Lunar Landing Stands As America's Greatest Nonmilitary Accomplishment

Here's how The Detroit News reported the moon landing, which took place 40 years ago this week:

"Where it will end, no one can say.

The planets, certainly. Perhaps the stars. But wherever men go in the years ahead, the marks of their first steps will remain in a barren chunk of rock endlessly whirling in space around the green planet earth.

"For today, man's footprints are on the moon, to stay....

"Nothing can remove that moment from history — not failure in future flights ... nor even the fact that the accomplishment resulted from a political race between great nations."

Aside from the very founding of America, landing a man on the moon stands as America's single greatest nonmilitary accomplishment. Twelve years before Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin and Michael Collins landed on the moon, the Soviet Union put the first satellite, Sputnik, into orbit and kicked off the space race between itself and the United States.

Not even the planet Earth was big enough to contain our Cold War rivalry. But the moon landing all but proved America's technical and scientific superiority, which was far from a given at the time.

Today it's an open question whether America could muster the will to land on the moon if it hadn't done so already. The risks and expenses associated with a lunar landing might be too high for a nation not nearly as idealistic, curious and, yes, cocky as the United States was in the early 1960s.

Critics continue to question how America can justify spending billions of dollars on space exploration when it is faced with poverty, joblessness and other social problems on Earth.

But it shouldn't be an either/or proposition.

The space program's track record has justified America's continued investment.

The innovations and technologies that have spun off the program have made us a more efficient, competitive nation and helped fuel our prosperity.

Under President Ronald Reagan, the National Aeronautic and Space Administration created international space stations, transforming the once competitive space race from a petty rivalry into a global and cooperative quest for knowledge.

Since then, NASA has discovered the possibility of life and operated a robotic Pathfinder on Mars. During NASA's 50th anniversary in 2008, the U.S. House's Science and Technology Committee noted that the space program's work has yielded "improvements that have made (civilian and military aircrafts) safer, faster, more efficient, and more environmentally friendly." And, as controversial as it is, space-based anti-missile systems might be America's best line of defense as more rogue nations get their hands on nuclear arms.

Americans have enjoyed a generous return on their investment in space. And there's still plenty to learn in exploring the cosmos.

REPRINTED FROM THE DETROIT NEWS.

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