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USG is SpaceXs most important external client. I doesn't take some conspiracy to explain them launching a national security asset like the X37b.
by thinkcontext 3y ago
USG is SpaceXs most important external client. I doesn't take some conspiracy to explain them launching a national security asset like the X37b.
- sneak 3y agoEvery sale is, literally speaking, a conspiracy between buyer and seller to do a deal. A conspiracy doesn't need to be nefarious to be a conspiracy. I think there is a lot more on the bargaining table between SpaceX and the US military than dollars, given the geopolitical implications of the level of easy access to orbit that SpaceX currently exclusively possesses. No other organization on Earth could cost effectively build something like Starlink today, due to F9 reusability. Euphemising the X37B as a "national security asset" doesn't change the fact that SpaceX has historically only launched reconnaissance for the US military and not weapons (and that Musk had explicitly avoided getting involved in supporting weaponry, at least until it seems he no longer could). This being a change to the status quo, of course, presumes that the need for FH indicates an X37B payload that is heavy (or an orbital insertion that requires more energy). Both of these suggest (but do not guarantee) weapons systems, either from payload weight requirement or orbital insertion requirement (or both). This is, of course, an assumption, and it's possible that SpaceX still hasn't committed to launch any weapons, and that the X37B is just heavier because of its research payload(s) (or it's also reconnaissance and they just want to put it in a specific big-delta-v-requiring-orbit for better surveillance). It's also possible it's chock full of munitions and SpaceX doesn't get to keep trying to research how to get to Mars if they don't help the US military continue to do what they do on Earth.