Don Davis article

--- In spacesettlers@yahoogroups.com, "janet_baker76"
wrote:
>
> You restated Davis' point well,

I am the author of the article.
At the critical era of the mid 1960's America was at it's peak of
post war affluence, in our bravado we devoted resources to many
initiatives, some which worked out and some which didn't. Vietnam
became a sinkhole because major effort was put into protracted limited
warfare using up men and material to maintain an unstable status quo.
Because one intervention, that in Korea, resulted in a strong Western
friendly government with a thriving economy we though this could be
repeated in the very different physical and culturel enviornment of
Vietnam. The folly was obvious to many in the US, particularly among
the youth who were in line to be drafted.
More signifently, the cultural divide which resulted in vastly
different perceptions of the same events by millions of people in the
same country first really emerged at that time, and in the ensuing
cacaphony aggresive space programs became a casualty of priorities and
cultural favor among too many important people. A condensed attempt to
grapple with this process can be found at:

http://www.donaldedavis.com/DEC99NEW/DDs60s.html

although space is not specifically addressed in that article.

> Regarding Iraq, I would like to voice an opinion, too: that it is
> such an ideological war that it seems if we would cease so many of
> the activities that muslims object to and lead more virtuous, family
> friendly lives, we could save a whole, whole lot of money and use it
> on space projects.

Ha! I'm afraid the Moslem world would be hostile to people going to
the moon, something about desecrating a sacred object (the Moon) by
stepping on it...;-) Among the factors which will truly impact our
ability to begin Space Migration are the wars in progress which sap
our resources and periodically decimate portions of civilization. I'm
afraid the biggest current conflict trend is toward a clash of
civilizations, the Islamic World against the West. This is overtaking
in my 'hazard index' our longest standing current war scenario, a
military conflict with Mainland China. The 'Window of Opportunity' to
act on our grand dreams cannot be expected to remain open indefinitely.

Don Davis