Category After Apollo?

On Saturday, July 25, Tom Paine called the Western White House in San Clemente requesting a ten-minute meeting on the following Monday or Tuesday to discuss a “personal decision.” That decision, it turned out, was to leave his position at NASA to accept an unexpected and apparently unso­licited offer from his former employer, General Electric, to become its vice president in charge of the company’s power generation group. This was a well-compensated position and Paine had the education of four children to pay for, but it is probable that he also was very frustrated by his inability to get the Nixon administration to accept his vision of the future in space. There is no evidence that the White House had encouraged Paine to resign; in fact, Peter Flanigan would later ask Paine to stay on until his successor was ready to take over.17

When George Low learned of Paine’s resignation, he was surprised. In a July 25 telephone conversation, Paine had told Low that he would have “some important information” he would discuss once Low arrived in Washington; Low was in the process of moving his family from Houston. Low “momen­tarily thought that this information might concern Tom’s resignation,” but he “quickly discarded this idea” because Paine had “told me after Apollo 13 that he would not leave the agency until after we had flown a successful Apollo mission.”18

Paine met with the president on the morning of Tuesday, July 28, to submit his letter of resignation, effective on September 15. Even after resign­ing, Paine continued his effort to convince Richard Nixon of the value of an ambitious U. S. space program. On August 10, Paine once again requested a 90-minute appointment with the president to present “NASA’s projection of man’s future in space to the year 2000.” Although Ehrlichman and Flanigan recommended that the president schedule such a meeting, Nixon decided to “wait for [the] new man,” that is, Paine’s replacement. When the search for a new NASA administrator did not produce quick results, the meeting never occurred.19

In attempting to set NASA on an ambitious post-Apollo course, Tom Paine had reversed by almost 180 degrees the approach followed by his predeces­sor, James Webb. According to one of his closest associates, Paine from the start of his time as NASA administrator had “decided to be a promoter. . . a fighter for what he thought ought to be done. He always may have known that he wasn’t going to get it all, but he would never admit it in advance.” Where Webb had believed that NASA should create a broad basis of capa­bility and allow the country’s leaders to select specific missions to use that capability, Paine felt that NASA should take an “uninhibited look at what the program should consist of” and then ask “the public and the nation the biggest question that we could ask, namely, whether the United States was sufficiently wealthy and sufficiently adventurous to continue human explo­ration of the solar system.” As he prepared to leave NASA, Paine continued to believe that NASA had asked “the right question, made the right offer,” but that the country, including Richard Nixon and his associates, “may have made the wrong response.”20

Paine’s 23 months as the head of NASA left a mixed legacy. He brought to the fore those within NASA who had the most expansive view of the agency’s objectives; by doing so, he tried to shake the agency out of what had been its rather cautious approach to the future. He adopted and expanded on George Mueller’s ambitious integrated plan, giving priority to human space flight rather than robotic science and application missions and in the process perpetuating the split between NASA’s human and robotic programs and antagonizing large elements of the external scientific community. Paine was willing to give up the repeated use of existing capabilities, particularly the Apollo/Saturn system, in order to get started on the next generation of human space flight projects. He took the lead in advocating international participation in NASA’s post-Apollo human space flight efforts; that partici­pation has been a hallmark of such efforts since.

Given the desire of those advising the president to avoid committing to major post-Apollo space projects, Paine’s advocacy may have been a necessary counterbalance; he thought that “the responsibilities of leadership. . . required him to get approval for as large a space program as the traffic would bear.” According to NASA’s Homer Newell, there was “a difference of opinion as to whether Paine’s attempts to force the space budget far above the lev­els the administration wanted to see kept it from falling lower than it did, or were counterproductive.” One assessment noted that Paine’s departure was “greeted with relief in the Bureau of the Budget and the White House staff”; another suggested that his resignation “came as a welcome relief to both the executive and legislative branches.” A Bureau of the Budget veteran characterized Paine as a “glory hound” who was “unrealistic and unwilling to compromise.” But to Flanigan, Paine’s aggressiveness was not “counter­productive.” Paine was a “good soldier” who accepted decisions after getting a full hearing. Ehrlichman compared Paine’s bold proposals to a spring that “had to be stretched in order for it to come back to where it belonged.”21

President Nixon and a large entourage left Washington on the evening of July 22 to begin the trip to the Apollo H splashdown and then to under­take the president’s round-the-world diplomatic mission. After spending the night in San Francisco, on July 23 they flew to Johnston Island, a small atoll 750 miles west of Hawaii. During that flight, Nixon, NASA Administrator Paine, and national security adviser Kissinger spent some time discussing the president’s desire to increase international participation in the U. S. space program; Paine remembers that “we made a great deal of progress in laying out the plan for international cooperation.”34 Borman was also aboard Air Force One, and met separately with the president and Kissinger, also to dis­cuss international space cooperation.

The president’s party arrived on Johnston Island at 5:00 p. m. local time. Those of the group that would view the Apollo H splashdown then boarded helicopters for the hour and a half trip to the aircraft carrier Arlington, where they would spend the evening. As he had earlier met with Ehrlichman to plan his trip to meet the returning Apollo 11 astronauts, President Nixon had attempted to stage manage his trip to the splash down. He recog­nized that Secretary of State William Rogers and Kissinger would have to be part of the diplomatic trip, but he did not want them to accompany him to the recovery; instead, Nixon declared, they would stay on Johnston Island awaiting his return. Nixon did not want to share the event with

a large entourage; his presence as the crew returned from the Moon was “to be his triumph, not theirs" Nixon told Ehrlichman that “no staff— no Dr. [Doctor]—only two SS [Secret Service]—no press pool—nobody” was to ride on his helicopter to the recovery carrier. Ehrlichman described these directives as an example of the “forlorn and impossible wishing game he liked so well.” He added “as he knew it would, Nixon’s entourage at the splashdown included the full complement of bodyguards, a vast press contingent, the President’s doctor, Haldeman, Haldeman’s aide, and, of course, both Rogers and Kissinger.”35

Haldeman in his diary described in vivid detail both the trip from the Arlington to the smaller recovery carrier Hornet to view the splashdown and the event itself:

Up at 4:00 for 4:40 departure. It was beautiful on the flight deck, absolutely dark, millions of stars, plus the antenna lights on the ship. Borman said it looked more like the sky on the back side of the moon than any he had ever seen on earth. Helicopter left in the dark and flew over the ocean to the Hornet. Landed and went through quick briefings on the decontamination setup and the recovery plan. Then waited on the bridge for the capsule to appear.

It did, in spectacular fashion. We saw the fireball (like a meteor with a tail) rise from the horizon and arch through the sky, turning into a red ball,

then disappearing. Waited on the bridge for an hour or so until we could see the helicopters over the capsule and raft in the sea. We steamed toward them. Watched the pickup, first through binoculars, then with naked eye. P [the president] was exuberant, really cranked up, like a little kid. Watched every­thing, soaked it all up.

Then the pickup helicopter landed on deck. P ordered band to play “Columbia the Gem of the Ocean.” . . . Then down to the hangar deck for P chat with the astronauts in quarantine chamber. Great show. He was very excited, personal, perfect approach. Then prayer and “Star Spangled Banner.” Then “Ruffles and Flourishes” and “Hail to the Chief,” and we left.36

The Apollo H command module Columbia splashed down on target at 5:51 a. m. local time (12:51 p. m. EDT) on July 24, 13 miles from the Hornet. After donning their “biological containment garments,” Armstrong, Aldrin, and Collins were helped from their spacecraft into a raft, then lifted into a waiting helicopter. By now, the Hornet was only a quarter of a mile away, and the helicopter carrying the Apollo H crew landed on its deck at 6:57 local time.

The astronauts had an hour before interacting with the president, first undergoing a quick medical examination, then taking a shower and chang­ing into comfortable clothing. Armstrong later reflected “there were the Nixon ceremonial activities to attend to. We needed to do that and get it behind us so we could celebrate.” Collins added that after showering and shaving, “we were looking for something to do, and it’s not long in coming.” The crew was summoned to the end of the quarantine facility and “part­ing the curtains we see that the hangar deck has arranged for some sort of ceremony—the first of many, I would guess.” After the band played Ruffles and Flourishes, “in marches none other than President Nixon, looking very fit and relaxed as he stands by a microphone just outside our window.”As he spoke with the crew, Nixon demonstrated his lack of facility with small talk, attempting to joke that his conversation with the crew while they were on the Moon was a collect call, pointing out Frank Borman standing nearby, and asking whether the crew knew the results of the baseball All Star game and whether they were fans of the American or National League. One of Nixon’s biographers suggested that his conversation “set some sort of record for inappropriateness.” He told the astronauts that he had spoken to their wives—“three of the greatest ladies and most courageous ladies in the whole world today”—and had invited them to a dinner on August 13. He asked the crew “Will you come?” Demonstrating his “penchant for hyperbole and weakness for gross exaggeration,” Nixon “came out with the all-time Nixonism,” telling the crew that “this is the greatest week in the history of the world since the Creation, because as a result of what happened in this week, the world is bigger, infinitely” and “as a result of what you have done, the world has never been closer together before.”37

Shortly after 9:00 a. m., President Nixon and his party boarded their helicopters for the return trip to Johnston Island; by early that afternoon, they were on their way to Guam, the first stop in a tour that would bring

Nixon to the Philippines, Indonesia, Thailand, Vietnam, India, Pakistan, Romania, and the United Kingdom before returning to Washington on August 3. At each stop on the journey, Nixon evoked “the spirit of Apollo 11.” For example, when he landed in Manila, the president said “as we think of that great venture into space, as we think of the first man setting foot on the moon, we realize the meaning that that has, clearly apart from the technical achievement, we realize that if man can reach the moon, that we can bring peace to the earth. And that should be the great lesson of that great space journey for all of us.” In Romania, Nixon added “mankind has landed on the moon. We have established a foothold in outer space.” He added “but there are goals that we have not reached here on earth. We are still building a just peace in the world. This is a work that requires the same cooperation and patience and perseverance from men of good will that it took to launch that vehicle to the moon. I believe that if human beings can reach the moon, human beings can reach an understanding with each other on the earth.” As had been planned from the start of the Nixon administration, and indeed from 1961 as President Kennedy had laid out his rationale for sending Americans to the Moon, the Apollo 11 triumph was used by President Nixon as a powerful tool in Earth-bound diplomacy.39

Missing in Richard Nixon’s communications during the Apollo 11 mis­sion and his subsequent world tour was any mention of John F. Kennedy. However, some in NASA did recognize President Kennedy’s role. As the Apollo 11 spacecraft splashed down in the Pacific Ocean, one of the video screens in the front of the mission control room at NASA’s Manned Spacecraft Center in Houston had displayed Kennedy’s 1961 challenge, while another screen noted simply: “Task Accomplished.”40

On the evening of August 10, 21 days after leaving the surface of the Moon, the Apollo 11 crew members were released from their Houston quar­antine. Early on the morning of August 13 they left Houston on what prom­ised to be an exhausting day. The crew and their wives and children were flown by Air Force Two to New York City for a ticker-tape parade. According to Armstrong’s biographer, “not even the revelry at the end of World War II or the parade for Lindbergh in 1927 matched in size” the crowd watch­ing the crew’s parade through Manhattan; one estimate of the turnout was 4 million people. Then on to Chicago, where the crowds were “even wilder.” Finally the astronauts arrived in Los Angeles for the huge dinner celebrating their mission.

Richard Nixon acted as master of ceremonies for the evening. The assem­blage included representatives of 83 countries, governors from 44 states, 14 members of the president’s cabinet (“More members of the Cabinet than are usually present at a Cabinet meeting,” joked Nixon), the chief justice of the Supreme Court, 50 members of Congress, a bevy of Hollywood stars, NASA officials and astronauts, aerospace industry executives, and the man who Nixon had defeated in the contest to be president, former Vice President Hubert Humphrey. At the culmination of the evening, Vice President Spiro Agnew presented the Medal of Freedom, the nation’s high­est civilian award, to each of the Apollo 11 crew members. Then the astro­nauts spoke. Michael Collins said “here stands one proud American, proud to be a member of the Apollo team, proud to be a citizen of the United States of America which nearly a decade ago said that it would land two men on the moon and then did so, showing along the way, to the world, both the triumphs and the tragedies—and proud to be an inhabitant of this most magnificent planet.” Buzz Aldrin added, “There are footprints on the moon. Those footprints belong to each and every one of you, to all of mankind, and they are there because of the blood, the sweat, and the tears of millions of people. These footprints are a symbol of the true human spirit.” Neil Armstrong hoped that “this is the beginning of a new era, the beginning of an era when man understands the universe around him, and the beginning of the era when man understands himself.” President Nixon closed the evening, saying “It has been my privilege in the White House, and also in other world capitals, to propose toasts to many distinguished people, to emperors, to kings, to presidents, to prime ministers. . . Tonight, this is the highest privilege I could have, to propose a toast to America’s astronauts.” Reflecting on the event the next day, Haldeman suggested that the “dinner was a truly smashing success. . . Highly emotional and patriotic evening that completely succeeded in meeting all the P’s objectives. Well worth all the work.”41

The incoming Nixon administration was advised that there was a need for a focused review of the future options for the U. S. civilian and national security space programs. Arthur Burns, an economist and long-time Nixon associate whom Nixon had appointed as his top domestic policy advisor, had reviewed the reports of the 17 Nixon transition task forces and had extracted from them recommendations for President Nixon’s early attention. With respect to space, Burns had identified three items:

1. Opportunities for increasing the amount and broadening the character of international cooperation in space;

2. Opportunities for significant reduction in the costs of space launches;

3. The need for a comprehensive review of the nation’s space programs.

The second and third of these items were quickly incorporated into February 4 memos from President Nixon to science adviser DuBridge. With respect to lowering launch costs, Nixon told DuBridge “I would appreciate hav­ing by February 10, 1969, your assessment of this matter, and also of the recommendation that the Department of Defense and NASA be directed to coordinate studies in this area.” With respect to the overall program review, Nixon noted that “there is general agreement that our space efforts should continue, although there are notable differences of opinion in regard to specific projects and the amount of annual funding.” Burns had pro­posed “the establishment of an interagency committee which would include you [DuBridge], the Administrator of NASA, and a senior official from the Department of Defense. The primary function of this committee would be to furnish recommendations to me [Nixon] on the scope and direction of our Post Apollo space program.” Nixon also asked for an assessment of this pro­posal by February 10.34 A similar presidential memorandum regarding the first of Burns’s recommended items for attention, international space coop­eration, was sent to Secretary of State William Rogers only on February 21.

NASA learned of the plans for the White House space review only by acci­dent. The agency’s public affairs office had noticed a news item in a Florida newspaper saying that the president had asked his science adviser to evalu­ate ways of achieving lower costs in the space program. NASA contacted DuBridge to learn what was going on. While the story had to do with the transition task force’s suggestion that it might be possible to lower launch costs, when DuBridge talked to Paine, he was confused, and began to explain to Paine his not-yet-final plans for the overall space review. He told Paine that what he had in mind was a steering committee composed of DuBridge as chairman and including Paine from NASA, either Deputy Secretary of Defense David Packard or Secretary of the Air Force Robert Seamans from the Department of Defense, and Vice President Spiro Agnew in his role as chairman of the National Aeronautics and Space Council, the high-level interagency group set up in 1958 to develop a national perspective on space issues. DuBridge suggested that after this group had examined the space program he would integrate their views and would prepare a summary docu­ment that he would present to President Nixon. Paine “dissented strongly” from this proposal, saying that “it was not proper for the President’s Special Assistant for Science and Technology to put himself in a position superior to the Vice President, the Secretary of Defense, and the Administrator of NASA, all of whom report directly to the President.” DuBridge suggested that Paine’s objections were a “question of protocol.” Paine disagreed; to him, the issue was “a basic question of executive authority, organization, and responsibility.” DuBridge closed their conversation by telling the NASA chief he would be in contact with a new proposal that he hoped would meet Paine’s objections.35

DuBridge’s apparent intent in organizing the post-Apollo review, with himself as its chair and his OST staff and the President’s Science Advisory Committee (PSAC) playing key roles, was to make sure that the review “covered all the necessary bases and got all the necessary points of view exposed for the president.” There was a concern within OST that if NASA controlled the review the science adviser “would be called upon to rubber stamp a NASA document.” Paine’s negative reaction was aimed at preserving NASA’s direct access to the president; Paine feared that what DuBridge had in mind “might result in some diminution of NASA’s authority. . . because you never want one bunch of guys to do the planning and another bunch to carry it out.” NASA was also concerned about DuBridge having the key role in the review, given his reported skepticism regarding the value of human space flight.36

After two days, DuBridge came back to Paine with a new proposal. It met many of Paine’s objections. One change was making Vice President Agnew the chair of the review. Paine asked DuBridge about “the delicate matter” of whether the White House really wanted to put Agnew in such an impor­tant role; even three weeks into the Nixon administration, it was clear that Agnew would not be part of Richard Nixon’s inner circle. DuBridge assured Paine “that he had discussed this question with both the President and the Vice President and this was their decision.” With this assurance and word that the White House did not want to wait until a permanent NASA admin­istrator was selected to begin the review, Paine agreed to DuBridge’s new proposal.37

Later that day, DuBridge sent a memorandum to the president suggesting a “Task Group” composed of the acting administrator of NASA, the secre­tary of defense, the chairman of the National Aeronautics and Space Council, and the director of the Office of Science and Technology (DuBridge him­self) to oversee the review, with Vice President Spiro Agnew in his role as Space Council head as chair of the Task Group. DuBridge still proposed to reserve to himself the key role of “staff officer” and coordinator of the staff studies that the Task Group would review. He earlier had suggested that the separate review of space launch cost reductions be folded into the general review of the space program. DuBridge noted that “there is some urgency in proceeding with this review because of the very long lead time for space proj­ects” and suggested a September 1, 1969, date for submitting the group’s recommendations. DuBridge attached to his report a draft memorandum for presidential signature.

Richard Nixon on February 13 signed that memorandum. It said that “it is necessary for me to have in the near future definitive recommendation on the direction which the U. S. space program should take in the post-Apollo period.” Thus was created what came to be known as the Space Task Group (STG). Over the next seven months, the STG would be the forum for debate over the American future in space.38

If Paine’s faint hope was that the August 4 presentation, which he had intended to “substantially shake up” the STG, would lead to a decision to recommend the program he and von Braun had outlined, he was quickly disappointed. Immediately following the presentation, the STG principals began to discuss the content of their report, and it was soon clear that they were not in agreement with the NASA proposal.

Speaking after von Braun and Paine, Secretary of the Air Force Robert Seamans indicated that he was not prepared to endorse the humans to Mars goal, and in fact thought that the focus of NASA’s activities during the 1970s should be on space applications of direct service to mankind rather than on creating the capabilities needed for human exploration. Seamans had been a member of the transition task force on space headed by Charles Townes, and his comments to the STG on August 4 echoed many of the themes of that transition task force report. Before the meeting he had pre­pared a letter to the vice president outlining his views, and he used that as the basis for his remarks. He supported continued missions to the Moon, but only on a “careful step-by-step basis reviewing scientific information from one flight before going on to the next.” Seamans argued for the use of Apollo hardware for additional missions in Earth orbit, including investiga­tions of the planet’s environment, but he judged that it was premature to “commit ourselves to the development” of a large space station. Seamans, in contrast to the bullish assessment of the space shuttle recently completed by a DOD/NASA team (see chapter 9), suggested that “it is not yet clear that we have the technology” for a reusable space transportation system that would produce major reductions in the cost of transporting payloads into space, and suggested “a program to study by experimental means including orbital tests” the feasibility of such a system. With respect to human mis­sions to Mars, Seamans did not think “we should commit this Nation to a manned planetary mission, at least until the feasibility and need are more firmly established.” The funds needed for such a mission “would compete with the resources needed to provide immediate benefits from NASA’s capabilities.” Given the ambitious proposals that NASA had just presented, Seamans felt he was “sort of like a skunk at a garden party” for espousing such a “go slow” view. Agnew expressed his disappointment with Seamans’s views, suggesting that while it was difficult to argue in terms of concrete payoffs for the ambitious NASA proposal, it represented “a new vista for mankind.”35

Undersecretary of State Johnson indicated that he was sympathetic to Seamans’s perspective, and science adviser DuBridge indicated that PSAC was thinking along similar lines. DuBridge suggested that a NASA pro­gram at the $4-$5 billion level for the next twenty years could achieve many of NASA’s objectives, although on a stretched-out scale. Although he was an observer, not formally a member of the STG, budget director Robert Mayo spoke next, commenting that Seamans and DuBridge “had made his speech already.” Mayo’s comments carried particular weight, since it would be through budget decisions in the fall of 1969 that any recommen­dations that the STG might make would begin to be implemented. Mayo was quite cautious, arguing that pursuing the ambitious NASA program would make it impossible to meet the budget needs of such high priority issues as alleviating poverty and better control of the environment, in addi­tion to avoiding a budget deficit. Glenn Seaborg, another STG observer as chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission, disagreed, saying that “the country can certainly afford the suggested space program and still take care of its domestic needs.” In the subsequent discussion, Mayo indicated that while he recognized “some social dividends to space,” he did not see “how we could announce an exciting new goal when we have these problems on earth that need to be solved.” Agnew and Mayo engaged in a spirited debate over national priorities that ended with the vice president calling the budget director “nothing but a cheapskate.” DuBridge suggested that the target date for an initial Mars landing be set at 1990 or even the end of the century. Paine objected, saying that such slow forward movement “would change the character of NASA.” He continued to argue that NASA needed a definite goal and decisions by President Nixon on specific things that NASA should do next. Agnew closed the discussion by suggesting that perhaps the STG should suggest a first mission to Mars in the 1980s as the culmination of a broadly based space effort.36

The STG principals and observers, without their staff present, then dis­cussed the actual content of their report, at that point due on September 1, less than a month away. They had before them a draft of the report’s sum­mary and recommendations section prepared by Russ Drew of DuBridge’s staff. Drew had identified four “major issues. . . for which additional guid­ance is requested.” These were:

1. Shall there be a single powerful theme or goal for the post-Apollo decade?

2. If so, what should that goal be, and how should it be presented?

3. Should there be a large space station program, and should it precede the availability of a low-cost transportation system?

4. Should a reusable space transportation capability be developed, and how should the program be managed?

Drew’s draft noted that “there was complete agreement [among the staff directors] on the importance of programs that are directed toward the application of the nation’s space capabilities to a wide range of problems.” There was also “general agreement” that “exploration of the solar system and beyond” should be “an important continuing broad objective of the Nation’s space program.”37

At the suggestion of the vice president, the STG members agreed that rather than present a single recommended program of human space flight, the report would provide the president with three options: [3]

• an “intermediate” program with a commitment to sending humans to Mars but with no fixed date for such an achievement, and with NASA’s budget increasing to $5-6 billion by the mid-decade;

• an “austere” program with funding level at approximately $4 billion per year, with no commitment to a Mars mission, while retaining the option of such a commitment at a later date.38

President Nixon traveled to the Kennedy Space Center to view the November 14 launch of Apollo 12, the second lunar landing mission; in doing so, he became the first sitting U. S. president to witness an astronaut launch. The weather for the launch was “dismal,” but Nixon, his wife Pat, and his daugh­ter Tricia sat under umbrellas as the Saturn V lifted off through rain and low clouds, generating a lightning strike that threatened to abort the mission. Nixon called the launch “spectacular.”20

NASA Administrator Paine took the opportunity of Nixon’s presence at the launch to press his case for a NASA budget at the level the agency had requested. Paine had received the BOB allowance the previous day, and made sure the president knew of his unhappiness with it. Speaking to NASA employees in the launch control center after the Apollo 12 crew— Pete Conrad, Alan Bean, and Richard Gordon—were safely in orbit, Nixon commented on his reaction to seeing the launch in person. He compared it to seeing a football game live rather than on television, because “it is a sense of not just the sight and the picture but of feeling it—feeling the great experience of all that is happening.” Then, in his first public comments on the space program in the two months since the STG report was submitted, Nixon told the crowd

You can be assured that in Dr. Paine and his colleagues you have men who are dedicated to this program, who are making the case for it, making the case for it as against other national priorities and making it very effectively.

I leaned in the direction of the program before. After hearing what they have to say with regard to our future plans, I must say that I lean even more in that direction.

I realize that within those of the program, between scientists and engi­neers and others, there are different attitudes as to what the emphasis should be, whether we should emphasize more far exploration or more in taking the knowledge we have already acquired in making practical applications of it.

All of these matters have been brought to my attention. I can assure you that every side is getting a hearing. We want to have a balanced program, but, most important, we are going forward. America, the United States, is first in space. We are proud to be first in space. We don’t say that in any jingoistic way.

We say it because, as Americans, we want to give the people of this country, in particular our young people, the feeling that here is an area that we can concentrate on a positive goal.21

That the president was so aware of the arguments about the future direc­tion of the NASA program may have come as a surprise to Paine; the NASA chief must have been heartened by Nixon’s words. But those words turned out to be much more rhetoric designed to reassure the NASA workforce than a reflection of Nixon’s actual attitude toward future space efforts. That attitude was soon to be reflected in Nixon’s budget decisions.

In the first half of 1970, an alternative approach to developing a space sta­tion emerged. The Aerospace Corporation, the national-security-oriented engineering and systems analysis organization that had done most of the work on a joint Department of Defense-NASA study of the space shuttle submitted to the STG in June 1969, had continued to examine possible uses of the space shuttle. One of those options was using the shuttle to launch a number of smaller modules that could be assembled in orbit to create a space station with capabilities similar to the Saturn V-launched version. Some in NASA found this approach intriguing, and by April were suggesting that NASA’s space station study contractors begin to examine “Shuttle-sized modules” as the basis for a station. By mid-May, NASA at the engineering level had made its decision; a directive to the study contractors said that “additional work on the 33-ft. diameter space station will be deferred” and that further study effort would focus on “modular station concepts 15-ft. in diameter.” (That diameter was based on the width of the payload bay of the shuttle design NASA was studying.) After some additional in-house study, this decision was formally announced on July 29, 1970; that was the day that the Congress passed the NASA appropriations bill, which included no funds for the Saturn V. (There had been some faint hope that the Congress would reverse the Nixon administration decision to suspend production.) Henceforth, NASA’s industry partners would study only a shuttle-launched station.3

As he accepted Paine’s resignation on July 28, President Nixon asked him to suggest potential successors. Paine replied quickly, telling Nixon that “it would be best to seek a replacement from outside” of NASA; this ruled out George Low and Wernher von Braun as candidates. Paine provided a list “of seven principal candidates of national stature.” They were: James Fisk, president, Bell Telephone Laboratories; Thomas Jones, chairman, Northrop Corporation; Ruben Mettler, president, TRW Systems; Howard Johnson, president, MIT; Charles Townes, University of California, Berkeley; Frank Borman, who was in the process of leaving NASA; and George H. W. Bush, then a member of the House of Representatives and a candidate for the Senate from Texas (and a future president). Paine’s personal recommenda­tion was to select Borman, who was “the right age and temperament,” would “add technical experience and charisma to your administration,” could “deal effectively with the Congress,” would “be received with enthusiasm by NASA and the press,” and “can do an outstanding job maintaining the momentum in securing increased cooperation in space.”22

Flanigan added several other names to Paine’s list. One was Roger Lewis, chief executive officer of General Dynamics. He asked several people, including science adviser DuBridge, General Bernard Schriever, and Donald Kendall of Pepsi Cola, a Nixon confidant, to evaluate the various candi­dates. Flanigan tried to persuade Paine to remain in his job until a successor could be confirmed, but Paine said that this was not possible, and that in his judgment George Low was “entirely competent to manage the Agency for two months.” Flanigan reported to the president that, after first being interested in the NASA position, Borman had “indicated a change of heart, saying that he had no great interest in the job.” Even so, Flanigan was sure that “Borman would take the job if he knew you [Nixon] wanted him to have it.” Flanigan added that “much as I would like to see the position held for George Bush should he not win in Texas, I have serious reservations about leaving it unfilled for two months,” since this might be interpreted as indicating that “NASA and the Space Program were not important to the Administration. Given the current condition of the space industry, this would be an unfortunate inference.” Donald Kendall and Nixon assistant Leonard Garment knew Roger Lewis and indicated that “he appears to be an exceedingly able individual and would make an excellent spokesman for NASA and the Administration.” Based on this assessment, Flanigan recom­mended offering the NASA job to Lewis.23

It is not clear from the available record whether that recommendation was accepted and Roger Lewis rejected the offer, or whether action was deferred.

At any rate, Lewis was not nominated, and a month later, Flanigan was still seeking ideas for people to become NASA administrator.24 Paine left NASA on September 15, 1970; the next day, George Low became NASA’s act­ing administrator. Rather than being only a short-term replacement, Low would serve in that role for the next eight months. It fell to him to take the next steps in defining the program that NASA would pursue in the 1970s, particularly in terms of the negotiations with respect to NASA’s FY1972 budget. In taking on that responsibility, Low would be dealing with a mix of new and continuing members of the Nixon White House. His style was very different than that of Tom Paine, but he had little more success than Paine in getting the kind of commitment to a major future program that NASA so badly wanted.

Although both NASA and the White House certainly expected that at some point after their mission the Apollo 11 crew would embark on an interna­tional tour, there were no concrete plans for such a junket in place at the time of the Apollo 11 gala dinner. One characteristic of the Nixon White House evident early on was the intent to exercise close control over executive agency activities of direct interest to the president; there was little trust in the career bureaucracy. By early August, the White House was becoming increasingly impatient to hear from NASA regarding plans for the Apollo 11 tour. On August 6, three days after the president returned from his round-the-world trip, Nixon’s assistant Peter Flanigan wrote to NASA’s Julian Scheer, saying “No doubt you will be arranging for international trips for the Apollo 11 astronauts.” Flanigan requested that “before any specific schedule has been agreed upon, we would appreciate an opportunity to have the chief scheduler sit down here at the White House with the appropriate members of the White House, the National Security Council and the State Department [so] that we can coordinate the proposed schedule.” Five days later, Flanigan again wrote Scheer, this time saying “the President has again asked that he person­ally have an opportunity to review the Apollo 11 astronauts’ foreign travels. He has some strong opinions on this matter and wants to make sure he can express those opinions before any commitments are made.” Flanigan added “he is also anxious that there be some movement along this line, so I would appreciate hearing NASA’s thoughts with regard to the schedule in the near future.” On August 14, Nixon told Haldeman that the White House should control the tour schedule, with “no countries included w/o WH [without White House] approval.” As a result, Flanigan on August 15 wrote NASA administrator Paine, saying “the President is most anxious that the Apollo 11 astronauts commence their world-wide trip as soon as possible.”42

On August 15, the same day that Flanigan wrote Paine, Scheer finally replied, sending Flanigan a plan for the crew in the United States, to include an appearance before a joint session of Congress, as well as suggested “opera­tional guidelines for the overseas tour” and a proposed itinerary. Scheer noted that the plan was put together “with the guidance of U. Alexis Johnson of the Department of State.” Johnson was a veteran diplomat, then undersecretary of state for political affairs, who had long involvement in space policy mat­ters and was at the time part of the White House review of post-Apollo space plans. With respect to the proposed itinerary, Scheer noted that “it was more than advisable: 51 days, 28 countries and 30 cities. We would like to reduce this by 10 days.” With respect to the trip’s guidelines, Scheer suggested that “the Apollo 11 astronauts represent the President on a Presidential ‘Spirit of Apollo’ world trip.” He noted that “a Presidential aircraft, such as Air Force 2/3, is important for image purposes overseas.” Scheer proposed that

NASA supply both the “Chief of Mission” and the “Mission Director,” with a supporting staff of 11 additional NASA people; there would be four people from the U. S. Information Agency and only one from the Department of State in the traveling party.43

Little in what NASA was proposing was acceptable to the White House, which wanted a “highly political and carefully choreographed” tour designed to “reward friends, snub foes” and to produce “a flood of positive foreign headlines.” Nixon, reflecting his August 14 decision to take over from NASA the responsibility for planning the astronaut trip, told Kissinger “if you leave things in their [government bureaucrats] hands like this, they come out with an utter disaster.” Flanigan told Scheer on August 23 that “the President was dismayed at the proposed foreign schedule for the astronauts,” believing that “it went to too many countries, many of which were unimportant, while leaving out others of considerably greater importance.” Flanigan announced to NASA in no uncertain terms that “the President has given the White House staff the responsibility for reconstructing this schedule” and that “as soon it is completed it will be sent to you.” To make sure his point was clear, Flanigan added “Please be sure that all interested parties know that this is now a White House responsibility.”44

On August 26, completing the White House takeover of the trip plan­ning, Flanigan informed Administrator Paine that the astronauts would indeed “tour the world as his [the President’s] representatives.” Rather than NASA managing the tour, Nicholas Ruwe, a senior Department of State protocol officer, was designated “Chief of Mission” and would be “respon­sible to the President for its successful completion.” Both NASA and the State Department would provide staff, but only “as requested by the White House.”45

NASA was not at all pleased by the White House intervention in the tour arrangements; tension between Scheer, particularly, and the White House ran high. Ruwe on September 23, a week before the tour was to commence, reported to Kissinger “NASA and I are at complete loggerheads with regard to the execution of the Apollo 11 trip.” Dissatisfaction with tour planning extended to Armstrong, Aldrin, and Collins themselves. On September 17, the day after they had addressed a joint session of Congress, the three were briefed at the State Department with respect to tour preparations. The astro­nauts had set as their objectives for the trip “to demonstrate goodwill to all people in the world and to stress that what we had done was for all man­kind.” According to Aldrin, they were not impressed when they perceived from their briefing that an important objective of the tour was “to visit the American embassies anxious to score social coups.” The crew’s response was “we would take care of Americans in America.”46

The Apollo H tour was code-named “Giant Step.” It departed on September 29, with the first stop being Mexico City. The day before, Nixon, reflecting his personal concern that the tour serve his broader purposes, called Armstrong to give him some final thoughts. Using talking points prepared by Borman, Nixon urged Armstrong to convey to the leaders in each of the countries visited that the Apollo 11 flight and the astronauts’ tour represented “the interest of the United States in maintaining space explora­tion as a project of peaceful benefits for all nations of the world.” He sug­gested that Armstrong might repeat what the president had said during his post-mission trip—that “the success of the Apollo XI mission belongs to all the people of the earth and not just the people of the United States.”47

The crew visited 27 cities in 24 countries over 39 days. They returned to Washington on November 5. Neil and Jan Armstrong and Mike and Pat Collins enjoyed most of the exhausting trip; Collins remembers that “despite the fatigue and the repetitive nature of the ceremonies,” the tour “was the rarest of opportunities, to cram in slightly over a month’s time visits with the Queen of England, Marshal Tito, the Pope, the Emperor of Japan, the Shan of Iran, Generalissimo Franco, Badouin King of the Belgians, King Olaf of Norway, Queen Wilhemina of the Netherlands, the King and Queen of Thailand, and dozens of Presidents, Prime Ministers, ambassadors, and lesser lights.” In contrast, Buzz Aldrin found the trip extremely stressful, and became increasingly depressed as the tour continued; he and his wife were at times not on speaking terms.48

When the crew arrived back in Washington, they went by helicopter directly to the South Lawn of the White House. There they were welcomed by President Nixon, speaking “for all of the American people in expressing the heartfelt thanks of this Nation to the Armstrongs, the Aldrins, and the Collinses for what I think is the most successful goodwill trip in the history of the United States of America. . . Certainly the first men ever to land on the moon have demonstrated that they are the best possible ambassadors America could have on this earth.” That evening, President and Mrs. Nixon hosted a White House dinner; the only other people present were the crew members and their wives. Aldrin remembers a “friendly, warm evening.” The president told the crew that he had used his stop in Romania in his around-the-world tour to send a secret message to China’s leaders that he was open to normal­izing U. S.-Chinese relations and said that opportunity had “paid for every­thing we spent on the space program.” He asked each crew member what they wanted to do next. While Armstrong and Aldrin were non-committal, Collins expressed interest in continuing work in public diplomacy. In a con­versation with NASA Administrator Paine even before leaving on the “Giant Step” tour, Collins had learned that Secretary of State Rogers had expressed interest in Collins becoming the assistant secretary of state for public affairs. Collins told Nixon of his interest in that position. The president immedi­ately called Rogers, telling him that Collins would be an excellent fit for the job. After dinner, Pat Nixon led a tour through the White House and the Executive Office Building next door. When the crew had interacted with the First Lady at the August 13 banquet, they had found her distant and stiff. Now, she was “charming,” a “delightful, warm hostess who really tried to make us feel at home”; the tour was carried off “with unexpected enthusi­asm and a beautiful informality.” The three astronauts and their wives then spent the night at the White House. A few weeks later, “Giant Step” would be resumed for a two-day trip to Canada, but the White House evening pro­vided a satisfying conclusion to the mission of Apollo 11 and its immediate aftermath. According to Collins, Mrs. Nixon’s hospitality “made our stay at the White House the real highlight of our around the world trip.”49

Richard Nixon’s vice president, Spiro T. Agnew, was not an obvious choice to chair a review of the U. S. space program. Agnew had been elected governor of Maryland in 1966; before then he was a local Maryland politician. He had no prior exposure to space issues, or indeed to most national issues. Agnew had first supported Nelson Rockefeller as the Republican nominee for presi­dent in early 1968. But Rockefeller, much to Agnew’s surprise, in March 1968 had announced he would not enter presidential primaries or otherwise campaign for the Republican nomination. (He later reversed this position and competed with Nixon to be the Republican nominee.) Richard Nixon met with Agnew for the first time two weeks later; Nixon was “impressed with his intelligence and poise.” Nixon’s campaign asked Agnew to be one of Nixon’s nominators at the Republican convention; this put him among the leading candidates to be Nixon’s choice for the vice presidential nomination. After two of Nixon’s closest advisers turned down the vice presidential possi­bility, Nixon informed Agnew that he was his choice as vice-presidential can­didate. Nixon noted in his Memoirs that Agnew at his first press conference admitted that his name was not exactly “a household word,” and assured the press “that he would work to change that situation.” In ways likely not intended, Agnew succeeded in that objective.39

There was a straightforward reason for involving Vice President Agnew in space affairs. The vice president by law was the chairman of the National Aeronautics and Space Council, the White House organization set up by the 1958 Space Act to provide presidential-level coordination of space policy. At its origin, the president chaired the Space Council, which included as members the administrator of NASA, the secretary of defense, the secretary of state, and the chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission. When John

F. Kennedy became president in 1961, he asked the Congress to change the law to make the vice president the council chair. Kennedy recognized that Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson had been deeply involved in space matters in the Senate, and he wanted to give Johnson some specific respon­sibilities during the Kennedy administration. Johnson in his role as Space Council chair had played an important part in developing the recommenda­tions that led Kennedy to set a lunar landing within the decade as a national goal, but in the remaining 30 months of the Kennedy administration he had limited influence on space choices. Johnson did accumulate a sizeable staff for the Space Council. Once Johnson became president and chose Hubert Humphrey as vice president and thus council chair, the Space Council dur­ing the rest of the Johnson administration had become almost dormant, even while it retained its large staff.

The Nixon transition task force on space had discussed what to do with the Space Council. It observed that “the Space Council has not been very effective” and observed that President Nixon could ask Congress to abol­ish it. But, “as long as the Council exists. . . it should be made effective. For that purpose, there should be a strong staff and the President should be Chairman.” As he considered how best to organize the post-Apollo space review, science adviser DuBridge also considered what to do with the coun­cil. One option, suggested Russell Drew, the space specialist on DuBridge’s staff, was to “strengthen the Space Council,” with a “vigorous and knowl­edgeable person as Executive Secretary.” The Executive Secretary was the presidentially appointed, Senate-confirmed top staff person for the Space Council and ran the day-by-day operations of its staff. If the president were to replace the vice president as chair of the Space Council, then the council staff could logically become part of the presidential science adviser’s office and the executive secretary could report to the president through DuBridge. (It is likely that OST staffer Russell Drew aspired to the position.) The other alternative was to abolish the Space Council, but this would be likely to run into vice presidential opposition, since it would mean that he would lose a large number of dedicated staff positions.40

There was no serious consideration at the start of the Nixon administra­tion given to making the president the Space Council chair. However, over the course of 1969, there were attempts to revitalize the Space Council. One step in that direction was the May 1969 selection of 34-year-old Apollo 8 astronaut Bill Anders as the Space Council’s new executive secretary. NASA Administrator Paine was instrumental in Anders’s selection, seeing an opportunity to place someone positively disposed toward human space flight in a senior White House position, counterbalancing the skepticism of OST and OMB. Anders could not take on the job immediately, since he was part of the Apollo H backup crew; this meant that the council staff would not become engaged in the work of the STG. Anders had become convinced that he was unlikely to get a role on a later Apollo flight that would give him the opportunity to walk on the Moon, and so was ready to take on a new and very different challenge with the Space Council position. He was told

by Agnew and Paine that once he came to Washington he would have the opportunity to reinvigorate the Space Council and its staff so that they could play a more influential role in space policy development.41

But that was in the future; by coming into the vice presidency with the Space Council as one of his assigned responsibilities, Spiro Agnew in February 1969 became the titular leader of the effort to define the U. S. future in space. Few could have predicted at the time that he would become perhaps the program’s leading cheerleader within the Nixon administration.

At the conclusion of the August 4 meeting, NASA was given the assignment of defining the programmatic content of these three options. This was the role that the agency had sought from the very beginning of the STG pro­cess, when Tom Paine had argued vigorously against the proposal that space program options should be defined by DuBridge and his external advisory panel. NASA took full advantage of this assignment, and by mid-August submitted to the Staff Directors Committee three options, each of which included the same hardware elements, derived from Mueller’s integrated plan, and each of which included human missions to Mars; the difference among the plans was in their schedules and annual budget requirements, not in their content. Each included simultaneous development of the two new systems that were NASA’s top priority objectives for the next few years—a large space station and a space shuttle. Although at the August 4 meeting the STG principals had suggested that NASA prepare a $4 billion/year “aus­tere” option that included a continuing human space flight effort, NASA argued that such an option was not feasible, and thus refused to provide it. The NASA options were:

• Program A, described as “maximum progress technically feasible,” and “comparable to the 1961 decision to go to the moon.” This was essentially the program that had been presented to the STG on August 4;

• Program B, described as “maximum returns from an economical pro­gram”; and

• Program C, described as “minimum consistent with continuing techno­logical advance.”39

It was clear from the way that NASA presented its options that Program B was its preferred choice; if adopted that option would commit the Nixon administration during its second term to NASA budgets greater than those at the peak of the Apollo effort.