WASHINGTON -- U.S. President George W. Bush unveiled an election-year vision of space exploration yesterday, a big-budget bid to explore Mars that seeks to inspire voters and delay the heavy costs. Bush wants to develop new spacecraft to carry Americans back to the moon by 2015 and build a long-term base there for missions to Mars and beyond.
"We'll build new ships to carry man forward into the universe to gain a new foothold on the moon and prepare for new journeys to worlds beyond our own," said Bush, reviving goals set out by his father 15 years ago but not endorsed by Congress.
"The vision I outline today is a journey, not a race, and I call on other nations to join us on this journey in a spirit of co-operation and friendship."
The U.S. would complete and withdraw from the International Space Station by 2010, using the intervening time to research the long-term effects of space travel on humans.
The space shuttle fleet, devastated by the loss of Columbia nearly a year ago, would help finish the space station before it's retired the same year after nearly 30 years of service and more than 100 missions.
Since the beginning of the U.S. space program, America has lost 23 astronauts and one astronaut from an allied country.
A new "crew exploration vehicle" would be developed and tested by 2008, said Bush, with the first "extended" mission to the moon seven years later and a goal of using the moon as a launching pad by 2020.
"Establishing an extended human presence on the moon could vastly reduce the cost of further space exploration," Bush said at NASA headquarters, "making possible ever more ambitious projects."
"Spacecraft assembled and provisioned on the moon could escape its far lower gravity using far less energy and thus far less cost."
Public opinion surveys suggest many Americans would rather spend the money to get to Mars -- pegged by some at a whopping $750 billion US over the long term -- on other things.
And the Republicans are already facing a record deficit approaching $500 billion this year that's been widely criticized.
In response, Bush proposed modest new spending for the space venture of only $1 billion over five years, while shifting $11 billion in federal money from other NASA programs.
The lion's share of the cost would have to be picked up by future governments, even if Bush wins a second term.
"This is only a beginning," acknowledged Bush, whose plan must be endorsed by Congress.
Some Democrats have been highly critical of Bush's space plans when the U.S. faces costly health-care issues and other major concerns.
Bush's speech mirrored goals set out by his father's administration in 1989, when the senior Bush also proposed a base on the moon and a manned mission to Mars. Congress dismissed the plan, saying the $500-billion cost was out of reach.
Bush emphasized advances made possible by space exploration, including successes in medical technology, weather forecasting, computers, robotics and electronics.
"We do not know where this journey will end, yet we know this: human beings are headed into the cosmos," said the president.
"Along this journey, we'll make many technological breakthroughs," he promised. "We may discover resources on the moon or Mars that will boggle the imagination, that will test our limits to dream."
