad moon on the rise. China has made no secrets of its goals. It is investing heavily in space capabilities, maintaining a permanent presence in low-earth orbit, and working to plant its flag on the moon by 2030. The stakes could not be higher.
▶ 0:21:06Chair Cruz: Space is no longer reserved simply for peaceful exploration. It is today a strategic frontier with the direct consequences for national security, economic growth, and technological leadership. If our adversaries achieve dominant space capabilities, it would pose a profound risk to america. This is not just about exploration.
▶ 0:21:34Chair Cruz: The choices we make today will determine whether the united states leads in space or seeds space to an authoritarian regime. That is why continuity in nasa's programs is not simply good practice. It is a matter of national security. Any drastic changes in nasa's architecture at this stage threaten united states leadership in space.
▶ 0:22:01Chair Cruz: Delays or disruptions only serve our competitors interests. Congress has spoken clearly on this matter. On the one big, beautiful bill, which I was proud the champion, we reaffirm strong support for nasa's exploration programs.
▶ 0:22:22Chair Cruz: At a time when some have sought to prematurely dismantle the international space station, despite china's presence in low-earth orbit, congress provided ample funding to continue the safe operations of the iss, as well as provide an on-ramp for follow-on commercial stations. Congress also provided the funds necessary to sustain a presence on the moon.
▶ 0:22:49Chair Cruz: Artemis 4 will deliver and assemble the first major elements of the gateway station in lunar orbit. Artemis five will expand surface exploration using that platform. These missions rely on the space launch system and orion capsule to reach the moon and the gateway station.
▶ 0:23:13Chair Cruz: It would be folly to cut short these missions after much of the hardware has already been purchased, and in some cases delivered, and with no commercial alternative readily available. I look forward to working hand-in-hand with the administration to ensure that those funds are utilized in full accordance with congressional intent.
▶ 0:23:39Chair Cruz: We have seen overwhelming support for maintaining these programs from senators, republicans and democrats alike. Congress supports nasa's exploration goals, and we do not want to sudden or disruptive changes that undermine america' is leadership. Nasa is more than just a symbol of national pride. It's a strategic capability that advances our economy, security, and values.
▶ 0:24:08Chair Cruz: The milestones ahead, maintaining continuous human presence in low-earth orbit, returning american astronauts to the moon, landing the first female astronaut in history on the surface of the moon -- as the father of daughters that is near and dear to my heart, and preparing for human missions to mars. These are not just scientific achievements.
▶ 0:24:36Chair Cruz: They are fundamental to america's role as the world's leading space-very nation. America must remain -- spacefaring nation. America must remain the leader in space with steady leadership and clear direction, I'm confident that we will. I now turn to ranking member cantwell.
▶ 0:24:57Sen. Cantwell: I'm glad to join you today in this fight to say that we must maintain our focus on returning to the moon. It's good to see the witnesses here, Mr. cutler, Mr. gold, Mr. bridenstine, lieutenant general shaw, and I also want to recognize Mr. nye. We are here in a race with china to return to the moon and stay there.
▶ 0:25:26Sen. Cantwell: Meeting china back to the moon isn't just about bragging rights and it certainly not about grabbing headlines. Today it's clear that president xi, president putin, and prime minister modi are all in china having a big national security and strategic discussion that could easily, easily include space and defense, and a security and defense of vocations. No surprise that kim jong-un is also there.
▶ 0:25:58Sen. Cantwell: Let's take for consideration that he would like to figure out how to improve his rocket technology with more accuracy, more distance, more tracking. I don't like this scenario. The strategic value of maintaining our position to live and work on/in space is critical. It is critical to our future economic and national security.
▶ 0:26:23Sen. Cantwell: Returning to the moon requires us to push the limits of technology to find the solutions that we can solve and maintain our national defense and innovation economy. All you have to do is look back to the 1960's and look at the development of technologies that created an ecosystem within the united states of america that lead to discoveries and innovations that we are still now counting on today.
▶ 0:26:50Sen. Cantwell: So, we must not waver in this important mission of technology and national security defense. I believe each of the witnesses will tell us something about this today, and why the consequences of failing to achieve this goal will be monumental. We know we need to go back to the moon, and we know we need to be there before china establishes a permanent presence.
▶ 0:27:16Sen. Cantwell: I want to hear, importantly, about the expertise that these individuals think that we must pull together so that we won't fall short of the school. It is clear -- of this goal. It is clear in some of your testimony you are articulating the strategic advantage china has of being so uniform on their government structure.
▶ 0:27:38Sen. Cantwell: We, on the other hand, are trying to work both within the government and within the commercial sector on a partnership that allows all of us to creatively work together and move forward. That is why, lieutenant general shaw, I found your statement in your testimony quite compelling.
▶ 0:27:59Sen. Cantwell: "I believe with we do not unify and synchronize our efforts we will find ourselves rather than the space leaders we are today, instead in a position of increasing disadvantage in space as we progress further into this century." I don't want to see that reality either. I want us to explore how to get the most out of nasa's commercial partnership and determine if sufficient redundancy in the provisions of commercial space are there to ensure that.
▶ 0:28:29Sen. Cantwell: The state of washington plays a very proud role in the exploration of space and space economy. About 77,000 people are employed today just in the space of economy. Obviously more than 100 thousand are employed in aerospace in general. These are important companies to us, boeing, blue origin, all working on rocket infrastructure, crew capsules, gateway lunar landing orbit stations, and human landers. All of these are so important.
▶ 0:29:02Sen. Cantwell: Also, to shout out the returning colonel mclean from spokane who just returned from serving as the commander on the is mission from march through august of this year. Yes, we have a lot of people thinking about space in the northwest. I am concerned about the current plan and what we are doing to make sure that we continue to push forward. I would love to see the continued focus on dual landers given how important they are going to be for the future.
▶ 0:29:33Sen. Cantwell: It's not just one time, is many times. This is an operation where we will continue to return and be an operational system. I want to make sure that we have the best. I want to make sure that nasa has backup plans that take advantage and ensures that they already-delayed mission doesn't slip any further.
▶ 0:29:53Sen. Cantwell: I don't know that it takes a genius to figure out that while china may be projecting 2030, -- who are betting that they are going to go sooner and they are going to beat us. We don't need another sputnik moment. It has already happened.
▶ 0:30:18Sen. Cantwell: The only thing that we have to do is make sure that we in congress get the budget right and to support the artemis mission. I appreciate everything that the chair has done in putting money towards the artemis mission, and I appreciate everything that we are doing collectively to ensure that the administration spends it.
▶ 0:30:38Sen. Cantwell: I also want to point out that as lieutenant general shaw also says, this whole cis lunar communication architecture, the space between the earth and the moon, this is what china would love to do. Dominate the communication system between the space and the moon. That is what they are already working on. We can't allow that to happen. We need to move forward quickly, fastly, with these investments because our national security and defense depends on it.
▶ 0:31:08Sen. Cantwell: Thank you, Mr. chairman. I look forward to asking the witness is more detailed questions about this, the president's budget, and why we need to make sure that we are funding this appropriate mission for the future, not just of our innovation but also for our national security. Thank you.
▶ 0:31:25Chair Cruz: I think the ranking member. I would like to introduce our witnesses today. Each witness exemplifies essential elements to maintaining U.S. leadership in space. The first is Mr. allen cutler, president and chief executive officer of the coalition for deep space exploration, a national organization comprising more than 50 space industry businesses and stakeholders dedicated to ensuring the U.S.
▶ 0:31:55Chair Cruz: Remains the leader in space exploration. The second witness is Mr. michael gold. The president of civil and international space for redwire where he leads a variety of commercial space activities. He served as nasa's associate administrator for space policy and partnerships there he directed the development and implementation of the artemis accords and negotiations for the lunar gateway.
▶ 0:32:21Chair Cruz: Our third witness is a good friend, the honorable jim bridenstine, managing partner of the artemis group. He previously served as the 13th administrator of nasa. Under his strong leadership, nasa launched the artemis program to explore the moon and prepare for missions to mars. Our final witness is lieutenant general john shaw, the former deputy commander of the U.S. space command, where he was responsible for conducting operations in, from, and to space to deter conflict.
▶ 0:32:55Chair Cruz: Mr. cutler, you are recognized for five minutes.
▶ 0:32:58Mr. Cutler: Thank you. Chairman cruz, ranking member cantwell, members of the committee. Thank you for the invitation to testify today and for your consistent bipartisan support of nasa. That support has been critical to return american astronauts to the moon and building a sustained presence there.
▶ 0:33:19Mr. Cutler: The most recent example of this support is the funding of nasa budget reconciliation bill supporting facilities and activities from earth to mars, including funds for the artemis ii four and artemis v missions. Artemis is more than a space program, it is a statement of american leadership to the rest of the world. It ensures the united states and not our competitors or adversaries since the rules for utilization.
▶ 0:33:47Mr. Cutler: Without a successful artemis program we risk giving the moon to china. The nation is working diligently to land before we return, looking to establish control over key lunar regions and resources. Their intent is clear. The progress is real. Time is not on our side. This is a race that the united states cannot afford to lose. China's capabilities in space cannot be underestimated.
▶ 0:34:12Mr. Cutler: Their activities orbiting earth or its ambitious lunar program, china's persistence in achieving its national goals in space underscores its unfaltering intent to be the leader in space . Recent progress by china includes a successful static fire test as well as successful early lunar landing testing determinants capabilities.
▶ 0:34:35Mr. Cutler: The united states still retains advantages with the space launch system orion, gateway development, and exploration grounds of system processing, but appears to trail china for the critical final leg and space to the lunar surface, the development of a lender. Let me be clear here the country that lance astronauts on the moon next shapes the rules of engagement and space for decades to come. The current artemis project is making strong progress, but we need every element to execute its role.
▶ 0:35:05Mr. Cutler: The technical challenges that need to be overcome to land on the lunar surface cannot be ignored and congress must keep a watchful eye on how that effort progresses. Artemis ii is preparing for its crude launch next year but the work doesn't stop there. There is mission hardware that's being built today for artemis iii through artemis ix. Hardware is being manufactured and thousands of americans across the country are at work to make this successful.
▶ 0:35:35Mr. Cutler: The united states is leading a growing coalition of 56 partner nations under the artemis accords, global community under president trump's first term supporting principles for a peaceful, sustainable, cooperative space exploration. Advancing our lunar program, the rewards extend beyond beating china. It is an economic engine here at home.
▶ 0:35:58Mr. Cutler: For every dollar invested in artemis, three dollars flow back into our economy, supporting advanced manufacturing, creating high-quality jobs and driving innovation that benefits americans in their daily lives. Supporting artemis to be china creates stronger communities and stronger industrial base and a stronger america. This race is not just about the moon. It's about economic growth, global competitiveness, and national security.
▶ 0:36:24Mr. Cutler: Commerce can strengthen our national securities with the reauthorization bill to reaffirm our commitment to the current plan and make improvements where necessary. It should continue the direction for lunar exploration found in the president space policy directive one which calls for the united states to lead the return of humans to the moon for long-term exploration and organization, followed by human missions to mars.
▶ 0:36:44Mr. Cutler: The multiyear authorization bill with these elements will provide the long-term certainty needed to keep nasa focused and our workforce, partners, and allies aligned. Great strides are being made from lessons learned after the artemis ii on mission and greater missions and cost reductions could be realized by cutting the national requirements that are not critical, requiring a plan for a phased approach, commercial services for future artemis missions to further drive down costs, and ensuring that decision-making at nasa centers
▶ 0:37:15Mr. Cutler: And industry sites is available when the work is happening, increasing efficiency. These steps make artemis more agile, sustainable, while keeping the united states on track. The passing of the bill alone will not be sufficient. Congress must hold nasa accountable for implementing the laws that congress enacts. Mr. chairman, members of the committee, the progress that we have made is invaluable. The investments to support it are paying off. The industrial base is ready and capable.
▶ 0:37:42Mr. Cutler: If we lose momentum now, the progress will not be easily regained. When successful, artemis will deliver historic achievements and secure america's leadership for generations. With your continued support, artemis will secure a place on the moon before china, strengthen our economy here at home, and keep america strong. Thank you for your time, your attention, and for your commitment to artemis, nasa, and america's leadership in space.
▶ 0:38:08Chair Cruz: Thank you. Mr. gold, you are recognized.
▶ 0:38:14Mr. Gold: Thank you, chairman cruz, ranking member cantwell, members of the committee, I'm thankful to you and your intrepid staff or the ability to testify but even more grateful for the work that this committee has done to support american leadership in space via the one big, beautiful bill act. I would be remiss if I did not think it senator cruz in particular for your leadership.
▶ 0:38:35Mr. Gold: Senator cruz and I both share a strong affinity for star trek and the highest compliment that I can pay the chairman is that he is the captain kirk of the senate. Thank you, senator.
▶ 0:38:46Chair Cruz: Your time is extended to 10 minutes. [laughter] >> I think that that could be a new nickname in the senate.
▶ 0:38:58Chair Cruz: Well said, Mr. spock.
▶ 0:39:01Mr. Gold: Well, with your leadership we will live long and prosper. Senator cruz, senator cantwell, all of you have chosen to stand up and fight for this nation's future in space. Specifically for the direction of the one big, beautiful bill nasa must complete and launch the lunar gateway.
▶ 0:39:20Mr. Gold: Last month along with nasa officials and representatives from all of our international partners, I watched the successful deployment test of redwire's massive roll up solar rays for the gateway's power and propulsion element. These rays, some of the largest ever deployed by humanity in space, will power the gateway, representing the pinnacle of solar electric propulsion technology, key capability for both future civil space exploration and national security activities.
▶ 0:39:49Mr. Gold: Without the funding and a direction of the one big, beautiful bill this critical work would be in jeopardy, and I'm sure china would like nothing more than for the U.S. to abandon its lead in solar electric propulsion and lose the benefits of gateway in orbit and on the lunar surface. With gateway and full commercial logistic services, the artemis program can support lunar surface operations for 60-90 days.
▶ 0:40:14Mr. Gold: Enabling robust activities, transforming the dream of lunar resource extraction and utilization into reality. Without gateway, lunar surface activities would be limited to five-seven days, dramatically curtailing the very nature of nasa operations. Additionally, not a military facility. The presence of gateway in cis lunar space will provide a platform that will inherently allow america and his partners to monitor chinese activities.
▶ 0:40:41Mr. Gold: A permanent spacecraft orbiting the moon will project american influence and power forward, discouraging illicit chinese operations that may otherwise occur in the shadows. Moreover, gateway is critical for projecting american power, not only in space but here on earth. Over 60% of the gately's costs are being born but our -- by our international partners representing billions that have already been spent yielding hardware.
▶ 0:41:09Mr. Gold: Turning away from gateway now would squander this unprecedented global investment in artemis and force our international allies to seek partnerships with america's geopolitical rivals. Conversely, if nasa reaffirms its commitment to gateway, we can unlock billions of dollars of additional international investments, creating even more robust capabilities for artemis, along with a windfall for the american taxpayer.
▶ 0:41:36Mr. Gold: The combined gateway modules can be completed and launched in 2027, two years from now. We can achieve an early win in this competition if america can simply demonstrate the wherewithal not to give up on the race when we are so close to the finish line. Additionally, the success of our lunar and martian exploration efforts depend upon maintaining a strong foundation in low-earth orbit.
▶ 0:42:02Mr. Gold: The technologies, experience, partnerships that occur in leo drives the capabilities of our entire space enterprise. For example, at redwire, using our bio fabrication facility on the international space station, we have printed the first ever human meniscus in space. Who doesn't need a meniscus? Wheat followed this up with printing live cardiovascular tissue and bringing it back still alive.
▶ 0:42:31Mr. Gold: Eventually, we can print whole organs in space, and that would save countless lives. We are also at redwire making more progress in drug development with our pillbox system that has now flown 30 two times on the international space station. We have demonstrated how larger, more uniform seed crystals can be grown in space, leading to the development of enhanced pharmaceuticals with better efficacy come along to committee -- efficacy, longevity, and less side effects.
▶ 0:43:01Mr. Gold: There is no doubt antigravity manufacturing will transform the pharmaceutical and biotech fields. The only question is, will those benefits be enjoyed in china or here in the united states? Without the funding of the one big, beautiful bill act, an explicit action by nasa within the next few months, we run the risk of reducing the number of american astronauts on the iss from four to three and down to two.
▶ 0:43:29Mr. Gold: If this committee's directives are not followed, for the first time in history there will be more chinese astronauts in space than americans. This should be unacceptable. Unacceptable to congress, unacceptable to nasa, and unacceptable to this nation. Again, I am grateful to this committee for the support of artemis, the iss, and nasa science.
▶ 0:43:50Mr. Gold: Together, we must speak out with one unified voice that we will not cede leo, our international partnerships, and the moon to the tender mercies of the chinese. I urge us, all of us here today, and listening online, to fight, fight for the iss, fight for artemis, and fight for america's future.
▶ 0:44:15Chair Cruz: Thank you, Mr. gold. Mr. bridenstine.
▶ 0:44:22Hon. Bridenstine: It is an honor to be here. After hearing mike gold's testimony, I want to comment on a few things. Everything he said about medicine and microgravity is correct. We are seeing transformational capability in pharmaceuticals because atoms and molecules organized differently in microgravity than on earth.
▶ 0:44:47Hon. Bridenstine: There are drugs that we are demonstrating on the international space station that we can create that can do things like -- we had a drug for lung cancer, and we were able to make that drug so that instead of trying to find out if within two to three months it will be efficacious, you can find out within two to three weeks whether or not it will be efficacious. Instead of administering it with an infusion, which takes time and is painful and costly, we can do it with a pill.
▶ 0:45:18Hon. Bridenstine: That is just one drug that is improved. We are talking about drugs to treat diseases that have never been treatable before. To piggyback on what mike gold just said, we are either going to have that capability and united states because we have a permanent human presence in space with a fully mission-capable space station, or we are going to cede that to china. That is just on the pharmaceutical side.
▶ 0:45:55Hon. Bridenstine: Regenerative medicine, we are 3d printing tissue. Mike mentioned the meniscus. We are growing in 3d tissue-like cardiovascular tissue and vain tissue and other things -- vein tissue and other things come critical to the economy of the united states of america. If we don't want to have a fully mission capable system, if we want to not have a permanent human presence in space, not only does that capability go to china but all of our international partners go to china as well, because they want that capability. This is a big deal. That is on the low-earth orbit side of things.
▶ 0:46:26Hon. Bridenstine: Senator cruz, I know that you're getting a lot of accolades today, but it's true. The one big, beautiful bill with the $10 billion for nasa human spaceflight was, in large part, you're doing. I know it was bipartisan. I know the one big beautiful bill may not have been bipartisan, but that element was in fact bipartisan and I know senators on both side or grateful. I would say the purpose of this hearing is, are we going to get to the moon first?
▶ 0:46:56Hon. Bridenstine: That is the title of the hearing. I will tell you, and I know there will be questions, and I will go into more depth later, but look at the architecture we have developed to land american astronauts on the moon. Look at the architecture. It is extraordinarily complex. In some cases, you know, it hinges on us -- me is saying here today that it is highly unlikely that we will land on the moon before china.
▶ 0:47:26Hon. Bridenstine: I will explain it in the next two minutes. Number one, we have the sls rocket, the most powerful rocket ever built. Senator cruz mentioned, yes, it has had his problems in the past. Expensive, overruns, all those things, but is behind us, it's done, we need to use it. We have the orion crew capsule which is a shiny object in this whole thing.
▶ 0:47:52Hon. Bridenstine: The orion crew capsule is not only usable today, but ultimately the cost is going down because more and more of it is reusable every time that we use the orion crew capsule. Those two elements are in good shape. I will tell you, I have been critical of both in the past. In front of this committee and in other places. I'm more than happy to be critical of all of our contractors, to be clear. But I will say what we don't have today, here is what we don't have, we don't have a lending system for the moon.
▶ 0:48:22Hon. Bridenstine: There was a moment -- a landing system for the moon. There was a time when we didn't have a nasa administrator. It was before senator nelson became the nasa administrator. Architecture was selected. I don't know how this happens but the biggest decision in the history of nasa since I have been paying attention, the biggest decision happened in the absence of a nasa administrator. That decision was, instead of buying a moon lander, we will buy a big rocket.
▶ 0:48:52Hon. Bridenstine: To be clear, we need this rocket to be successful, it is important for the country and is transformational, but in the meantime the architecture is as such. We need to launch starship. The first starship is a fueling depot in orbit around the earth. Then we need to launch -- nobody really knows. Nobody knows, but it could be up to dozens of additional starships to refuel the first starship.
▶ 0:49:16Hon. Bridenstine: Imagine launching starship over and over and over and over and over and over and over dozens of times with no delays, no explosions to refuel the first starship. Once it is fully refueled that starship has to fuel another starship that is, in fact, human rated. That process hasn't even started yet. The hole in space refueling thing has never been tested either.
▶ 0:49:42Hon. Bridenstine: We are talking about cryogenic liquid oxygen, cryogenic liquid methane being transferred in space. Never been done before. We are going to do it dozens of times. Then we are going to have a human rated starship that goes to the moon. We don't know how long it can be there because it is boiling off the entire time that it's in orbit around the moon. While it is there we have to launch the sls, the orion, the service module, the astronauts come the crew already to go.
▶ 0:50:14Hon. Bridenstine: They have to orbit the moon themselves in that window when starship is around the moon. Then they have to dock around the moon. They have to transfer from the orion into the starship. It has to go down and land. When it is on the surface of the moon, orion is gone for the next seven days until he comes back around in a low orbit. Our astronauts are now planning to be on the surface of the moon -- in a halo orbit. Our astronauts are plenty be on the moon for seven days.
▶ 0:50:42Hon. Bridenstine: This is not something that any nasa administrator I am aware of would have selected if they had a choice but it was made in the absence of a nasa administrator in the last administration. It is a problem, needs to be solved, that puts us as a nation at risk of not being the first on the moon. I should say the first next on the moon, because we did land in 1969 and 1970 two. Chairman cruz, I've heard that you said that we need to put it into law that the wrath of khan is in fact of the greatest star trek movie in history, and we are in agreement.
▶ 0:51:12Hon. Bridenstine: With that I yield back the time that I took from the general.
▶ 0:51:17Lt. Gen. Shaw: I think the administrator. -- chair cruz: I think the administrator. I'm not sure that we need to codify the wrath of khan even more than we need to codify the sky is blue. Some things are indisputable, and that is one of them.
▶ 0:51:33Lt. Gen. Shaw: Chairman cruz, or should I say captain cruz. I'm grateful to share the table with some amazing people here today and I look forward to our session and what they have to say today. It was the honor and time of my life to serve our great nation and lead our phenomenal war fighters for 33 years in uniform in our united states air force and united states space force.
▶ 0:51:56Lt. Gen. Shaw: Throughout my military service I had the privilege to work with nasa, noaa, and other civil organizations. I'm grateful to have the opportunity the last two years since my departure from uniformed service to work with the commercial side of our nation's space business. It has given me a fresh and broader perspective on how to both envision and realize our nation future in space in totality and how to bring to bear our combined national strengths to best thwart china in the years to come in this crucial arena.
▶ 0:52:25Lt. Gen. Shaw: My bottom line come up front for the committee, is that I am an advocate for and the champion of a unified grand space strategy for our nation, for the earth-moon system, and beyond. Yet, such a grand strategy, which would unify and synergize our national efforts across civil, commercial, national activities in pursuit of common goals, opportunities, and capabilities does not currently exist.
▶ 0:52:51Lt. Gen. Shaw: I believe that our mission to return americans to the moon can be a powerful and central driver, as well as a beneficiary of such a strategy. During my military career, I watched and studied, as any good soldier would of a potential adversary, china slowly but surely developing and deploying its own civilian and military space capabilities and to set its own agenda for space achievements.
▶ 0:53:15Lt. Gen. Shaw: It is clear to me that the chinese communist party is already employing its own integrated grand strategy for the earth-moon system, with only superficial distinction between civil, commercial, and national secured activities and all focused on a common purpose. And, as the senator has already made my next point, I think that if we don't unify and synchronize efforts, we may find ourselves rather than in a leadership position, in a position of increasing disadvantage and we get -- as we get further into this century.
▶ 0:53:47Lt. Gen. Shaw: Human progression in any domain both has and will involve a robust mixture of exploration, economic opportunities, and growth, and security opportunities to set conditions for success. Space is no different. By the way, I realize that I'm probably representing those three things. Exploration, commercial, economic growth, national security. I represent national security here, but I'm excited about all three. That is how we will succeed as a nation.
▶ 0:54:18Lt. Gen. Shaw: An example for the grand space strategy, example objective, would be to set the standards for the establishment of a logistics infrastructure, one that would enable increased capabilities and performance for space activities well-timed -- all kinds of other european system. Such infrastructure would include on orbit manufacturing, assembly, refueling, replenishment, other service. We already know that we will need such an infrastructure to sustain human presence on the moon.
▶ 0:54:47Lt. Gen. Shaw: Solely from just the exploration approach. But such an infrastructure could also and will benefit dynamic space operations for national security platforms as well as for commercial endeavors. Our national approach to space logistics to date has appeared disjointed and inconsistent to those in the commercial community. I hope that my opinion was addressed to see their perspective, seen as inconsistent to those who may want to invest in those capabilities.
▶ 0:55:15Lt. Gen. Shaw: The chinese are already matching and perhaps outpacing us in the logistics pursuit. A recent example, just in the last few weeks, this summer, as observed by open sources, we have seen china perform a docking and apparent refueling operation between the sj21 and sj25 platforms in orbit.
▶ 0:55:37Lt. Gen. Shaw: The dock to spacecraft together, last month, performed the largest single maneuver in geosynchronous orbit ever conducted in excess of 330 meters per second. That is a lot like today's standard. Some day that will be a pittance, but today that is a lot. Other examples where I believe that we can move faster and more effectively under unified strategy include lunar space domain awareness and lunar communications architecture, both again necessary for sustain human presence on the moon.
▶ 0:56:08Lt. Gen. Shaw: I'm also supportive of swiftly developing nuclear fusion power solutions in space compelling to sustain operations on the lunar surface but could also better enable national security activities such as in the form of nuclear propulsion and could unlock new commercial opportunities and benefits. I will point out that china is developing or has already fielded capabilities in each of these example areas. Learn the domain awareness, lunar communications, and space nuclear power.
▶ 0:56:35Lt. Gen. Shaw: The challeng -- the challenges are great -- as were china's ambitions and continue the united states leadership and the ultimate high ground appeared in the words of a different star trek captain, let's engage and make it so. I look forward to your questions.
▶ 0:56:55Chair Cruz: Thank you to each of you. Mr. bridenstine, let's start with china, topic that you addressed at some considerable length. China is on an aggressive timeline to put astronauts on the lunar surface by 2030. They appear on track to do so. They are also currently operating a space station right now in low-earth orbit. Mr. bridenstine, china is racing to control the moon in low-earth orbit and they are not shy about using space to expand their power on earth.
▶ 0:57:26Chair Cruz: If america doesn't beat them, if we cede the lunar surface or continuous presence in orbit to beijing, what does that mean for our national security, our economy, and america's leadership?
▶ 0:57:39Hon. Bridenstine: A very important question. So, here is how I view things. I think that the general will appreciate this from my time as a lieutenant in the navy. We did joint professional military education and we learned at the dying theory of national power. In each of those elements you have an acronym.
▶ 0:58:04Hon. Bridenstine: When I was at the helm of nasa, my goal was to always think about what we are doing in those elements. How does this advanced diplomatic power, information power, military power, economic power. On the diplomatic side, you mentioned in the international space station and the next generation commercial space stations.
▶ 0:58:24Hon. Bridenstine: On the diplomatic side, we have, like, 50 different countries that are operating international space station's today, astronauts from I think 21 different countries at this point. We have agreements with over, actively, 600 or 700 agreements now internationally as it relates to missions. Nasa is a key element of diplomatic power for this country. I will tell you, I don't think it's often used correctly.
▶ 0:58:51Hon. Bridenstine: We can put it on the table for a whole host of, kind of, carrot and stick activities to benefit the united states of america and america first policy. That is the way I thought about it when I was the nasa administrator.
▶ 0:59:04Hon. Bridenstine: On the information power and side of things, one of the big things, first eye-opening experiences at nasa, when we landed insight on mars, a lander that was going to land on mars and help us understand mars quakes, how is it organized inside, when we landed insight on mars it was on the cover of every newspaper worldwide. That's amazing information power.
▶ 0:59:30Hon. Bridenstine: Including one newspaper was the -- it was the hardline newspaper of the islamic revolutionary in iran. I'm not saying that we want to win their press, but at the end of the day it was a story about how we landed on mars.
▶ 0:59:46Chair Cruz: There sunday comics are excellent.
▶ 0:59:49Hon. Bridenstine: It was a story about how we landed on mars. It was a story about how we did it, when we did it, what we were doing, and the list at the end was all of our international partners that participated with us in that. This is a newspaper in iran where they don't get good information about the united states of america. When we land on mars it changes things. It changes the perception of young people towards this country that we love. I think that's an important information power.
▶ 1:00:19Hon. Bridenstine: Of course, everyone likes to talk about apollo 11 when we landed on the moon and the whole world watched. That is information power that we reference even today. If we can land on the moon, why can't we do these things? That kind of thing. On the military side, nasa is not strong. We don't play military. We don't report the secretary of defense a lot of our technologies and capabilities have dual use capabilities.
▶ 1:00:44Hon. Bridenstine: One thing that concerns me greatly right now is the devastating consequences happening to the jet propulsion laboratory in california. Jpl. There are the ones who build all of the mars lenders. They are the ones who landed on mars nine times in history. A lot of that technology, make no mistake, has military application. And we are at risk of losing a lot of that. I think that's important to note. Finally, that is the military side. But it's not where nasa plays.
▶ 1:01:16Hon. Bridenstine: Nasa plays in exploration, science, discovery. The e, going back to the opening statements, that e's economic power. When it comes to pharmaceuticals, regenerative medicines, advanced materials, the article came out that china is using their space station to create new, advanced materials for hypersonic's. Materials that, my understanding is, we don't have now, although maybe someone know something I don't.
▶ 1:01:41Hon. Bridenstine: At the end of the day we have to use microgravity, where we know the atoms and molecules organized differently. We have to use it to our advantage and advanced materials. China is doing that. We are not doing it the way we should and we are at risk of losing it. All of those elements I think are important when we think about the great power competition with china. We need to think about nasa being used for diplomatic power, information power, military power, economic power.
▶ 1:02:09Chair Cruz: Gateway will be america's I in the sky. Extending our lunar surface program allowing longer missions, heavy equipment delivery, and protection of U.S. assets while paving the way for advanced infrastructure like interim administrator duffy's goal of a lunar nuclear reactor by 2030.
▶ 1:02:28Chair Cruz: Meanwhile, china has made it clear that it intends to build its own cyst lunar station as a platform to dominate the moon -- cislunar station as a platform to dominate the moon. Why is it critical that the united states lead with gateway before china builds its own cislunar station and uses it to control the moon?
▶ 1:02:57Chair Cruz: I got a briefing and I did not sleep for a week. You hear that democracy dies in darkness. Our freedom could die in the depths of space if we are not able to monitor and understand what is happening with space situational awareness around the moon. Relative to nuclear on the moon, you mentioned helium 3, it is not just about the moon, its earth. The countries and companies that control the moon will control the earth. It is just a matter of time.
▶ 1:03:29Chair Cruz: Rare earth elements, helium 3, we need to be able to extract these resources, we need to be able to live off the land. I am a native of the great state of montana, a lot of camping and fishing back in the day. I can't imagine going on those camping trips if I had to bring all of my air, my water, my food, my oxygen. You can't have the sustainable robust presence or support economic activities if you cannot live off the land. We cannot do that without nuclear.
▶ 1:03:58Chair Cruz: I cannot praise secretary duffy enough for acknowledging that this is not just about going back to the moon. This is about going back to the moon, harnessing its resources for the earth, and establishing infrastructure and a permanent presence. The secretary gets that. I applaud him for moving forward with nuclear. Our friend is now the associate administrator of nasa.
▶ 1:04:25Chair Cruz: Again, I very much appreciate secretary duffy's decisive actions, his decisive leadership in elevating the head of the moon-mars program to associate administrator. The highest civil servant post at nasa. That sends a message not only to nasa but our international partners, even china, that we are back. We are reigniting the torch of artemis and will go forward to the moon. The national civil servants needed to hear that. I'm very grateful to secretary duffy for making that point.
▶ 1:04:54Chair Cruz: At redwire, we are developing a system that will use microwaves to center regulate, to create landing pads, burns, roads, we need to be able to build that infrastructure. More than anything, we need to be able to rebuild our credibility here on earth. When I was negotiating the gateway agreements with european space agency, they learned one thing about popular culture, maybe from the comics in the tehran times. Lucy and the football.
▶ 1:05:25Chair Cruz: Why should we sign up with you? The trump administration will be gone in the year and a half and we will look foolish for making that investment. I said, don't listen to me. They are justifiably skeptical. Nasa failed to sustain since apollo. Failure has not just been an option, it has been a certainty. So, how did I convince the europeans? Senator cantwell, I had your help.
▶ 1:05:47Chair Cruz: I told them, don't listen to me, listen to senator cantwell, senator nelson, listen to the bipartisan coalition that jim bridenstine created. If we lose then they will carry forward. If we cannot show that we can be a good partner, that we can be a reliable partner, all of the benefits that we talked about diplomatically, economically will go to others. We are talking a lot about star trek.
▶ 1:06:16Chair Cruz: The reason I love star trek, not just the adventure, the stories, but because it said we are not going to have just better technology but a better future in space. We launched not just our astronauts and hardware, we launched our values. If we cannot move forward with gateway, if we cannot move forward with artemis, we will lose that feature to the chinese.
▶ 1:06:35Chair Cruz: Thank you both for your testimony. I was disappointed with both of you that both of you guys left matt damon on the surface of mars. But other than that you both did an excellent job. Ranking member cantwell.
▶ 1:06:48Sen. Cantwell: Thank you all for illuminating why we need a grand strategy. It equates to the notion that the time is here to think bigger about the implementation of all of the things. It reminds me sitting here how a colleague once said to me, you know your state should be called jefferson. My state should be called jefferson? He said, yes.
▶ 1:07:15Sen. Cantwell: It was president jefferson who basically made the big decision to send the lewis and clark at a critical moment in our country's history to go all the way across the united states, tried to find if there is a faster path, and lay claim to the pacific northwest. Other people were already there obviously by ship. The president, jefferson, saw the importance of america's expansion all the way to the pacific coast.
▶ 1:07:41Sen. Cantwell: Anyway, we are still proud that we are called washington, but it brings up this point about the predicate of getting there first. I don't know if this is you, Mr. gold or lieutenant general shaw, but there are areas, particularly the south pole, the moon, that are critically, strategically important.
▶ 1:08:07Sen. Cantwell: Getting there in a timely fashion to claim those resources, claim that space seems to be just as critical as jefferson's decision to get all the way to the pacific. I don't know if one of you want to comment on that.
▶ 1:08:20Mr. Gold: I would say even more critical than jefferson's decision because this affects the whole world. You're right. The moon is a large place. With a number of locations that have the combination of water ice, sunlight, and other aspects that we need that are actually relatively limited. We could lose those to the chinese if we don't move quickly. Additionally, the countries that get their first will write the rules of the road.
▶ 1:08:48Mr. Gold: What we can do on the moon, how we act. We have had tremendous success with the artemis accords. 56 countries have signed. The chinese only have 13 for the international lunar space research program. If we are not first, trust me those numbers will change. The fear, china will eventually outspend us in space. It's inevitable. We must out entrepreneur them. That's why I'm so grateful for one of your constituents, blue origin.
▶ 1:09:18Mr. Gold: The reason I think this doesn't get enough clay, they have spent billions -- billions of their own money to support the hls system. They will launch one a spacecraft to the moon paid for on their own dollar.
▶ 1:09:31Sen. Cantwell: I'm assuming everyone is for the redundancy of the lunar system. >> we are grateful for your leadership to make that happen.
▶ 1:09:41Mr. Gold: Which we desperately need, because you have to have efficiency, you need that for competition, you need that for safety. If we don't get out there and get their first couple we will lose real estate, we will lose the rules -- don't get out there first, we will lose real estate, we will lose the rules, and that could be a new clean power revolution that we will let the chinese communist party have.
▶ 1:10:07Sen. Cantwell: We have some companies already working on this in the northwest. We are very proud of that. Lieutenant general shaw, this notion, I get up this morning and I see the headlines from china and everyone is there together. Including prime minister modi, kim jong-un, although we don't have all of the photos. You can see that somebody could start focusing on new alliances.
▶ 1:10:30Sen. Cantwell: What is it about the grand strategy that is so critical for us to implement from a military perspective? How can you describe it in the context of using the first mover advantage that would be so critical to the alliances and partnerships that would help us?
▶ 1:10:47Lt. Gen. Shaw: Senator, I think of some of the other panelists have said, the earth-moon system are not just for exploration alone, anymore than the lewis and clark expedition's were just, I wonder what is out there? No, they were about understanding the environment, to scope it for economic growth, and security issues along the way. Clark was a lieutenant in the U.S. army.
▶ 1:11:14Lt. Gen. Shaw: There to understand our borders and frontiers. We need to approach the moon in the same way. It is all of the pieces that Mr. bridenstine mentioned. The examples where I don't think -- where we could do this better as a nation would be cislunar domain awareness.
▶ 1:11:42Lt. Gen. Shaw: There are going to be needs for that just for human presence in and around the moon to understand that domain. What debris might be in lunar orbit. It's a different regime then low-earth orbit that we are used too, but there is a possibility there will be things in orbit. We want to understand what is there. It is easy to hide things way out there. We want to understand that.
▶ 1:12:05Lt. Gen. Shaw: So, not only protecting humans and human exploration, but there is a national security need to understand that environment as part of the full earth-moon system. To my knowledge, the government is not really focusing that much on that. If there is a national need to do it, why not have the department of defense perhaps be part of that solution and develop the capabilities that it will ultimately need anyway? That is the idea of where we could probably do things in a more coordinated and synergistic fashion.
▶ 1:12:34Sen. Cantwell: I'm definitely concerned about our communication capability writ large and I think defense is moving into space and a satellite, the effects of communication, and then I worry if someone is going to be on that frontier of the latest of technology communication, in a cislunar environment, that has to be us. We have to understand what the ramifications are of that system. Is that not correct?
▶ 1:12:59Lt. Gen. Shaw: That is absolutely correct. I would like to point out that china sent seven payloads to the moon last year. Six of them were communications-focused. They were not scientific experiments, they were communications focused. The building blocks of the communications architecture. They are demonstrating the fact that they are trying to build that if a structure that I talked about before.
▶ 1:13:20Sen. Cantwell: Do you have any idea what that infrastructure could do? Would that be a military concern?
▶ 1:13:27Lt. Gen. Shaw: The term dual use has already been brought up by the panel. Any capability that could be used for scientific or exploration, or even economic purposes, invariably is going to have some kind of national security use of some kind.
▶ 1:13:43Lt. Gen. Shaw: As an example, in this particular case, if there are chinese national security payloads operating in the earth-moon system, they can use that communication architecture network to have continuous communication rather than relying on strictly test real relays.
▶ 1:13:59Sen. Cantwell: A big advantage there.
▶ 1:14:02Chair Cruz: Senator fischer.
▶ 1:14:06Sen. Fischer: Thank you, chairman. Thank you for your I chair the subcommittee on strategic forces. We had numerous discussions as we have jurisdictional space. I appreciate your comments. You are good storytellers. I would like specific answers. I need to leave for another hearing and there are some things I would like to get through. Mr.
▶ 1:14:34Sen. Fischer: Gold, I'm not picking on you first but should china be the first to establish a permanent presence on the moon they would be serious consequences for americans. You have spoken to that in the past as the administrator. I want to hear examples from you on how the lives of americans would be impacted should china establish control of the moon's resources.
▶ 1:15:06Sen. Fischer: Americans and reach out and touch what would really happen in their lives.
▶ 1:15:09Mr. Gold: The potential wealth of the moon is extraordinary.
▶ 1:15:14Sen. Fischer: You are telling me story.
▶ 1:15:17Mr. Gold: China lands on the moon. The next day we see tremendous benefits to china geopolitically . Our allies turned them not only for space exploration but for national security, free trade agreements. The meeting occurring now between china, india and russia that you are seeing today. If china lands on the first -- on the moon first, that will strengthen those economic ties.
▶ 1:15:46Mr. Gold: China is good at leveraging space. If they get their first, we will see a global realignment that will impact our economy, our tax base, our ability to innovate and our national security in terms of diplomacy and geopolitics that will affect security and many other aspects of our lives.
▶ 1:16:09Sen. Fischer: While at nasa you help lead the artemis accords and establish the framework for the principles to guide civil space exploration. China has their own framework. The internal lunar research station.
▶ 1:16:29Sen. Fischer: Can you speak to the importance of the accords and then speak to the risk that we would see with those principles if they start to erode the risk we have for future deep space exploration since china and would establish that permanent presence on the moon?
▶ 1:16:52Mr. Bridenstine: A couple of things that are important to note. When we established the accords, and this is so important, we went to an event where there were a lot of international players in the space domain. We said we are thinking about creating a moon program. We are going to create a moon program. If you would like to participate, come to a meeting. We had 26 countries show up. They were so enthusiastic about being part of the program that it was overwhelming.
▶ 1:17:22Mr. Bridenstine: When that was over I came back and I called my golden I said we need to figure out a way to use this as a compelling way to get people to behave properly in space. In many ways they don't. I actually got mike gold to run the effort, what he turned the artemis accords. At the end of the day what we have to have his rules. If we are going to go extract resources for the move there have to be rules.
▶ 1:17:52Mr. Bridenstine: Those rules are established in law and precedent when you think about international waters. Just because you extract tuna from the ocean doesn't mean you on the ocean but you get to own the tuna. If you extract energy from the ocean, you don't own the ocean but you on the energy. Those same principle should apply to the moon.
▶ 1:18:13Mr. Bridenstine: If you extract platinum group metals or rare earth metals or in this case where lunar metals, if you extract that and apply your sweat and equity and effort to get those resources, you don't own the moon. The outer space treaty says you cannot appropriate the mood for national sovereignty, however you can on the resources you extract. That's an important principle we as americans need to be leading the world on. That is what the artemis accords were about. That is what I got mike gold to come help.
▶ 1:18:42Sen. Fischer: Administrator, when we look at trying to remain competitive with china in deep space there is going to be an increased demand for commercial launches. Do you assess that demand would outstrip an existing launch capacity? If so, what can be done in order to expand that capacity that we currently have?
▶ 1:19:12Mr. Bridenstine: That is an important question and very challenging. Yes, we are already overcapacity. Our launch facilities are basically stretching and twisting and doing everything they can to put more launch capability into the same amount of space. A couple of things is important to note. I want to be clear. The architecture for the artemis program is strained, to say the least.
▶ 1:19:37Mr. Bridenstine: I would say we need starship to be successful for a host of capabilities. It is true if they do what they are setting out to do that there will be over 100 launches from cape canaveral and kennedy space center per year from starship. In each one of those launches that means they will be testing, there will be landing, a lot of things happening. Each time that will end up shutting down those facilities.
▶ 1:20:07Mr. Bridenstine: It puts us in a position where we could end up with basically one launch provider. If we don't figure how to solve the problem. I believe over time there will be other opportunities to launch from different locations. We are not there right now. I'm talking about launching from oklahoma. We have a spaceport. We would have to drop something on kansas and senator moran does not want us dropping something on kansas.
▶ 1:20:37Mr. Bridenstine: I think it's important we try to find alternative solutions for launch initially on the coast but eventually we will have to come to england launches. -- inland launches.
▶ 1:20:51Sen. Fischer: If you look at the existing structure, yes, we have to be able to look beyond where we are now. Space force determines the launchpad allocations. We have a tie in between these committees, each within their own jurisdictions, specific jurisdiction over different parts of what we are discussing today. Thank you.
▶ 1:21:25Sen. Kim: Mr. bridenstine, there's been a lot of conversation about the different national security implications and I agree with that. It's important we keep our foot on the gas.
▶ 1:21:42Sen. Kim: As I'm trying to explain to the people in new jersey with the benefit we get out of the space program, especially from a commercial aspect in terms of just implications to people's daily lives, our economy, how do we go about doing this? What is the best argument you have come across? You raised potential expiration benefits of microgravity, biotech. I will do for you to expound on that and try to help us hit home to the american people the influence of this.
▶ 1:22:12Mr. Bridenstine: I would summarize it with a lot of ways to talk about it but the way we communicate. A lot of us use internet broadband from space. People who are familiar with directv, dish network. The way we communicate now is highly dependent on space. Even our terrestrial wireless networks, cell phones are dependent on the timing signal that comes from gps. Even our wireless networks are dependent on space.
▶ 1:22:41Mr. Bridenstine: The way we communicate, the way we navigate, gps is critically important. The way we produce food. We are increasing crop yields and reducing water usage. The way we produce energy cleanly. The way we predict the weather. The way we understand climate. There's a lot of partisanship around the climate issue but we have to know what's happening. There are ways we can use our space assets to understand how the climate is affected what we do on earth.
▶ 1:23:09Sen. Kim: One thing I saw nasa do that I was not aware of was how much the applications are for agriculture, especially when it comes to what you were saying about climate and understanding the crops and storm systems, etc. I took a code l trip to south korea and japan -- codel trip to south korea and japan and thinking about our space cooperation, the role it plays with other countries.
▶ 1:23:40Sen. Kim: I would like to open it up. What you see in terms of south korea and japan, places where we can build upon when it comes to accelerating artemis, building a counterweight to china's space partnership with russia. There is no doubt we saw those images with modi standing next to these leaders.
▶ 1:24:02Sen. Kim: How can nasa work with india to build on the partnership to advance shared space science and expiration goals and think about how it is we can try to anchor that relationship?
▶ 1:24:13Mr. Bridenstine: Wonderful question. When it comes to south korea and japan, japan specifically has been a long partner with the united states on space exploration from the international space station, they have modules, experiments. They have rockets that resupply the international space station. They are among our best partners on the international space station. They are one of the early adopters of the artemis accords.
▶ 1:24:41Mr. Bridenstine: I think they were in the first eight.
▶ 1:24:48Mr. Gold: The reason the english is so good in the accords is because of the corrections the japanese made. They know english better than we do. I don't know what that says about us.
▶ 1:25:01Mr. Bridenstine: All those are important international partnerships. On the south korean side, they sign up to the artemis accords. They want to do more in space and they have the capability to do that. Since they cited the accords we want to bring them into the fold and have them participate in the missions. >> in regard to the accords, what is wonderful to see is it created an ecosystem. A family of nations.
▶ 1:25:30Mr. Bridenstine: Back at nasa during the launch by united arab emirates, that was a spacecraft built by uae that was powered by a partnership that began between the uae and korea. The uae did not have the technical capability and the koreans help them build this and they brought it to nasa and it was launched on the japanese spacecraft with american assistance from colorado.
▶ 1:25:53Mr. Bridenstine: During the launch we heard japanese, arabic, english, and even korean for technical conversations. That is the future we want. When it comes to national security, that is the coalition that will keep us safe in china if we can continue with the artemis program.
▶ 1:26:14Sen. Kim: I'm almost at a time so I will say I have worked in diplomacy to four and did a lot in terms of bilateral, multilateral relationships. I have never seen another issue that can really solidify some of these relationships and stay out of the day-to-day politics and some of the geostrategic conversations and just be able to have that kind of pure expert sites is science kind of partnerships. There's a lot to build from and I'm excited about the energy I see on this committee.
▶ 1:26:44Sen. Kim: Thank you for your testimony today and I will yield back. >> on behalf of senator campos, she has an article from air and space forces magazine she would like to have submitted to the record. Without objection, so ordered. Gentlemen, thank you so much for your presence here today. All of you have served your country. Mr. gold and Mr. bridenstine, lieutenant general. Mr.
▶ 1:27:10Sen. Kim: Cutler, you served the senate on the staff and I think you for the knowledge you bring to us today. I will start with the appropriations process. Mr. gold and Mr. bridenstine and others would care to comment. I'm worried once again we will end up in a continuing resolution.
▶ 1:27:34Sen. Kim: I'm worried commerce, justice and science has stalled and I would welcome your efforts in the work that you do to make certain that is not the case encouraging support from all of my colleagues. I would like to have you tell me what you see occurring, good or bad, from the passage of the commerce, justice, science bill as it relates to the funding of nasa.
▶ 1:28:02Mr. Bridenstine: First of all it's important to the extent we have a cr, it is better than a shutdown. I think we all understand that. A cr. It is stunning that people are now advocating for cr's. We need to be advocating for appropriations. Ultimately, technology is changing.
▶ 1:28:27Mr. Bridenstine: Capabilities are changing and we need to change programs commensurate with the times and not just fund things the way they used to be. Then we buy obsolete things and not the right things. We need to do appropriations. I worry that when we think about how we get the nest how we get the n nasa funding, the reconciliation bill when a long way to supporting human spaceflight but there are other parts of nasa that are critically important.
▶ 1:28:57Mr. Bridenstine: I would say the science mission directorate largely is not partisan. It is not political. There's a lot of by particle -- bipartisan consensus around it. The gentleman behind me, bill nye, he does not like my politics. I will also tell you that he and I agree strongly we need planetary defense. We need the ability to look out into space and see large objects that could really hit earth and do damage.
▶ 1:29:28Mr. Bridenstine: Not only that, we need to be able to intercept those if necessary. That is what our space program is capable of doing. It is an element of the science mission directorate inside nasa. It needs to be funded. All this capability largely comes from our ability to do planetary science. When we go to mars, land on mars, we go to every planet in the solar system, these are unique capabilities that only this nation can and has done. Every planet in the solar system.
▶ 1:29:59Mr. Bridenstine: And be on that we have missions to the sun for helio physics. We have astrophysics. I got beat up in this committee a lot over the james webb space telescope. Probably because of this guy down here on the end, Mr. comfort. I will -- Mr. cutler. I will tell you that now that it's in space everybody knows it sets america apart from the rest of the world by 50 years when it comes to physics. That is the impact.
▶ 1:30:29Mr. Bridenstine: 50 years when it comes to physics. Why do we need to look at the stars anyway? There's a great story I like to tell about einstein and his understanding of time space continuum, which ultimately is critical for how we use gps today. Basic science resulted in us understanding time and space in a way we otherwise we wouldn't and enables gps to function. That is the type of science we get from nasa and that is the type of capability. James webb.
▶ 1:31:00Mr. Bridenstine: We will learn about dark matter, which I hate to even use that term because nobody really understands or knows what it is, but dark energy and all these different capabilities. We are learning things that have never been discovered before. It sets us apart.
▶ 1:31:16Sen. Moran: Thank you. The webb came close to being terminated for lack of progress. The decision was made to continue.
▶ 1:31:26Mr. Bridenstine: Thank you.
▶ 1:31:28Sen. Moran: It seems well worth the difficulties we went through. I have not said this publicly but I tend to vote against a cr, which would mean a shutdown. I have said this in previous years. It is easier -- as long as it is easier to do a cr than appropriation bills, we are not going to do them. It is a mistake for this congress to get in the habit of continuing resolutions.
▶ 1:31:57Sen. Moran: Unless there is a consequence, we are going to do them every year. My hope is I will have colleagues who will join me in an effort to make sure the appropriations process does not end it early time -- and it's time early -- end it's time early in this 2025 session. Before I turn it over to Mr.
▶ 1:32:26Sen. Moran: Lujan, a couple of my questions have not been answered. You talked so long, Mr. bridenstine, that we have run out of time.
▶ 1:32:39Mr. Bridenstine: It happens. Sorry.
▶ 1:32:42Sen. Moran: I'm surprised you never served in the senate. General shaw, p speak to the necessity of establishing a grand strategy which the chinese have already adele wished to unify and energize efforts across civil, commercial and national security and we risk losing our domination of space without one. What are the pillars of a successful strategy capable of beating the chinese in space?
▶ 1:33:11Sen. Moran: It's also important we concentrate time and energy and effort in knowing what follows once we get back to the moon and our long-term goals, what they should be. How does the strategy deal with getting us back to the moon and also the long-term strategy and what happens next?
▶ 1:33:34Lt. Gen. Shaw: In the formulation of a strategy, the overarching objectives extend beyond us returning to the moon. What do we want to accomplish in this century in this system and beyond for the benefit of the nation? Those are not solely exploration objectives.
▶ 1:33:53Lt. Gen. Shaw: There are about economic growth and about the appropriate security framework to ensure we can set the conditions for that economic success against all the forces the panel has talked about and against the challenge -- additional challenges we face in china gets there first and starts to establish the ground rules almost literally on the surface of the moon.
▶ 1:34:16Lt. Gen. Shaw: I say if we think of it, that strategy has to be something that now establishes an architecture and framework that lasts to the end of the century and beyond. That has to involve all the elements of national power and all those key pieces I mentioned in progress. Exploration, economic growth, security measures. We don't really do that today with regard to space.
▶ 1:34:45Lt. Gen. Shaw: We do it sometimes by accident but is never by design. I would love to see us approach that from a national perspective by design. As you lay out the objectives and you know identify the ways and means to achieve those objectives, but signing those to the appropriate part of our nation, not necessarily our government. We rely on industry or commercial to help with some of those, for the scientific community. I lay out the framework.
▶ 1:35:16Lt. Gen. Shaw: Something that doesn't really exist today but could help us. The chinese have that. They have exactly that kind of framework and that is enabling them to continue to meet their milestones and goals they have put out. They were amazingly consistent. They predict what they are going to do, say what they're going to do and do what they say they are going to do. We should use that to our advantage, to understand how that is going to play out. I hope I have answered your question.
▶ 1:35:46Lt. Gen. Shaw: That is how I would approach a strategy in looking at the long-term and we can bring all the nation to bear.
▶ 1:35:51Sen. Moran: I appreciate your answer. I have run out of time. In the meantime, while we develop the strategy we should already have implemented and follow it, I worry about what happens to our supply chains with such uncertainty in today's world, the current problems. That supply chain across the country is the way we do get back to the moon and continue our efforts. A lot of long-term and short-term concerns.
▶ 1:36:23Sen. Moran: Senator lujan, I recognize you. Senator peters has joined us. Senator peters.
▶ 1:36:29Sen. Peters: Mr. cutler, thank you for being here today. The programs and contracts like those that artemis supports, thousands of jobs across the U.S. in the manufacturing supply chain. Michigan is one of the top 10 states in aerospace manufacturing. It's home to over 600 aerospace related companies. I'm looking to that to grow considerably in the years ahead.
▶ 1:36:56Sen. Peters: It's estimated the moon to mars activities have generated over $20 billion in economic output nationwide. The president's budget creates uncertainty about the future for artemis and after the next launch. Disrupting the existing project plan jeopardizes our efforts in the space race. It hinders the development of our domestic aerospace supply chain and leaves billions on the table in future economic benefits.
▶ 1:37:27Sen. Peters: My question is, the coalition for deep space expiration has noted its commitment to supporting the inclusion of small businesses in the nasa programs. In your experience how has nasa programs like artemis been beneficial to the small businesses in our states and our local economies? What can we do to better support efforts to include more small businesses in this important supply chain?
▶ 1:37:52Mr. Cutler: Thank you for the question. If you look at artemis, there are 2700 suppliers. They are part of the artemis program. Everything from small mom-and-pop shops making valves, nuts, washers, albeit to integrators. We cannot have the program without small businesses. They are absolutely critical.
▶ 1:38:18Mr. Cutler: If you think about it, these missions need every single piece to work. It is common to hear something like you need a million things to go right for the mission to be accomplished. Only one can go wrong. That is up and down the supply chain and its marts with small businesses. They are making the initial components that make artemis possible. Absolutely critical on the small business side.
▶ 1:38:45Mr. Cutler: As we talked about this with senator moran, the instability comes from uncertain funding, from not knowing if we are shut down, continuing resolution. Are we going to continue the program without artemis iii? This inserts instability into the businesses' understanding.
▶ 1:39:15Mr. Cutler: Maybe larger companies can weather that sort of storm. Small businesses, it's hard. It's a small outfit. We don't have a massive staff. I essentially run a small business. I understand with the small guys do. They are busy. That is their lives, their livelihoods. If we are not doing things to help them, that's wrong.
▶ 1:39:43Mr. Cutler: The things we have done from the small business side, we brought in some of the prime contractors. What can they do?
▶ 1:39:54Sen. Peters: Thank you. There is no question about focusing on that. Mr. bridenstine, great to see you here today. It was a pleasure to work with you and your previous capacity as a nasa administrator. In 2020, the president tsai the pro-swift act into law -- the president signed the pro-swift act into law to critics of your subb -- to predict
▶ 1:40:26Sen. Peters: Severe space weather events. Thank you. Space weather events can have implications for power systems, gps, other assets in low-earth orbit. On monday, the space weather production center just recently issued a watch for a potential geomagnetic storm. Continue research is needed to strengthen our space weather production capabilities to ensure we can have these accurate warnings.
▶ 1:40:54Sen. Peters: Unfortunately the president's budget includes cuts to the funding that could jeopardize these efforts. We could have major implications for communications systems in particular. My question is can you speak to how nasa's science missions like the space weather program play a critical role in our everyday lives? This is nonpolitical. This is straightforward. Why do we need to make sure we have funding for space weather production?
▶ 1:41:22Mr. Bridenstine: There's a lot of reasons to do it from a pure human spaceflight perspective. When we put astronauts on the other side of the van allen radiation belt and orbit around the moon on the surface of the moon, the astronauts are in jeopardy of things like a solar flare hedingham or a coronal mass ejection -- hitting them or a coronal mass ejection that would be more devastating.
▶ 1:41:48Mr. Bridenstine: In fact, if you go back to apollo 11, neil armstrong and buzz aldrin were narrowly -- nearly missed a solar flare that could have been devastating for their lives. We did not know what we did not know back then. Now we can learn predict. Thank you for your efforts to help with that.
▶ 1:42:10Mr. Bridenstine: Beyond that, when you think about the capabilities of our satellites in orbit, they become in many cases at risk from a coronal mass ejection or solar flares. We need to be able to predict that and respond. It is not a lot of lead time. Maybe a matter of eight minutes or 10 minutes to be able to respond to something like that.
▶ 1:42:35Mr. Bridenstine: The consequences of being hit with a carrington event, 100 some years ago now, 140 years ago or so, but if that were to happen today it would be far more devastating than even back then. Today we are so dependent on technology. All that technology would be -- it's important to predict and respond and defend our power grid and defend our critical infrastructure.
▶ 1:42:59Mr. Bridenstine: A lot of that includes command-and-control in space, including gps which is important for timing signal for a host of different capabilities on earth. We have to be able to respond to that. Your bill quite frankly was right on point in helping us do that.
▶ 1:43:15Sen. Peters: I'm out of time. If you look at the cost benefit analysis, to cut small costs and the huge program and the cost to society if we don't have the warning is astronomical. I appreciate your comments.
▶ 1:43:30Mr. Bridenstine: Literally astronomical.
▶ 1:43:32Sen. Peters: Senator blackburn.
▶ 1:43:35Sen. Blackburn: Thank you all for being here. Mr. cutler, you have 2700 suppliers and you are noting impediments. If talked about the need for a budget, not having a cr. I would like to hear in writing if you will. You said you are constantly looking at this. What about regulations? What about security clearances? What about testbeds? What about other components?
▶ 1:44:08Sen. Blackburn: If you will submit that to me for the record.
▶ 1:44:09Mr. Bridenstine: Absolutely.
▶ 1:44:10Sen. Blackburn: Mr. bridenstine, happy to see you back up here. Let's talk about commercial space innovation and importance. You look at where we are, where china is. Is there anything the U.S.
▶ 1:44:28Sen. Blackburn: Should do immediately, that we in congress should do immediately that is going to encourage coordination among federal, state, commercial partners to advance innovation?
▶ 1:44:44Mr. Bridenstine: That's a wonderful question. In keeping with the spirit of the hearing regarding the moon, we have to think about infrastructure. What is the infrastructure that will encourage private investment on the moon, around the moon, that kind of thing? Part of that infrastructure would be -- mike gold talked about the gateway. It is designed to be open architecture.
▶ 1:45:13Mr. Bridenstine: The way we do power and communications and data and rendezvous and proximity operations, docking, all that stuff is standardized so that if commercial partners want to build a landing system that is compatible with it, they can. There is international partners that have an interest in doing that type of thing.
▶ 1:45:30Sen. Blackburn: In the 1990's, nasa and dod did a collaboration on the x-37 b, direct? -- correct?
▶ 1:45:43Mr. Bridenstine: Yes.
▶ 1:45:44Sen. Blackburn: Given we are facing the competition we are, what about reinstating a program such as that and utilizing it?
▶ 1:45:55Mr. Bridenstine: I think it's a great idea. We do have -- nasa and darpa have been partnered on capabilities in space as it relates to nuclear power in space for a lot of different capabilities. We need nuclear power in space for sensors. In fact, if we are going to be directed energy from space, we have to have nuclear power for that. If you think about golden dome.
▶ 1:46:21Sen. Blackburn: Linda landers. -- lunar landers. I think we need to think differently and revisit some ideas that worked. They opened new opportunities. Tennessee had a space grant consortium. They did this with nasa 27 years ago. It was there to promote space and science education throughout the state.
▶ 1:46:53Sen. Blackburn: 15 colleges and universities, two not-for-profit organizations, and today the ut space institute is one of the leading hypersonic workforce programs in the country. We love the work they are doing around space force. What they are doing around hypersonics in the testing that can be done at arnold engineering.
▶ 1:47:21Sen. Blackburn: We think this is something that is beneficial and it encourages the interdisciplinary training that needs to take place. Talk a little bit about related items of education and how that affects some of the workforce that can go into some of these programs like the program with dod and nasa.
▶ 1:47:51Mr. Bridenstine: When you think about nasa projects, we find when we have a university as a leader of a project you will have students working side-by-side with professional engineers in a way you see collaboration that is really beneficial to the students. I would also state in the university environment you have the scientists side-by-side with the engineers. They are making trades in the development of a program early.
▶ 1:48:23Mr. Bridenstine: A lot of times you find -- you go down an engineering path and the science does not work. I think it's too late in the program and it results in delays and everything else. In a university environment where you have the scientists and engineers working together side-by-side and you have students in the mix --
▶ 1:48:42Sen. Blackburn: And students who are not afraid to fail. They are looking for opportunities to try new concepts. I think that is why ut's program has been so successful. Thank you.
▶ 1:48:56Mr. Bridenstine: I would also say if you look at the university-the admissions, overwhelmingly they are on budget and on schedule. That is not always the case outside of universities.
▶ 1:49:08Chair Moran: Senator rosen.
▶ 1:49:11Sen. Rosen: Thank you to all of our witnesses are being here today. Quite a great conversation. I have concerns over budget cuts. We are talking about research. Amazing research. Science is not afraid to fail -- that is how science happens. Sometimes failure leads you to a positive result on the line. That tells you something.
▶ 1:49:38Sen. Rosen: We have seen how nasa's investment fuel our economy, strengthen our national security, and they are inspirational as they inspire the next generation of scientists, engineers, dreamers and thinkers and all those things. We know with the space program has done for us through the decades.
▶ 1:49:58Sen. Rosen: I'm concerned about the president's budget cuts to key programs that have long delivered value right here on terra firma, right here on earth . Specifically aeronautics research at the armstrong flight research center, iss payload operations at marshall space flight center, and science missions at goddard space flight center just to name a few.
▶ 1:50:25Sen. Rosen: Administrator, can you talk about the potential impacts in proposed cuts to these programs I mentioned as we are building on what everyone has been asking about, innovation, scientific leadership, leadership in general, our ability to respond to these challenges, economic competitiveness, advancement, climate and national security?
▶ 1:50:50Mr. Bridenstine: It is important when we think about nasa and the budget it has and you think about the size of the U.S. budget, we are talking about an agency that has less than one third of 1% of the federal budget. By the way, if you go back to apollo, it was somewhere between 4% to 5%. We are significantly smaller as a percentage of the federal government then we were back in the apollo era.
▶ 1:51:20Mr. Bridenstine: All that said, not all that is because of nasa cuts. A lot of that is because of the growth of government in other areas. I understand we have a huge deficit problem and we have a debt problem and I know the president is focused like a laser on trying to get control over that. I think everybody understands we have to get control of it.
▶ 1:51:40Mr. Bridenstine: I would say it is really hard to balance the budget when you are talking about cutting a few billion dollars from agency that asked for was -- for less than one third of 1% of the budget.
▶ 1:51:55Sen. Rosen: I'm a child of the 1960's and 1970's. I watched them walk on the moon. I know people that went into careers because of what they saw. It still happens today. I would argue there's a pretty good return on the investment. We have a lot of questions so I will try to move on in my two minutes. I want to ask about the future of space stations.
▶ 1:52:25Sen. Rosen: The request for proposals for proposals first phase two of the earth orbit develop meant program is expected to defy nasa investment and commitment, awarding contracts to two or more commercial providers to ensure redundancy and competition for services and that's essential for driving innovation. Competition drives economic growth. Can you speak about the critical need for these providers to be operational before the iss de-orbits?
▶ 1:52:56Sen. Rosen: We can't wait to have nothing up there and then hope we are going to get something there. How do we ensure the timely development and deployment of the systems?
▶ 1:53:07Mr. Bridenstine: It's important to note we need to have space stations that can replace the international space station. I meet space stations that are fully mission capable and have a permanent human presence in space. The capabilities and technology that come from human spaceflight are significant. We have talked about some of them today when we think about pharmaceutical development to treat diseases that have never been treatable before, regenerative medicine, printing and 3d human tissue to grow in 3d human tissue.
▶ 1:53:38Mr. Bridenstine: All these capabilities, if we don't stay in front of it, our greatest competitor, china, will at our partners will join them in the effort. It's important to have fully mission capable space stations that can replace the international space station. I would also say when it comes to advanced materials, whether we talking about semiconductors were about hypersonics, microgravity is critical to all these capabilities.
▶ 1:54:05Mr. Bridenstine: We are at risk if we do not have a fully mission capable system, if we don't have a permanent human presence in space, we are at risk of losing that to our greatest competitors. >> it's not only enough that we avoid the gap. We must have portable capabilities that are at least equal to the chinese. We have avoid the gap and make people -- avoid the gap.
▶ 1:54:39Sen. Rosen: Investing in research and public partnerships is important. Thank you for your time today.
▶ 1:54:45Chair Moran: Mr. bridenstine, is that a bill nye approved beverage you have the? Diet mountain dew, that's a first.
▶ 1:54:53Mr. Bridenstine: I'm guessing not. >> he is shaking his head. I'm a child of the 1990's. Senator young.
▶ 1:55:02Sen. Young: Thank you to the witnesses for being here and get to see you again, congressman. As many of you know, indiana has deep roots with our nation's space expiration history. Purdue university likes to call itself the cradle of astronauts. I was up there over the weekend with some family members. You see a lot of banners.
▶ 1:55:31Sen. Young: They advertise to those who visit the community and they inspire the students with their 27 astronaut alumni, including neil armstrong, the first man on the moon who was a boilermaker. This is an effort to boast about my state but also to highlight the opportunities many U.S. universities provide to our young scientists and engineers.
▶ 1:56:01Sen. Young: As we look to reauthorize nasa, partially authorize for the chips and science act of years ago, it is crucial to focus on and fomenting strategic investments in research to not only secure our stem pipeline but to maintain a competitive edge in the scientific research and development, which will eventually lead to commercialization and deployment of new technologies to bolster our space exploration.
▶ 1:56:32Sen. Young: Mr. gold, thank you for highlighting the groundbreaking microgravity research that redwire is advancing on the international space station. The world should know it is anchored in greenville, indiana. Not only strengthens our state's economy but underscores the state of indiana's leadership in space innovation. Mr.
▶ 1:56:58Sen. Young: Gold, could you speak to how space and biotech are converging and share your vision for the future of microgravity research in indiana and bound? -- beyond?
▶ 1:57:18Mr. Gold: Thank you so much. I believe you have been to our greenville facility. Thank you for your support. We are at a point where microgravity and pharmaceuticals are coming together in a way that will transform those fields. I talked about how we are printing live cardiovascular tissue. At the most recent launch a week ago, we launched liver cells.
▶ 1:57:50Mr. Gold: Drink all you want, redwire will get you a new liver. Enjoy some of that kentucky bourbon. We have all had friends on the organ donor list probably who have suffered or died. Because these organs would be grown with their own stem cells, we could avoid the painful and expensive rejection therapies. We have now flown 32 pillboxes. These are going see crystals for drugs.
▶ 1:58:21Mr. Gold: That's like a sourdough starter kit. We just need to bring down from space a thimbleful of these crystals and they lead to drugs that because of microgravity they form larger, more uniform. We get new versions of drugs with better efficacy and fewer side effects. We partnered with eli lilly. We flew a version. We said they were the previous crystals they have ever seen. The revolution is happening.
▶ 1:58:51Mr. Gold: Let's not turn around now and snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. We are about to move into a larger facility in indiana. I reassure you the road to space goes through southern indiana.
▶ 1:59:07Sen. Young: That's great. It is a road with many arteries. Let me end by being expansive here and inclusive. I think your testimony here today, Mr. gold, illustrates how parts of our country people would not perhaps associate as important components to the space economy are ready to go.
▶ 1:59:37Sen. Young: They are on the cusp of achieving some amazing achievements scientifically, engineering-wise, and by extension, that will benefit the economy around the country. These continued scientific investments through the chips and science act, by reauthorizing nasa, etc., or critical.
▶ 2:00:01Sen. Young: I say that to a lot of my colleagues but I want the administration to know it is ok to have a pause on research funding, but unless they present an alternative plan to fund some of these research projects that collectively benefit all of us and are not internalized in individual companies, then we are really going to be missing the boat.
▶ 2:00:26Sen. Young: Just to add here, I'm over my time, we do that in the senate, I would say that our adversaries are not slowing down. I received this so it might be a little choppy about 30 seconds before I started speaking. A little social media post pertaining to a comment vladimir putin just made. This was overheard as I understand it by a chinese state media broadcaster.
▶ 2:01:00Sen. Young: Evidently vladimir putin walking towards tiananmen square for a parade, his translator could be heard saying in chinese, "biotechnology is continuously developing. " after an audible passage, "human organs can be continuously transplanted. The longer you live, the younger you become.
▶ 2:01:26Sen. Young: You could even achieve immortality." these can seem like things that are abstract and removed from the daily lives of my own citizens but they are here and now. We don't want our adversaries to get ahead of us in these areas of science. All of you are testifying to things that continue -- I know my constituents would find compelling and lead many of us to continue investing in these critical areas.
▶ 2:01:57Sen. Young: I thank you.
▶ 2:01:58Mr. Gold: If I can make a plea. We will lose the momentum, if not capability entirely if we drop the astronauts. We need to send it to stay on nasa and your excellent staff to make sure we realize these commercial benefits and america never, never drops below the number of chinese in space.
▶ 2:02:22Sen. Young: Thank you. >> the senator from colorado. >> thank you, Mr. chair. This is really a stellar panel. General shaw, your former deputy commander and you have better most the threat that china poses the U.S. national security and our interest in space.
▶ 2:02:47Sen. Young: China's capabilities in this domain are accelerating rapidly, the result that you noted in your testimony. Complete fusion of civil, commercial and national security expertise. What was your assessment of the threat from china over the next four to five years, especially in light of their -- the cozying up to russia to china?
▶ 2:03:09Mr. Gold: From a purely military perspective, but we have seen trying do over the last couple of decades is look at what we have done in space for our war fighters. I am fond of saying our joint war fighters today rely more on space than they did yesterday and will rely more on it tomorrow than they do today. That continues to move upward. China has observed that.
▶ 2:03:39Mr. Gold: That is why they developed capabilities to deprive us of space assets and they have built and deployed space weapons. They have also built their own space capabilities mirroring hours for there were fighting. -- their were -- their wear fighting. If they are not regularly getting briefings from the U.S.
▶ 2:04:05Mr. Gold: Space force on china's capabilities, that might be helpful to get that classified breathing from a military perspective.
▶ 2:04:12Sen. Hickenlooper: We are getting that. It is truly alarming.you saw the administration announced its intention to relocate U.S.-based command to alabama citing political factors such as -- the deity inspector general said earlier this year it will take three to four years for the same mission-critical systems to be established in alabama that the war fighters rely on everyday in colorado.
▶ 2:04:44Sen. Hickenlooper: Given the threat picture you just shared, what is your assessment of the impact to readiness? We are at full operational capability now. The delay during such a critical geopolitical window?
▶ 2:04:58Lt. Gen. Shaw: He's the secretary the air force and he's heavily involved and closely involved in the decisions. I have known him to be a good thinker on those topics and he probably made a good recommendation to the president.
▶ 2:05:18Sen. Hickenlooper: Switching to space debris, Mr. bridenstine, let me ask you. We have over one million space to be objects. Most of them traveling hundreds of thousands of miles per hour and could do severe damage to aircraft, satellites, almost anything. The space station had to conduct 27 debris avoidance maneuvers since 1999.
▶ 2:05:47Sen. Hickenlooper: Astronauts had to take emergency shelter in june of last year. Do you believe it is a national security. Of the united states develops and demonstrates technologies to remediate space debris?
▶ 2:06:01Mr. Bridenstine: Remediation is really hard. It is a capability that in some cases makes sense and other cases maybe not. You mentioned items that are one centimeter or bigger. When you talk about objects that are one centimeter and bigger, the cost of going up to space, to remediate or bring down something like that is extraordinarily expensive for the return you get.
▶ 2:06:32Mr. Bridenstine: If we can see it and track it, remediation is probably not the right approach. If you can't see it, can't track it, you would not know you need to remediate it. It is a double-edged sword. The cost is really expensive. What we have got to do is instead of remediate, we have to mitigate. We have to make sure we're not putting more debris up there.
▶ 2:07:02Mr. Bridenstine: We have to be able to have space situational awareness, space domain awareness and be able to maneuver. It is critically important we increase our ability to maneuver. I will also say here is the challenge. We are putting so many satellites in the same orbits. We are talking about tens of thousands of satellites going into one orbit, from one company and one country.
▶ 2:07:30Mr. Bridenstine: You start adding another company that wants to do it, another company, another that wants to do it and you start talking about europe once their own low-earth orbit mega constellation. China was to have its own low-earth orbit mega constellation. Each has numerous projects. There is no organizational system around it that will prevent us from getting to what eventually is the kessler syndrome.
▶ 2:08:00Sen. Hickenlooper: I had a question but I will put that off. I think some of the stuff, collecting essential data about atmosphere on mars and getting into deep research, there are a lot of things we did discuss about that. I will put that into the written. >> it is my turn.
▶ 2:08:33Sen. Hickenlooper: I wanted to be an astronaut as a kid. I went to the naval academy which has produced more astronauts than anybody else but I was not smart enough so I became a senator instead. I fit in perfectly now here. Mr. bridenstine, we didn't know what we didn't know in the 1960's. We did not know what we would face with the physics and the science of the universe we are operating in.
▶ 2:08:59Sen. Hickenlooper: It was just about eight years on the time the first flight from alan shepard two will be launched armstrong to the moon. We went from zero capability to literally sending humans to another planetary body and bring in the back safely which was kennedy's initial vision. The smartphone I carry and you have in your pocket is 10,000 times the computing power of what the apollo v rocket had to determine his navigation.
▶ 2:09:31Sen. Hickenlooper: We have computing capabilities and knowledge of the cosmos that far outweigh anything we thought we ever could know in the 1960's. Yet we look at what our capabilities are now, other than some bright spots like the james webb space telescope, we are far less capable as a nation that we were 50 years ago. For a decade we were paying the russians the center astronauts into space.
▶ 2:09:58Sen. Hickenlooper: If you told kennedy we would be paying the soviet union $60 million a to take american astronauts to outer space, they would laugh in your face. As a lifelong space enthusiast and someone who truly believes not just a national security but economic security and fundamental stability as a nation does depend on our ability to continue to lead in space, I'm very concerned about what the next decade looks like.
▶ 2:10:26Sen. Hickenlooper: I'm concerned the bureaucracy of nasa -- I love nasa but we have to be honest with ourselves. It is the bureaucracy positioned to give a space dominance in the 21st century? Just like we are seeing in the dod, our legacy industrial age acquisition infrastructure is failing to keep pace with china. They built ships 200 times faster than we do. They put more satellites into space everyday that we are every month.
▶ 2:10:56Sen. Hickenlooper: We are looking at the ability for us to innovate, iterate and deploy technologies and we are not keeping up with the rest of the world. As we look at systems like sls, orion, the space liner and say to ourselves, is our acquisition, engineering and develop a process up to the task? We look across the street at spacex and nasa is involved in that but that's a private enterprise that is frankly innovating at an astounding rate.
▶ 2:11:27Sen. Hickenlooper: Starship's flight was a wonder to watch. Assuming we all agree, and it sounds like we do, that we want america to lead the next space race, is nasa as it's currently configured -- it doesn't have a leader right now, hopefully soon it does -- but is nasa ready to lead that race or do we have to rethink how america structures are space program?
▶ 2:11:51Mr. Bridenstine: First of all you covered a lot. I'm in agreement with primarily everything you said. When you think about what has hindered us from going forward, you go back to george herbert walker bush and we had the space exploration initiative, a plan to go back to the moon and on to mars. The next administration came in and canceled it. Then we had george w.
▶ 2:12:16Mr. Bridenstine: Bush was a vision for space expiration, a plan to go back to the moon and mars. The next administration came in and canceled it. Then president trump comes in and says we will go to the moon and on the mars. For the first time the program sustained. As I said earlier in the hearing, the architecture is challenged significantly in the current format.
▶ 2:12:48Mr. Bridenstine: That architecture is a story nearly complex. It does not make a lot of sense. If you're trying to go first to the moon, it does not make sense to do that. What do we do? We can say we are not going to put flags and footprints on the moon as we did in 1969 through 1970 two.
▶ 2:13:14Mr. Bridenstine: It will go forward to the moon mike gold talked about the gateway and how that could be our moon base around the moon. We can have commercial and international partners join the moon base to be able to have access anywhere on the surface of the moon at any we want. The north pole, the south pole, the equatorial regions.
▶ 2:13:41Mr. Bridenstine: We are building infrastructure and allowing private capital to go forward and build all the things we can do on the surface. That means extract resources, whether it is platinum metals or other precious metals, helium-3, water ice or other capabilities. I think that is transformational. It also includes a lot more private companies. It includes a lot more international partners.
▶ 2:14:07Mr. Bridenstine: It's an open architecture system where we can have a sustainable path that goes forward regardless of administration. When getting cast to and fro, it has been very damaging over time. That is the challenger nasa. Sometimes it is multigenerational. You can't just have a go back and forth all the time.
▶ 2:14:29Mr. Bridenstine: >> the history of our space program, there was great tension between the air force and nasa as a push and pull between the military primacy or civilian. We maintained space should not be militarized. That is a belief we hold and other nations don't. How do you see the space force now weaving with nasa going forward to energize our ability to have a significant defense presence?
▶ 2:14:59Lt. Gen. Shaw: Our adversaries have developed space weapons. I point out that at some time there's a lot of progression in any domain for computing resources, economic growth and general competition. Our mission is predominantly to deter that from ever happening.
▶ 2:15:26Lt. Gen. Shaw: If we do the job properly, maybe we can ensure a broader conflict by making an adversary think they cannot achieve an objective. As for the future, I don't think we have ever could envision we will do exploration and economic growth without security measures around that to ensure we have transparency. People want to invest.
▶ 2:15:53Lt. Gen. Shaw: They are incentivized to do so in an environment that shows promise and security as opposed to a wild west scenario. >> I'm over my time. I will throw it into the record. There is a perception if it's in space it is safe and the reality is we are incredibly vulnerable from a communications and navigation infrastructure and with the golden dome and space-based detection.
▶ 2:16:21Lt. Gen. Shaw: We need to make sure we are hardening space infrastructure. , senator lujan is up next. The president's proposed budget/is nasa's budget -- slashes nasa's budget back to 1961.
▶ 2:16:45Lt. Gen. Shaw: The current market of the commerce, justice and science appropriation committee has funding. This administration has been operating with a ignore the law. If they want to cut something, they will do it and sue me in court. There's been a lot of attention brought to the incredible work that takes place at universities.
▶ 2:17:16Lt. Gen. Shaw: K-12, stem education, collaborations and partnerships we have now seen 300 employees that have left nasa, that does not seem helpful. Other colleagues have spoken today all benefit from the incredible investment through obvious collaborations that I pointed out earlier.
▶ 2:17:50Lt. Gen. Shaw: This hearing is dedicated to the united states beating china. My question of you is with huge cuts to nasa and stem efforts harm the ability to compete with china?
▶ 2:18:05Mr. Cutler: We have seen impacts already in industry where we look at what do we do.
▶ 2:18:28Mr. Cutler: Just from an industry perspective, that is something that should worry all of us. Why are they going to go into this field if we are not stressing it in k-12. It is not going anywhere in china.
▶ 2:18:56Sen. Ray Lujan: Yes or no. >> yes. >> no.
▶ 2:19:06Sen. Ray Lujan: If you could explain to me how you complemented two of my your response as to the incredible importance with students, scientists and engineers but you don't believe this. >> when you think about stem education and partnering with universities, that is a great thing to do.
▶ 2:19:40Sen. Ray Lujan: When you think about the partnership where we have scientists and engineers working side-by-side, all of that is extremely beneficial. That has been within the program itself. Does that make sense?
▶ 2:19:58Sen. Ray Lujan: It takes investment. >> I'm in agreement that we need to be involved in the students and the projects, I am in full agreement. When you think about education, we have the department of education. Several lujan general? -- Sen. ray lujan: general?
▶ 2:20:30Sen. Ray Lujan: >> yes. I hope they are refocusing in order to be china.
▶ 2:20:38Sen. Ray Lujan: There seems to be strong bipartisan support. I appreciate that response. During your tenure as nasa administrator you created the vehicle for science and technology development. What will they provide to nasa? >> that is a great question.
▶ 2:21:11Sen. Ray Lujan: They are talking about microgravity. There is ways to get microgravity. We could drop an object. And then we could put things on an airplane and put them on a parabolic trajectory and you might get 30 seconds or one minute. That's where I think we could have even more benefit.
▶ 2:21:34Sen. Ray Lujan: You could get five minutes or more and all of that enables to do research, development on technologies and capabilities. If all of that works you send it to the international space station.
▶ 2:21:52Sen. Ray Lujan: How would the united states be ceding ground to china? >> it's important to recognize that without that program there would be a lot of development capabilities that just get canceled. >> I have other questions but I will submit them to the record for time.
▶ 2:22:25Sen. Ray Lujan: >> you made senator cruz captain kirk. The need to fund nasa in the beautiful bill is something that is very important. All in agreement? I just want to point out there wasn't a single democrat that voted for that.
▶ 2:22:54Sen. Ray Lujan: I want to make sure that is crystal clear. As important as we say this is bipartisan, it was 100% of the democrats voting against that bill. When we talk about sequencing, how do we get there before china? I think we could get there before china gets there. There is sequencing that has to happen.
▶ 2:23:25Sen. Ray Lujan: You are going to be in ohio next week. I'm sure you are going there to celebrate the victory of ohio state versus texas. While you are celebrating that industry talk about the importance of developing that. >> I'm sure they are still celebrating. That is great.
▶ 2:23:54Sen. Ray Lujan: This community has been supported in all forms. If you want to open up our exploration of going to mars, this is something we need to be working on. There's only so much you could do with chemical production.
▶ 2:24:24Sen. Ray Lujan: If we want to sit there and send ourselves into the universe. If you plug into the wall and recharge it will be the same. These are technologies you should be working on. We need to up our game on that.
▶ 2:24:55Sen. Ray Lujan: >> I saw you earlier talk about administrator duffy putting some serious resources behind that. Where would you say is the center of esculin's -- excellence? >> cleveland is where you go.
▶ 2:25:21Sen. Ray Lujan: >> in terms of the coordination between the military and nasa how important is it for us to really take that to the next level? >> the department of defense and nasa always cooperate.
▶ 2:25:44Sen. Ray Lujan: The apollo missions the recent commands that I had before I left uniform service providing the debris situation to nasa to make sure the astronauts at the iss were safe. I was the committee general at vandenberg space for space watching that continuously communicating with houston.
▶ 2:26:17Sen. Ray Lujan: There have been many more examples. Ones that we have partnered in the past. Those only become more important as we become a presence in the lunar environment. There will be parallel efforts that may or may not involve humans. It is the entire earthing system. You don't get economic growth without security as well.
▶ 2:26:49Sen. Ray Lujan: I do think as the spaceports matures, they protect our capabilities in space. It is also a mission that provides awareness and the transparency in space that enables all of these activities. The U.S. navy and coast guard have done it from the beginning.
▶ 2:27:16Sen. Ray Lujan: >> obviously taking that to the next level is critically important. When you are the nasa administrator, you visited a lot of places, what was your favorite place that you visited? >> I don't even want to answer that. >> if you could end with us, how important is it for us to unleash the private specter -- sector?
▶ 2:27:47Sen. Ray Lujan: China is not the model I choose or the model we want to replicate. The advantage we have is we have a strong, thriving private sector. >> that is a great point and great question. As an agency nasa needs to build infrastructure so the private sector could see how they plug in and benefit from it.
▶ 2:28:13Sen. Ray Lujan: You get these naturally forming public-private partnerships and see themselves plugging into the gateway. When I was at nasa, that is a capability to re-create the international space station. That is a way to get landers to the surface of the moon. We had a commercial lending system for the moon. The architecture is extraordinarily strained.
▶ 2:28:45Sen. Ray Lujan: We need to have as much commercial as possible. When it comes to commercial, we have to make sure and I said this a lot when I was at nasa, the only thing worse than a government unlawfully -- monopoly is something the government is reliant on. Each of those providers has to go get customers that are about nasa.
▶ 2:29:15Sen. Ray Lujan: If they are capable of doing that we could have this robust capability market place that I think will be thriving. We have to be really careful about how we frame that. >> you are the most enthusiastic witness in the history of my time and senate. >> cleveland not only great in nuclear but the gateway.
▶ 2:29:44Sen. Ray Lujan: >> as we are working through the congress appropriations budget let's make sure to keep that top of mind. Senators will have until the close of business on september 10. You know in the senate that everybody has made a point but not by everybody. We will see if we get more of the same questions. The witnesses will have until the close of business to respond to those questions and this concludes today's hearing.
▶ 2:30:17Sen. Ray Lujan: The committee is adjourned. Thank you.