The landing of the space shuttle Atlantis in July brought an abrupt, if temporary, end to the nearly 50-year era of US human spaceflight. As NASA endeavors to restore US-made spacecraft to orbit, it faces the prospect of cutbacks in funding to accommodate budget cuts required to raise the debt ceiling.

Congress last year rejected President Obama’s plan to put off the development of deep-space exploration vehicles and ordered NASA to have a rocket and a crew vehicle capable of interplanetary travel available by 2016. In signing that legislation, the president backed a human spaceflight program that looks very similar to that of his predecessor in office: a private-sector-led effort to develop cargo and crew vehicles for traveling to the International Space Station (ISS) and a separate NASA program to produce a spacecraft and rockets for flying to the Moon, asteroids, and even Mars. Despite Obama’s having signed the bill,...

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