European Stars And Stripes (Newspaper) - November 29, 1987, Darmstadt, Hesse                                By Howard Benedict associated press o if Ihrl of shave is Ippi  i costs   a 1.  or and Hill . In lit. To kill it Al Turrth.  a it a lists say the and no matter fifi. Sni Gulfa project goes the United . R. In id.  behind Tho so-.i---, f n .1 tons  Alton. Whose res arh Bogul Thiv Mallen radiation Holl. Has reservations other than the it. Everything 15 Fine a Nasa s space station program approaches a in   stage in route to establishing a permanent american presence in of bit around the Earth Nasar moving full Speed ahead on i to space  Price tag Between $15 a Ion and $h2  depending on whose figures you want if. Use that supporters descent e  to Pton Eor space travel and orm r and to leapfrog soviet Span.  in superiority 1 trips Tod by the Boeing and Mariti Var. Tea have been competing to build Ilir  s living and work quarters Hiie Mcdonnell Douglas and Rock it in International Are leading Corn Poh  that want to build Tho  framework and Many internal compost it. Son i Vrr in Tho future Mankind will again .1 Karlh Nunci explore once More the   and   says Andre i Stefan. Nasa associate administrator Lor space station a space station is Tho Only place where research can be conducted on the biological effects of Long duration  flight and the station will m vhf i the Mission begins As a Point a Arturo for the journey "  Tho space  says  a i Unis Fator James c Fletcher. The uni re states would in effect.  t. Adversaries and allies Al a o it Roll. .1a world Leader in space " a National research Council report said  station plans rank As i to most aril cur. And lengthy task in Nasa history and the undertaking it risky and cannot tie undertaken on the cheap sen i k Rnic d wis Calls the station a Trujil in Varch of a Mission " it i it might he says Nasa has not Boon Able to sell the merits of this program to the bulk of the scientific Community a id Tho defense establishment looks upon it with great septic a Industry has shown a marked Reluct Areto endorse the station concept in fact the Only True space station groupies outside the Nasa bureaucracy Are the aerospace firms who of Toutsi stand to make a great Deal of Mono a if Money it s bigger than Star  says John a Pike of Trio of de ration of american so int the hardware contracts that Are up for grabs right now on the station Are larger than every strategic defense initiative contract that has been signed thus far put together on ski. You be got to it calf and dime the thing whereas the station Gumry to fall in your Lap in one fell  this is big Money " the  is to be a permanent expandable facility that will serve starting m in. Mid 1990s As a Resu Auh labor Altof it or Lenti fic and  ventures and Une Day May be a staging Bate Tor manned flights to the Moon arid Andrew j. Stofan Nasa associate administrator for space station with a Model in his Washington office. Mars initially it will  a Crew of eight the project has gone through Throo tumultuous years so �. Resident Rengan set development of Otto Stalnan a n National goal in Hist a 5 ital of the i Juon int Soage i a Jan  to Huld Tho station in "  Vith Anin a Ziajor allies but after an enthusiast . Negotiations with Tho of Opaann japanese and canned afr ? soured Over the amount of co Liol each will have Over its own modules and Over Pentagon insistence that to be Able to use the station for National Security research. Despite those difficulties riot to mention repercussions of Tho challenger catastrophe the project has survived sparking a High stakes Competition among aerospace companies to build the orbiting outpost Tor the winners there  be multimillion Dollar contracts and. More important a leg up on larger manned space program is in Tho future some of the losers May be out of manned programs for a decade or Mere Nasa soon will award multimillion Dollar contracts for the station s four major work packages the subject of ambitious Competition Between Boeing and Martin Marietta and Between Mcdonnell Douglas and Rockwell in add lion Nasa is expected to  Leo Srna Ler. Contracts to Rockwell s  Piston for the station a Fin. Is to in and to general flex in comp. A for a separate unmanned plan tinn tha will complement the station by carrying experiments in Polar orbit Tho Are Tho Only bidders Fach of the Lour teams has at least live sub cont  members because of the big Bucks involved each contractor team has invested millions of dollars of its own Money and the time of Many top Engineer some of thai Mon a has a Jon to adur Tisma campaigns in newspapers magazines and television talking up the importance of the space Stalion in August. Nasa apologized to congressional leaders after it was disclosed that the Agency s office of Industry affairs sent a memorandum to aerospace contractors asking help in lobbying Congress to keep its budget intact a Federal Law bans lobbying with appropriated Money. Pike associate director of space policy Nasa charges ahead with space station Lor the federation of american scientists does t see the memorandum As an oversight. Nasa is trying void aggressively and not too subtly to build a contractor  to  in an interview in his Washington. D c. Ollice. One reason it is clicking to Iho station configuration it has rather than going to something smaller and More modular is that when you re talking about $15 billion in hardware contracts you can get a lot of companies lined up " the space station really has Only two constituents that matter politically thai matter in terms of budget he added one is the contractors. The other is the president the Public i think is interested in space but that really does not translate into political capital on Capitol Hill. The problem that Nasa has right now is that Iho White House has primarily Boon interested in the space program in recent years because it provided photo opportunities and it provided Sor Lhing bold and exciting Tor the preside to say in his stale of Hie Union address Pike a highly regarded space e Oerl emphasized that the federation has of Lakon a position on Tho space . J that those views were his own the federation is a non profit organization of 5.000 physical and social scientists and engineers that deals with issues of science and society it Board of sponsors includes 39 Nobel laureates. Pike said he is not hostile to the idea of a space station but the big problems that this particular station has is that the Cost is extremely High and the benefits Are increasingly difficult to  while Here has been no visible Public White House support for the space station in recent months Andrew j Sloan Nasa associate administrator Lor space station insists it s there. When we wont through a recent phase one Cost estimate. The National Security Council the office of space transportation policy the office of management and budget and Nasa drafted a paper he said. This went Back to the president the president reconfirmed he wanted a space station. The White House still supports the  asked about Pike s assertion thai Nasa is building a contractor constituency Sloan said he can make any claim he wants. The Public support for the space program has been very very High for Tho last several years. Every Public opinion poll that has been run on Nasa s space Stalion has been highly favourable three out of the Lour congressional committees gave us All the Money we asked. Congress supports it and i think Congress reflects the people. There was just one individual in Congress who was trying to hit the space  that one individual was Proxmire. Chairman of a Senate appropriations subcommittee who tried in september to kill the space station by eliminating the $767 million Nasa had requested Lof the project in fiscal 1988 he failed but he gave Nasa some nervous moments. Proxmire instead proposed a slower step by step program that would Lead eventually to a permanently manned station to Surju sled starting by extending the Orbital lifetime of the space shuttle to perhaps two weeks and then building a smaller or Bilog station that would not be Perma Nolly manned but would be visited from time to Lime by astronaut Crews like the modest skylab space station of 1973 and 1974 that , he said much of the Money planned Tor the present station could be used to buy unmanned rockets Lor science projects placed on hold by the grounding of the space shuttle duet because of the Page 16 the stars and stripes sunday. November 29. 1987