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Space as a Means Not an End in Itself
By JEREMY SINGER
Space News Staff Writer
posted: 04:26 pm ET, 14 July 2003
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Gen. John P. Jumper, Chief of Staff, U.S. Air Force
U.S. Air Force Gen. John Jumper, the service’s top uniformed official, has a reputation among military space advocates as someone who is less than friendly to their cause.
For example, Jumper has said in the past that he would rather take money set aside for work on a planned constellation of radar satellites for ground surveillance and buy more of the aircraft that perform that mission today.
Jumper, a pilot and a former flight instructor, responds by saying that his critics should worry more about winning wars and less about protecting pet programs.
But the Texas native and graduate of the Virginia Military Institute also is quick to point out that he keeps an open mind when it comes to harnessing advanced technology.
"I didn’t just go from captain flying an airplane to the chief of staff of the Air Force," Jumper said. "Over the years there’s been no greater proponent of transformation than me, to make sure that we remain relevant on the battlefield."
Jumper, who flew tactical airlift missions during the Vietnam War, spoke recently with Space News staff writer Jeremy Singer.
Q. Is it difficult to balance space with other programs in the Air Force budget?
A. The most difficult part is dealing with people who think that everything needs to be in space now, especially if you’re a guy who’s more interested in winning the war than putting things in space.
Q. Does the Air Force devote enough funding to space programs?
A. I think what you have to be wary of is what can the space industry absorb.
We go up about a half a billion dollars from 2002 to 2003, another $300 million between 2003 and 2004, and we’ve got programs that are not going that well. So if you threw another $5 billion at it, what would the priorities be?
My emphasis is to make the programs that we have going successful, and solve the problems that we have had on programs like the Space Based Infrared System High missile warning satellites.
Q. Are space programs more trouble-prone than aircraft programs?
A. Absolutely. If we had a $3 billion problem in an aircraft program, I think we’d lose the program. It has to do with the relative expense of putting things into space, but it also has to do with making sure that we’ve got the same kind of discipline and oversight into anticipating these issues.
Q. Some have suggested that you are not a big fan of space programs. Is that fair?
A. I’d like to find someone and have that little debate with them, based on what I’ve pushed ever since I’ve been a senior officer in the Air Force — to put things on target and make us more precise. That’s what we’re trying to do.
There is no evidence that we’ve traded any of the top line of our space budget. As a matter of fact the budget for spacelift is increasing 33 percent; other elements of space are increasing 10, 15, 20 percent.
Q. Some space advocates have suggested that the Air Force shortchanges space programs in its budget requests. Your response?
A. There is absolutely no evidence of that. I would challenge somebody to show me where that’s happening. You have the Office of the Secretary of Defense adding money to space programs to make them go faster. But when we look at the money that’s in the programs in the end, I don’t think there can be any argument that somehow space is being shorted.
Q. Do space advocates focus too much on new systems as opposed to maximizing existing capabilities?
A. First of all, space people — just like fighter people and bomber people and ground people and naval people — need to worry first about winning the war. And what we all need to do is worry less about being protective of our platforms and environment and more expressive of the need to aggressively make them contribute to the problems that we face.
We need to be able to put a cursor over the target. Once that cursor is locating something you can decide what you’re going to do with it. You can kill it, you can save it as in a humanitarian operation, you can study it further.
All of the challenges that we have today have to do with location: locating Osama bin Laden; locating Saddam Hussein.
If you get the systems integrated properly to get that cursor over the location, there shouldn’t be an argument about which technology put the cursor there. The argument should be about what do you do with it next.
Q. What is the Air Force doing to better integrate its space capabilities into combat operations?
A. We have created the Space Weapons School at Nellis Air Force Base where the space warriors are right there with our operational-level warriors.
Look at the Air Operations Center over at Prince Sultan Air Force Base in Saudi Arabia during the war in Iraq and see the space operators sprinkled liberally through there.
To me the value is people who know how to fight wars and have the background in space to know how it needs to integrate.
Q. When might somebody with a primarily space-related background be appointed Air Force chief of staff?
A. Anytime. There’s nothing that restricts a space officer, and if you’re suggesting that there’s something that restricts that from happening now, absolutely not. Gen. Thomas Moorman was a space guy as the vice chief of staff of the Air Force.
You do have to have somebody who’s qualified, and somebody who’s qualified needs to understand the Air Operations Center and how the Air Force goes to war, as well as the tactical and operational level of war that’s fought on the ground. So the person who would have this job needs to understand all of that, and has to have had the opportunity to participate in that on the way up.
Q. Does the Pentagon need a separate space force?
A. I don’t see a reason for it because I don’t know how the space business would be integrated any better or quicker than it’s getting integrated today if it were separated.
As a matter of fact I think it would contribute to the stovepipe mentality.
When we start fighting wars in space it may be a different story.
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