Whatif the space shuttle program had been scrapped in spring 1970 by Congress ?
James G. Fulton was one of the strongest supporter of the program. IOTL he suffered an heart attack around february 1970 and died 18 month later.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_G._Fulton
Here's part of an article telling the story. ---
How Jim Fulton Saved the Space Shuttle
by
Frank Sietzen, Jr.
Sunday, September 21, 2003
In the spring of 1970, the House of Representatives Manned Spaceflight Subcommittee sought to bolster the anemic administration request for NASA by a budget boost. It recommended to the full Committee on Science and Astronautics a whopping increase to the manned effort, nearly all for what members then called a "recoverable craft" and a space station. This set in motion a showdown with the full committee, and ultimately for the full House, on what character of manned effort would proceed. The focus was the mark-up for the FY71 NASA Authorization bill.
There, supporters of the reusable logistics vehicle outlined in Nixon's study were hoping to move the concept forward in a big way. If, on the other hand, the project failed to get support for the upcoming Fiscal Year, it would mean the future of manned flight after Apollo and Skylab would most likely end, with resources being shifted to unmanned robotic probes. If critics succeeded in stripping funding for the project (called by NASA a "Space Shuttle"), it would be increasingly difficult - if not impossible - to prevail later. And with the Nixon Administration still uncertain as to the importance it might place on a Shuttle, defeat would make it less likely that Nixon would embrace the idea as his own manned space goal.
Thus, much was riding on the 1971 NASA budget.
Rep. Joseph Karth (D-MN) was the third ranking member of the full committee.
Rep. George Miller (D-CA.) was its chair.
Rep. Olin E. ‘Tiger' Teague (D-TX) was chair of the Manned Flight Subcommittee.
Rep. James Fulton was its ranking Republican. In the spring of 1970 Fulton was recovering from a heart attack and was often missing from early discussions about the shape of the budget, although he was also senior Republican on the full science committee. Many Democrats were grateful for Fulton's intense support for NASA programs, although he often succeeded in irritating some of them with endless questions and advocacy.
Fulton believed a Space Shuttle was crucial if manned flight beyond Apollo were to continue. Karth, by contrast, was a voracious critic of manned spaceflight, and in particular took a dim view of all of the talk about recoverable craft, space stations, and especially Mars missions.
Karth in particular was suspicious of NASA's claims for the cost of its programs. For projections of robotic missions, Karth once referred to such projections as "asinine". "NASA must consider members of Congress stupid idiots," he blasted.
Development of a Space Shuttle was unneeded, and the cost projections "totally unrealistic", Karth predicted. Teague's subcommittee had added $80 million directly for acceleration of Space Shuttle studies, and a total $300 million for advanced Shuttle prototypes, testing, and additional funding for manned space-related infrastructure. The debate began.
Karth told the full science committee that he would support funds for the remaining Apollo missions 16 and 17 but not for the Space Shuttle. He worried aloud that by pushing to start developmental work on the Shuttle before final designs or configurations were selected, Congress would be locked into the need for providing ever larger amounts as the Shuttle took shape.
Rep. Don Fuqua (D-FLA) shot back defending the Teague recommendations. "We're trying to get the best for our space dollar," Fuqua said. The nation needed the reusable capability that the Shuttle offered; and thereby should fund the Shuttle now. But others also objected to the increases.
Some said the $300 million added was too much. "This program is losing romance with the American people," said Rep. Thomas Downing (D-VA). But Teague backed his budget and the need for the Shuttle.
Teague called Nixon's budget for NASA and his indecision on the Shuttle as being "too little". At that time, the White House Bureau of the Budget was also battling NASA over funding to start the Shuttle project. Teague took a dim view of the B0B (predecessor to the Office of Management and Budget - OMB) role in restricting NASA. "I'll bet you this subcommittee of mine knows more about this program than the Bureau of the Budget does!," he told the full committee. The committee voted, and narrowly endorsed Teague's Shuttle increases.
But Karth's anti-Shuttle alternate budget became the official minority position, as the House Appropriations Committee moved the bill to the House floor for debate. Karth had three Democrats supporting his alternative, and three Republicans all from the committee. This bi-partisan split and the narrow passage of Teague's increases gave Shuttle critics hope that they could craft a coalition to kill the Shuttle on the House floor. But to defeat the Shuttle once and for all, Karth would need to rely upon conservative Republicans to an unusual degree.
Although Fulton had come to strongly believe in starting the Shuttle, his support for it might be meaningless. After his heart attack, his recovery made it unlikely that he would even be present for the vote on the floor - much less lobby other members for its passage.
With Fulton likely to be missing, the Republicans (in the minority) would manage their efforts through Rep. Charles Mosher (R-OH). Mosher was deeply troubled by the increases to federal spending. The $300 million proposed by Teague's subcommittee and adopted by the full science committee was too much for him to support. Mosher went to see Minority Leader Gerald R. Ford (R-MI). Ford had little love for the Shuttle idea as well, and was also concerned about the big increase. If Nixon wanted the Shuttle, why didn't he say so? And if Nixon would accept the increases, he should day that, too. Instead, the White House was still silent on what kind of space program it envisioned after Apollo.
Together, Ford and Mosher agreed to support cutting the Shuttle funds from the NASA bill when it got to the House floor. In essence, they would join forces with Karth, who was also planning a move of his own.
Mosher called together his supporters- Reps. Roudebush, Winn, Frey, and Price. Had Fulton been present, an anti-Shuttle coalition would have been much harder to assemble among the Republicans. But in his absence, Mosher thought the cuts would stand. The final debate began on April 23, 1970, less than two weeks after the crippled Apollo 13 had returned from the Moon.
Chairman Miller rose to defend his requests for NASA increases for the proposed Shuttle project. "The key to success for the nation's future space effort lies in the development of a low-cost recoverable and reusable space transportation system," Miller told the House. "The Space Shuttle will dramatically reduce the cost of putting people and cargo into space."
Mosher rose to attack the increases. He expressed dismay that manned spaceflight was getting so large a budget boost beyond the administration's request, and in light of the reductions being made to robotic space missions.
Karth now rose and proposed a substitute. He would fund the Shuttle at a study level only. His amendment would strip out $240 million of Teague's increases, and cut another $50 million from manned spaceflight and another $110 million from Nixon's NASA request. If it passed, there would be no manned space flight after Skylab.
Karth also suggested that in effect funding for the Shuttle in the 1971 Fiscal Year was the opening gambit in a NASA effort to override Nixon and get support for a manned Mars mission. "This mission to Mars will cost $50 to $100 billion before its over," Karth said. The Shuttle was but a down payment on the idea. Even the space station could only be justified by its role in planning more advanced manned missions. And he was against that, too.
Fuqua had heard enough. "I am puzzled by the statement that the Shuttle is in some way mixed up with the Mars landing," he said, looking in Karth's direction. Other Shuttle advocates rose to suggest that mentioning Mars were just an attempt to blunt the arguments for the Shuttle's abilities as a logistics vehicle. By attaching the Shuttle to Mars-and even to a space station- the project might be killed outright. Both Mars and the space station were highly unpopular topics in Congress in the spring of 1970.
These arguments continued, right up to the roll call. In 1970, there were no provisions for electronic voting. Members had to stand in lines, one for or one against. One line was to vote for the Karth amendment, killing Shuttle funding. The other was against – i.e. for the Shuttle
But the battle wasn't yet over. Several members continued to argue over the Shuttle's true purpose as they lined up to vote. Confusion broke out, with some members saying later they thought they were in line to vote to kill the Shuttle, not the Karth amendment. The chair called the total- a 53-53 tie. Under the rules, the proposed amendment failed.
But now, under the House rules, the Republicans could offer to recommit the bill. Mosher was ready to do so, but he had a compromise of his own. He would attach Karth's budget ceiling to the bill, effectively stripping the Shuttle, again, from the NASA FY71 budget. As the ranking Republican on the full committee present with Fulton gone, Mosher would have the last chance to stop Shuttle funding.
But, suddenly, word was flashed to Ford: An ambulance had pulled up to the House chamber, and out came James Fulton. He had known what Mosher was up to all along, and now his aides had tipped him off that Karth's anti-Shuttle move had been narrowly defeated-and was going to prevail if the Republicans joined the liberal Democrats in backing Mosher's budget cut. A visibly weakened Fulton now came onto the House floor.
Silence fell on the chamber, as both Mosher and Fulton turned to Ford. Ford had agreed to support Mosher's cuts, but Fulton was the ranking senior Republican on the full committee.
Fulton huddled with of all people Teague. After a time, he rose and addressed the chair. Fulton had a compromise of his own to suggest. He would move to recommit the NASA bill, but with a $30 million cut to spaceflight operations, not the Shuttle. It would show his fellow Republicans he, too, was concerned about federal spending. But it would allow the full Shuttle funding to proceed.
Which would prevail?
Ford now huddled with chairman Miller. They then announced that Fulton's amendment would be the one introduced-and that Miller now embraced it and not his original bill. A voice vote was quickly called, before the ailing Fulton was forced from the floor. It passed easily, given that seniority was everything to Republicans. And word now spread that Nixon, while still undecided on the Shuttle, would not object to the extra NASA funds.
The House then voted for the entire NASA bill, passing it by the surprisingly close 229-105. Karth and Mosher both wound up voting against the NASA budget after all. In the end, it was Fulton's seniority, not direct support for the Space Shuttle that had saved the day.
The Shuttle survived, but would face additional tests in 1971. In the end, a political coalition would be formed by Teague that pushed the Shuttle through in 1971. Among those would be abandonment of a fully reusable booster, and deferral of the space station that the Shuttle was supposed to service. ----
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So here's the revised article including Fulton death which is the POD here.
It was a cold day of January 1970. Congressman Jim Fulton was on this way to the
House of Representatives Manned Spaceflight Subcommittee when he felt a nasty pain on its left arm, obviously a heart attack. Ambulances were called and rushed to the rescue, but it was too late and he died minute later.
With the death of this man had vanished the last hopes of saving the Shuttle program.
Indeed, two month later,
In the spring of 1970, the House of Representatives Manned Spaceflight Subcommittee sought to bolster the anemic administration request for NASA by a budget boost. It recommended to the full Committee on Science and Astronautics a whopping increase to the manned effort, nearly all for what members then called a "recoverable craft" and a space station. This set in motion a showdown with the full committee, and ultimately for the full House, on what character of manned effort would proceed. The focus was the mark-up for the FY71 NASA Authorization bill.
There, supporters of the reusable logistics vehicle outlined in Nixon's study were hoping to move the concept forward in a big way. If, on the other hand, the project failed to get support for the upcoming Fiscal Year, it would mean the future of manned flight after Apollo and Skylab would most likely end, with resources being shifted to unmanned robotic probes. If critics succeeded in stripping funding for the project (called by NASA a "Space Shuttle"), it would be increasingly difficult - if not impossible - to prevail later. And with the Nixon Administration still uncertain as to the importance it might place on a Shuttle, defeat would make it less likely that Nixon would embrace the idea as his own manned space goal.
Thus, much was riding on the 1971 NASA budget.
Rep. Joseph Karth (D-MN) was the third ranking member of the full committee.
Rep. George Miller (D-CA.) was its chair.
Rep. Olin E. ‘Tiger' Teague (D-TX) was chair of the Manned Flight Subcommittee.
Rep. James Fulton had been its ranking Republican before his death. Many Democrats were grateful for Fulton's intense support for NASA programs, although he often succeeded in irritating some of them with endless questions and advocacy.
Fulton believed a Space Shuttle was crucial if manned flight beyond Apollo were to continue. Karth, by contrast, was a voracious critic of manned spaceflight, and in particular took a dim view of all of the talk about recoverable craft, space stations, and especially Mars missions.
Karth in particular was suspicious of NASA's claims for the cost of its programs. For projections of robotic missions, Karth once referred to such projections as "asinine". "NASA must consider members of Congress stupid idiots," he blasted.
Development of a Space Shuttle was unneeded, and the cost projections "totally unrealistic", Karth predicted. Teague's subcommittee had added $80 million directly for acceleration of Space Shuttle studies, and a total $300 million for advanced Shuttle prototypes, testing, and additional funding for manned space-related infrastructure. The debate began.
Karth told the full science committee that he would support funds for the remaining Apollo missions 16 and 17 but not for the Space Shuttle. He worried aloud that by pushing to start developmental work on the Shuttle before final designs or configurations were selected, Congress would be locked into the need for providing ever larger amounts as the Shuttle took shape.
Rep. Don Fuqua (D-FLA) shot back defending the Teague recommendations. "We're trying to get the best for our space dollar," Fuqua said. The nation needed the reusable capability that the Shuttle offered; and thereby should fund the Shuttle now. But others also objected to the increases.
Some said the $300 million added was too much. "This program is losing romance with the American people," said Rep. Thomas Downing (D-VA). But Teague backed his budget and the need for the Shuttle.
Teague called Nixon's budget for NASA and his indecision on the Shuttle as being "too little". At that time, the White House Bureau of the Budget was also battling NASA over funding to start the Shuttle project. Teague took a dim view of the B0B (predecessor to the Office of Management and Budget - OMB) role in restricting NASA. "I'll bet you this subcommittee of mine knows more about this program than the Bureau of the Budget does!," he told the full committee. The committee voted, and narrowly endorsed Teague's Shuttle increases.
But Karth's anti-Shuttle alternate budget became the official minority position, as the House Appropriations Committee moved the bill to the House floor for debate. Karth had three Democrats supporting his alternative, and three Republicans all from the committee. This bi-partisan split and the narrow passage of Teague's increases gave Shuttle critics hope that they could craft a coalition to kill the Shuttle on the House floor. But to defeat the Shuttle once and for all, Karth would need to rely upon conservative Republicans to an unusual degree.
Although Fulton had come to strongly believe in starting the Shuttle, his death doomed the program. With Fulton dead, the Republicans (in the minority) now managed their efforts through Rep. Charles Mosher (R-OH). Mosher was deeply troubled by the increases to federal spending. The $300 million proposed by Teague's subcommittee and adopted by the full science committee was too much for him to support. Mosher went to see Minority Leader Gerald R. Ford (R-MI). Ford had little love for the Shuttle idea as well, and was also concerned about the big increase. If Nixon wanted the Shuttle, why didn't he say so? And if Nixon would accept the increases, he should day that, too. Instead, the White House was still silent on what kind of space program it envisioned after Apollo.
Together, Ford and Mosher agreed to support cutting the Shuttle funds from the NASA bill when it got to the House floor. In essence, they would join forces with Karth, who was also planning a move of his own.
Mosher called together his supporters- Reps. Roudebush, Winn, Frey, and Price. Had Fulton been present, an anti-Shuttle coalition would have been much harder to assemble among the Republicans. But his death meant that Mosher cuts would stand.
The final debate began on April 23, 1970, less than two weeks after the crippled Apollo 13 had returned from the Moon.
Chairman Miller rose to defend his requests for NASA increases for the proposed Shuttle project. "The key to success for the nation's future space effort lies in the development of a low-cost recoverable and reusable space transportation system," Miller told the House. "The Space Shuttle will dramatically reduce the cost of putting people and cargo into space."
Mosher rose to attack the increases. He expressed dismay that manned spaceflight was getting so large a budget boost beyond the administration's request, and in light of the reductions being made to robotic space missions.
Karth now rose and proposed a substitute. He would fund the Shuttle at a study level only. His amendment would strip out $240 million of Teague's increases, and cut another $50 million from manned spaceflight and another $110 million from Nixon's NASA request. If it passed, there would be no manned space flight after Skylab.
Karth also suggested that in effect funding for the Shuttle in the 1971 Fiscal Year was the opening gambit in a NASA effort to override Nixon and get support for a manned Mars mission. "This mission to Mars will cost $50 to $100 billion before its over," Karth said. The Shuttle was but a down payment on the idea. Even the space station could only be justified by its role in planning more advanced manned missions. And he was against that, too.
Fuqua had heard enough. "I am puzzled by the statement that the Shuttle is in some way mixed up with the Mars landing," he said, looking in Karth's direction. Other Shuttle advocates rose to suggest that mentioning Mars were just an attempt to blunt the arguments for the Shuttle's abilities as a logistics vehicle. By attaching the Shuttle to Mars-and even to a space station- the project might be killed outright. Both Mars and the space station were highly unpopular topics in Congress in the spring of 1970.
These arguments continued, right up to the roll call. In 1970, there were no provisions for electronic voting. Members had to stand in lines, one for or one against. One line was to vote for the Karth amendment, killing Shuttle funding. The other was against – i.e. for the Shuttle
But the battle wasn't yet over. Several members continued to argue over the Shuttle's true purpose as they lined up to vote. Confusion broke out, with some members saying later they thought they were in line to vote to kill the Shuttle, not the Karth amendment. The chair called the total- a 53-53 tie. Under the rules, the proposed amendment failed.
But now, under the House rules, the Republicans could offer to recommit the bill. Mosher was ready to do so, but he had a compromise of his own. He would attach Karth's budget ceiling to the bill, effectively stripping the Shuttle, again, from the NASA FY71 budget. As the ranking Republican on the full committee present Mosher now decided to stop Shuttle funding.Ford then agreed to support Mosher's cuts.
Ford then huddled with chairman Miller. An exhausted Miller then announced that Karth's amendment would be the one introduced-and that Miller now embraced it and not his original opinion favourable to the Shuttle. A voice vote was quickly called and passed easily, given that seniority was everything to Republicans. And word now spread that Nixon would probably scrap the Shuttle.
This was done a month later and left NASA in deep sorrow. Thomas Paine left NASA and was replaced by James Fletcher.
Future of manned spaceflight looked gloomy.
Or it will stop, or Nixon could endorse three options for a manned spacecraft
- USAF lifting body
- Apollo CM block.3 (with a new Service Module)
- Big Gemini
In the end Big Gemini was the winner. It would enter service around 1975, too late for Skylab 1 or ATSP.
Then debate raged over the launcher. Titan IIIC sounded the less costly option, but NASA really disliked the idea of launching Big G on top of this rocket. Its SRBs were considered non man rated; it growth potential was near zero, meaning its payload could not improve much despite Big G promises, even if seven-segments SRB were added (in OTL they were developed for MOL in the 60's, forgotten for 20 years then resurrected for Titan IV in the late 80's).
Olin E. Teague then suggested to use Saturn INT-20 instead of Titan IIIC. Saturn INT-20 was basically a Saturn V without second stage, meaning it was so overpowered that F-1s engines had to be shut-down or delete in order to limit G-forces at take off! Teague arguments were as follow
-Saturn INT-20 used proven hardware and saved part of Saturn launchers while much less expensive to build
-The rocket had 100 000Ibs payload, enough to lift decent size space station modules
-It kept the S-IVB stage alive, thus allowing more moon missions if NASA budget rose later (by using of cheap Titan UA-1207 boosters Saturn INT-20 could boost a S-IVB in low earth orbit, thus allowing late LEOR lunar missions)
-It was a launcher powerful enough to replace the cancelled Shuttle. Teague argued that NASA still needed a new launcher to boost its new manned spacecraft.
-Titan III was no solution as its payload was even weaker than Saturn IB while diminishing crew safety.
Difficulties were not over, as in summer 1970 Karth, Mondale and Ford lobbied hard at Nixon to stop manned spaceflight after Skylab missions. Fortunately Teague found an ally called Caspar Weinberger, none other than deputy director of the OMB. He decided that manned spaceceflight should continue and agreed to back Teague Saturn INT-20 proposal. The two men were decisive in Nixon approval of NASA roadmap for the next future.
The document was presented in September 1971.
Nixon announced that future manned system would consist of Saturn INT-20 and Big Gemini to enter service around 1976. Main effort would be targeted to Skylab space stations and ATSP follow-ons.
Remaining Apollo hardware (Saturn IB, CSM and Saturn V SA-514 and -515 ) would be expanded as stopgap until 1975.
(more to come)