. CASE FOR MOON FIRST - 07 Moon firsters - ESA, Russia, Many astronauts, Bigelow aerospace, former US Vision for Space Exploration etc

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MOON FIRSTERS - ESA, RUSSIA, BIGELOW AREOSPACE, MANY ASTRONAUTS, FORMER US VISION FOR SPACE EXPLORATION etc.

So far, this is a vision shared by many astronauts, scientists and policy makers. The ESA has come out firmly in favour of sending humans to the Moon first.

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ROSCOSMOS (Russian space agency) are of the same opinion. They plan a mission Luna 27 to the south pole Aitken basin in 2020 in partnership with Europe. See Europe and Russia mission to assess Moon settlementand video summary Luna 27 mission to explore Moon's south pole

President Bush also favoured this approach, when the Vision for Space Exploration Program was announced, though now, of course, US favours a "Mars first" approach.

The Canadian astronaut and former ISS commander Chris Hadfield has also come out firmly in favour of Moon first, as reported by Wired Magazine: "I expect we'll treat the Moon, for the next 100 years, like we've treated Antarctica for the last 100 years. With an initial outpost briefly and then longer stays and people staying through the entire winter, and eventually we will have permanent habitation on the Moon."Then, he says, humans will go as far as Mars. This is also the message of former ISS commander Leroy Chiao who wrote an article about it for Space.com

Jeffrey Hoffman is another astronaut who says we should go to the Moon first, saying "We basically just scratched the surface during Apollo, you know,". The US non profit organization Space Foundation also say the same. As also mentioned, Paul Spudis is a keen Moon first advocate, author of several books, most recently, The Value of the Moon, as is Dennis Wingo, CEO of Skycorp, and author of Moonrush. Others includeMadhu Thangavelu, David Schrunk, and other contributing scientists to the voluminous appendices of The Moon: Resources, Future Development and Settlement. As another example, Bigelow Aerospace manufacturer of the BEAM inflatable habitat currently being tested on the ISS are more focused on the Moon their founder Robert Bigelow says the next logical step is the Moon. SpaceX is the only private space company that has Mars as its main target for humans.

More about some of this in Human Spaceflight At "Coastline Hugging Phase" - Lunar Villages Not Interplanetary Voyages - Op. Ed.

So far this is a "Moon first" argument. There's endless discussion between the Moon firsters and the Mars firsters about where humans should go first. See for instance the The Case for the Moon: Why We Should Go Back Now, and The Case Against the Moon: Why We Shouldn't Go Straight Back published in Space.com in 2011. These discussions rarely mention planetary protection.

Where this new vision differs is that planetary protection is a core principle which guides the vision. It's also an open ended vision where what we do next depends on what we discover along the way. It's a vision for human spaceflight enthusiasts with a deep love of science.

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