Exploring the Unknown: Selected Documents in ... - The Black Vault

436 Project Apollo: Americans to the Moon
Apollo had reached the Moon. In February, he asked his Vice President, Spiro
Agnew, to chair a “Space Task Group” to provide him with recommendations on
the future in space. The Task Group worked through the summer in the midst
of the enthusiasm surrounding Apollo 11, and on 15 September submitted a
bullish set of recommendations that called for the United States to accept “the
long-range option or goal of manned planetary exploration with a manned Mars
mission before end of this century as the first target.” (Volume I, III-25) As steps
toward this goal, the group recommended a series of increasingly larger Earthorbiting
space stations launched by the Saturn V and continued exploration of
the Moon. It also recommended the development of a lower cost Earth-to-orbit
space transportation system, which soon became known as the Space Shuttle.
This type of recommendation was not at all what the Nixon administration
had in mind; its top goal was reducing government spending. Between September
1969 and January 1970, the NASA budget went through a series of reductions from
what had been proposed to get started on the recommendations of the Space
Task Group, and George Low, who had become NASA Deputy Administrator in
December 1969, announced on 4 January 1970 that NASA was canceling Apollo
20 and stretching out the remaining seven missions so that they would continue
through 1974. Ten days later, faced with continuing budget cuts, Administrator
Thomas Paine announced that production of the Saturn V would be suspended
indefinitely once the fifteenth vehicle had been completed. 76 While NASA tried
for several years to retain the option of restarting the Saturn V production line,
by 1972 it decided that it had no choice but to give up this possibility. (Volume IV,
I-46) Thus within six months of the first landing on the Moon, the United States
had essentially abandoned the heavy-lift capability that had been so central to
James Webb’s vision of what Apollo could create.
Richard Nixon finally responded to the Space Task Group in a statement
issued on 7 March 1970, saying, “space expenditures must take their proper place
within a rigorous system of national priorities. What we do in space from here
on in must become a normal and regular part of our national life and must
therefore be planned in conjunction with all of the other undertakings which
are important to us.” 77 It was clear that there would be no more Apollo-like space
goals set while Nixon was in office.
Nixon’s intent to reduce the government budget continued to have an impact
on Apollo through the rest of 1970, and even into 1971. Thomas Paine, frustrated
by his lack of success in getting White House support for ambitious post-Apollo
plans and eager to return to General Electric, announced his resignation on
15 August 1970; George Low became Acting Administrator. Low was almost
immediately faced with a decision on whether to cancel two of the remaining six
Apollo missions, recognizing that NASA could not both fly these missions, launch
the Skylab space station in 1973, and begin its preferred new program, the Space
76. Ibid, pp. 195–196.
77. Richard M. Nixon, “Statement About the Future of the United States Space Program,” 7
March 1970, in U.S. President, Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: Richard Nixon, 1970
(Washington: Government Printing Office, 1971), p. 251.