Bridenstine Talks About Space Force When No One Else Will

Keith's note: I tuned into the Politico Space thing last night. I missed a lot of it since it was supposed to start at 6:15 but after 30 minutes of waiting for it to start I gave up and did something else. I checked back in later and listened for 15 minutes or so. I just happened to tune in just as Jim Bridenstine was asked about the whole Space Force thing. Being an actual warfighter who defended our country, a former Congressman who grappled with legislation, and a guy who thinks about space a lot, he knows his stuff.

Bridenstine answered the Space Force question cogently for 10 minutes or more, jumping back to the topic again and again later. Bridenstine clearly supports the idea of a Space Force and makes his viewpoint clearly without notes or stumbling. Indeed, now and then, he almost sounded like he was auditioning to be Space Force Commander.

What's odd about this is that no one at the Department of Defense really wants to talk about Space Force - just Bridenstine. Indeed, the impression one gets is that they are not too thrilled about turning the Pentagon into a Hexagon with a sixth service called Space Force (yes I stole that joke). You can't get the National Space Council to talk about this either. In Washington parlance Bridenstine probably got a little over his skis or was outside his swim lane a bit.

I do not think this signals any sort of military role for NASA. But this space agency does not operate in a vacuum (pun intended) when it comes to other space activities. If Bridenstine is the only one who is willing to talk about space in a larger context that includes things outside of NASA's purview such as Space Force - when no one else will - perhaps we should listen. Maybe he knows what is actually going on.

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