like 1914 Fords by 1970. What are we to have: 'Army and Navy and space' surplus sales stores on every town corner?" I continue to hold these convictions.

If NASA is successful in man-rating the Saturn V booster and they are to be commended for their successes to date, there will be seven Saturn I-B boosters, six Saturn V boosters and numerous command, service and lunar module spacecraft surplus to the needs of the Apollo program. Yet NASA is asking Congress to approve the purchase of still more Saturn I-B and Saturn V boosters for missions not yet definitized and without realistic planning for the surplus boosters and equipment from the Apollo program.

These Saturn I-B and Saturn V boosters to be ordered will not be cheap, besides being obsolescent, if not obsolete, by the time they are produced. Each Saturn I-B, without any payload or launch costs, would cost $47 million. Each Saturn V booster, without payload or launch costs, would cost $239 million.

With every expectation that the lunar landing mission will take place in 1969 with Saturn V vehicle Nos. 7, 8, or 9; this would leave from six to eight surplus Saturn V vehicles. Why should we order any more of these vehicles at a cost of a quarter of a billion dollars each when we don't know now exactly how many will be surplus to Apollo?

The type and number of booster vehicles for the Apollo applications program should be determined after the Saturn V is man-rated. That is the time for decision.

Last year I stated that the Apollo applications program missions are still not definite and are being changed frequently.

Last year NASA stated that one of their more important missions was the AAP-1A mission to fly earth resources experiments. Now we are told that this has been canceled and we can only conclude that it really wasn't important as NASA advised previously. The lunar mapping and survey system has been canceled. NASA's original plans were to launch two orbital workshops and two Apollo telescope mounts with the Saturn I-B booster. Now this has been reduced to the planned launch of one workshop and one telescope mount several years later than planned.

A new entry into the field has been observed. A Saturn V workshop will be flown, using the quarter-of-a-billion-dollar booster to duplicate an earlier workshop.

All of this near-earth orbit work is to take place in the 1970, 1971, and 1972 period while the Department of Defense manned orbiting laboratories are also in near-earth orbit with men performing experi

ments.

The advance purchase of obsolescent vehicles and spacecraft by NASA at this time, as contemplated under the Apollo applications program, will freeze out new technological developments as they become available in the next few years. There must be provisions made for the use of the 260-inch solid rocket booster which is an inexpensive booster capable of storage for an indefinite period. Some consideration should be given to upgrading the Saturn I-B boosters, such as the use of strap-on solid "ockets. Also, provisions should be made for the incorporation into the booster of the 1970's of new and exotic

liquid fuels as well as nuclear propulsion. Space storable fuels should also be developed for use on such boosters.

In fiscal year 1968, NASA stated that their request of $454.7 million for Apollo applications was a minimum program needed to maintain the national capability. On the floor during debate, it was stated that any reductions to this program over the token $10 million cut would severely affect the better development of manned space flight capabilities. It was also stated that the Apollo applications program presented by NASA "is an austere program-to do less would be to cripple the program." Notwithstanding these claims, congressional authorization and appropriation action reduced the amount requested to $315.5 million. When I stated that NASA could absorb still another $60 million reduction, NASA stated that such a cut would be disastrous. Yet, immediately after the appropriation action, NASA, on its own initiative, reduced the funds for Apollo applications from $315.5 million to $253.2 million, a cut of $62.3 million.

What credence can we put in the NASA statements that any cut would cripple the future of our space capabilities when, after a substantial reduction by Congress, NASA in its own wisdom apparently felt that the program had such a low priority that it could stand another reduction of over $60 million so as to provide funds for other programs in NASA?

I strongly recommend that the fiscal year 1969 authorization for the Apollo applications program be reduced to $253.2 million, the same level that NASA programed for use in fiscal year 1968. Under the present controlling circumstances, the Apollo applications program can very well carry out constructive research and planning with this amount while at the same time leaving our options open for the future.

ADVANCED MISSIONS

NASA continues to request funds for advanced mission planning and studies far in excess of its capability to effectively use such funds. In fiscal year 1968 NASA requested $8 million for advanced mission purposes despite the fact that it still had over $8.2 million unobligated from prior year authorizations. At that time I recommended that NASA not be granted any funds for fiscal year 1968. The Congress agreed with this recommendation and deleted all funds for that

year.

This year the situation has not improved. NASA is requesting $5 million for advanced missions for fiscal year 1969. Despite the fact that no funds were provided for this purpose in fiscal year 1968. NASA still has, as of this time, over $5.45 million unobligated from fiscal year 1967 funds.

Because of NASA's inability to use the funds provided to date, the committee accepted my amendment to reduce the current request from $5 to $2.5 million. Even this lower figure may be too high in the light of available funds from prior year appropriations.

It is hard to believe that NASA, which has only obligated $2.7 million from January 1967 to the present, will be able to obligate all of the $5.45 million remaining from fiscal year 1967 funds by June of this year. To do this, NASA would have to obligate funds at a rate more than six times the rate that has been in effect for the last 13

months. NASA may begin fiscal year 1969 with at least several millions of dollars of fiscal year 1967 funds still unobligated and hence available for use.

PLANETARY EXPLORATION

There is apparent misdirection and lack of long-range planning in NASA's planetary exploration program. My basic criticism is that there are serious imbalances in this Nation's planning for planetary exploration starting in fiscal year 1969.

NASA's present plan is strictly Mars-oriented, consisting of: two flyby missions to the planet in 1969; two orbiting missions in 1971; and two orbiters plus two small, survivable hard lander capsules in 1973. There is only limited "study money" in the NASA fiscal year 1969 budget for the future exploration of the other planets.

The committee view contained in the legislative report accompanying H.R. 15856 concerning the planetary exploration program states:

"It is to be hoped that sufficient flexibility will be retained in the planetary exploration program so that other scientifically attractive missions such as the Venus swingby to Mercury, the flyby of Jupiter, and the "Grand Tour" flyby of Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune can be given serious consideration beginning with next year's budget presentation."

I endorse the committee view insofar as it expresses concern over the lack of diversification in our Nation's planetary exploration efforts. But I do not feel that our future efforts should be based on the "hope" that better balance will be achieved. The Congress must forcefully insist on a more diversified program.

I have always strongly supported the early exploration of Mars. Last year I supported the Voyager program and as a House conferee, insisted on the restoration of funds for the program that had been cut by the Senate. Unfortunately, because of budgetary restraints, that program is now dead. In lieu of Voyager, NASA now plans a six-mission program over a 5-year period at a cost of $639 million plus $34 million for the construction of two 210-foot antennas in Spain and Australia.

The proposed 1971 and 1973 missions are really only an extension of the Mariner Mars 1969 flyby spacecraft uprated for orbital operations. This spacecraft has considerably less scientific capability for measurements from orbit than previously planned for the Voyager orbiter. The useful orbiter weight planned for Voyager was about 4,000 pounds compared to 900 to 1,000 pounds planned for the 1971 and 1973 orbiters. Likewise, the landers proposed for the 1973 missions are much smaller than planned for Voyager. The Voyager lander would have weighed 6,000 pounds. The proposed 1973 hard landers will only weigh between 800 and 1,000 pounds. Since both the orbiters and landers in the proposed missions are much smaller than previously proposed for Voyager, the same scientific results cannot be attained.

The United States should plan to be the first Nation to impact Mars. I have always said that our earlier Mariner flights to Mars should have contained probes or impact devices.

I favor more and wider use of landing capsules in the Nation's planetary effort. I oppose the extensive use of the flyby concept of planetary

exploration. The results obtained through occulation experiments in flyby missions are not nearly as comprehensive nor as reliable as can be obtained through hard or soft landers, or even probes for that

matter.

The hard landing attempt on Mars under NASA's present plan will not be made until 1973. Scientists speculated while testifying during the recent hearings that the Soviet Union may attempt unmanned Mars landings as early as 1969. Again, the United States will be "too late with too little" as was the case in the recent Soviet and United States flights to Venus.

The Russians impacted Venus, thereby relegating our flyby Mariner to the secondary role of only filling in some of the details. While our scientists now say that the results of the two missions complimented one another, the sad fact is that the United States again has played second fiddle. Our mission to Venus should have impacted the planet instead of merely flying by. As one scientist put it, “We need not always be first, but must not always be second."

Favorable launch opportunities for planetary flights to Venus and Mars occur relatively infrequently, only every 18 months for Venus and about every 24 months for Mars. We must take advantage of every favorable opportunity by either landing a capsule or injecting a probe and not rely on flyby missions alone.

The President's Science Advisory Committee in its report of February 1967, strongly advocated a planetary probe to Venus in 1970 to measure atmospheric properties (temperature, pressure and molecular constituents). I support this objective, even though the Russians have already gleaned much of the data.

The Science Advisory Committee also urged that more attention be given to the possible use of unmanned systems to obtain and return samples of the surface material of both Mars and Venus. Unmanned missions of this nature will doubtless be expensive but they will be far less expensive than manned missions and would require a much shorter development time. I also support this view and repeat that objectives of this nature cannot be accomplished by flyby spacecraft.

I would also place almost as high a priority on new pioneering missions to Mercury and Jupiter. Technically, such flights are feasible as early as 1970 and could lead to results of even greater scientific and national prestige value than did Mariner IV, because existing groundbased information is even less definitive for the more distant planets. Opportunities for Jupiter occur almost yearly and a presently available excess Saturn V launch vehicle from the Apollo program could be used for such a mission. A Venus swingby to Mercury is possible in 1970 and 1973, but not again until the 1980's. The existing AtlasCentaur launch vehicle would be adequate for such a mission. NASA has these launch vehicles already in the stable awaiting a mission and the spacecraft to do the job.

We are not exploiting the use of already developed and highly successful technology in our planetary exploration program.

The Saturn V booster is capable of placing 80,000 pounds of payload in the vicinity of Mars. NASA plans to use either a Titan III-Ď/ Centaur or a Titan III-C at an estimated cost of $38.4 million for the 1973 Mars mission. If the Titan III-D/Centaur combination is chosen as the launch vehicle, an additional $30 million in nonrecurring

costs will be incurred to integrate these two stages and to establish a launch capability at the Kennedy Space Center.

The Titan III D/Centaur launch vehicle can only place 8,000 pounds of payload in the vicinity of Mars, while the Titan III-C would limit the payload to around 3,500 pounds. Again, we are proceeding with the development of another launch capability tailored to a specific mission rather than using existing technology.

We have surplus Saturn V boosters in the inventory. Why can't these surplus boosters be used for unmanned planetary exploration? The 80,000 pound capability of the Saturn V could place multiple mission space vehicles in the vicinity of Mars, or other planets for that matter. A tremendous potential would be provided to accommodate hundreds of experiments with plenty of onboard power and without the usual competition for critical space within specified weight limitations imposed by the use of marginal thrust launch vehicles.

Likewise, NASA is not exploiting the already proven technology developed in the recently concluded and most successful Surveyor and Lunar Orbiter programs.

The soft landing techniques developed and used on the surface of the moon in the Surveyor program should not go to waste, nor should the photographic and soil sampling technology developed in that program be set aside.

With comparatively limited expenditures and development time, this vehicle could be uprated and soft landed on Mars, in lieu of the hard landers proposed, and with a relatively good chance of returning more valuable scientific data than will be possible from the planned 1973 hard landers. In my opinion, should such a program be initiated in fiscal year 1969, this Nation could effect a soft landing in 1971 instead of a hard landing in 1973.

The Lunar Orbiter project has been unusually successful. The technology developed in the lunar exploration program by this amazingly discrete spacecraft now lies idle, while NASA orients its planetary program toward the use of the Mariner class of vehicles.

In the short lifespan of the Lunar Orbiter, modern day scientists have learned more about the surface of the moon than their predecessors learned since the beginning of time. It is inconceivable that proven technology should be wasted in this manner.

This most versatile spacecraft could be uprated for photographic coverage of Mars and Venus at comparatively little expense and in much less time than developing new payloads from scratch. With the addition of radar sensing equipment it could prove to be of inestimable value in the topographic exploration of Venus and other planets.

I am in favor of the exploration of Mars and we should proceed promptly. I feel that our landings on this planet should be accomplished sooner than presently envisioned in the NASA plan and with capsules that will provide more sophisticated data. However, I do not subscribe to the theory of putting all of our eggs in the "Martian basket."

This Nation's planetary program must be more viable and diversified and must point toward broader objectives and goals than the NASA fiscal year 1969 program indicates. We must insist upon the development of carefully conceived plans, not only for the exploration of Mars, but for Venus, Mercury, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune and Pluto, as well as the Astroid Belt.