Elon Musk reaffirms NASA’s lunar ambitions: “We’re going straight to Mars”
Although SpaceX founder Elon Musk Although he is known for his outspokenness and controversial comments on his social media page
For example, he has rarely criticized NASA or its larger goal of returning humans to the moon through the Artemis program. Rather, Musk, who has long favored Mars as a destination for humans, is more or less a team player when it comes to the space agency’s moon-focused plans.
This is understandable from a financial perspective, since SpaceX has billions of dollars in contracts not only to build a human landing system as part of the Artemis program, but also to deliver food, cargo and other logistics services to a planned Lunar Gateway in orbit around the moon.
But privately, Musk has been critical of NASA’s plans, suggesting that the Artemis program is moving too slowly and is too dependent on contractors seeking low-cost government contracts and less interested in delivering results.
No more silence on politics
Over the last 10 days, Musk has begun to publicly express some of these private thoughts. On Christmas Day, for example Musk wrote on X“The Artemis architecture is extremely inefficient because it is a job-maximizing program, not an output-maximizing program. It needs something completely new.”
Then, on Thursday evening, he added that: “No, we’re going straight to Mars. The moon is a distraction.”
These are clear statements that directly contradict NASA’s plans to send a series of manned missions to the lunar south pole later this decade and establish a sustainable base of operations there with the Artemis program.
It would be one thing if Musk only expressed his opinion as a private citizen. But since Musk was instrumental in electing Donald Trump as the next president of the United States last year, he has taken on an important advisory role for the new administration. He was also co-responsible for the expected nomination of private astronaut Jared Isaacman as NASA’s next administrator. Although Musk doesn’t run US space policy, he certainly has a significant say in what happens.
So what does this mean for Artemis?
The fate of Artemis is an important question not only for NASA, but also for the U.S. commercial space industry, the European Space Agency and other international partners committed to returning humans to the moon. With Artemis, the US is competing with China to establish a meaningful presence on the lunar surface.
Based on conversations with people involved in developing space policy for the Trump administration, I can make some educated guesses about how to interpret Musk’s comments. For example, none of these people would disagree with Musk’s claim that “the Artemis architecture is extremely inefficient” and that some changes are warranted.
Still, the Artemis program is unlikely to go away. After all, it was the first Trump administration to create the program about five years ago. However, it may be less remembered that the first Trump White House pushed for more significant changes, including a “major course correction” at NASA.
“I urge NASA to adopt new policies and a new way of thinking.” said then-Vice President Mike Pence in May 2019. “If our current contractors cannot achieve this goal, we will find others who will.” (Speaking of vice president, it is unlikely that the National Space Council will be reestablished under JD Vance.)
