David DiCarlo's Opening Comments at 26th National Space Symposium

Opening Ceremony Remarks
David M. DiCarlo, Ph.D., sector vice president and general manager, Space Systems Division, Northrop Grumman
April 12, 2010

On behalf of Northrop Grumman I'd like to welcome everyone to the 26th National Space Symposium. I'd like to also offer my personal congratulations to all of tonight's award winners. We are all privileged to be part of an industry that attracts such dedicated, creative people.

People, of course, are the very foundation of our space accomplishments. True, the technology is impressive but the people who create it are the real story.

And they've been creating it for decades. It is the thousands behind the scenes who make possible the grand events that play out on the stages of Earth orbit and beyond.  We note this week one of those milestones, the launch on April 12, 1961 of the Russian Cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin, who became the first human in orbit. A month later, Alan Shepard became the first American in space.

Today, space is integral to our economy, our national security and our scientific prowess in ways almost unimaginable back in the 1960s.

The U.S. military depends upon space assets. Even irregular warfare is not low-tech warfare. The smaller, leaner irregular warfare force depends on the interconnectedness of space, air and ground assets.

The demand for wideband MILSATCOM capability is increasing almost exponentially. This year, the first Advanced Extremely High Frequency satellite will be launched - part of a new system that will increase the protected communications data rate more than five fold. And space still provides the best vantage point for missile defense and warning. In times of ballistic missile proliferation, these systems are even more essential for our national security.

This year we also celebrate the 50th anniversary of the first weather satellite. On April 1, 1960, the first Television Infrared Observation Satellite was launched from Cape Canaveral. Today, satellite imagery is a staple of the nightly weather report and indispensible to our warfighters. Over the longer term, as we strive to better understand the complex forces of climate change, space-based sensors will provide much of the information to help us build better predictive models and plan for future contingencies.

NASA Administrator Charles Bolden promises that manned and unmanned systems have a place in the future of space exploration. Certainly robotic missions like the Mars Lander and last year's LCROSS mission have provided a strong return on investment given the wealth of scientific data they provided. So, too, have the great space observatories -- Chandra and Hubble whose images inspire scientists and amateur stargazers alike. They will soon be joined by the James Webb Space Telescope which promises to help us better understand the very formation of the universe. 

Now it's easy and natural to focus on the machines and past successes. But that does not guarantee the future. Our continued space endeavors depend upon people. And that industrial base is indeed fragile.

Quite simply, industry and government are out of synch. In today's fiscal environment with a global economic crisis and deficits as far as the eye can see, there is pressure for the government to pull back from investing in innovation. The trend is toward "good enough."
 
As the amount of engineering work decreases -- particularly the cutting edge work in new technologies -- experienced engineers leave the industry. And once these people are gone, they take their capabilities with them. It becomes extremely expensive and difficult to reconstitute crucial capabilities five or 10 years later. And certainly, most young engineers would think twice about entering a field where manufacturing last year's model is as challenging as it gets.

It is these very people who have kept us competitive and in the forefront of the technologies that will define the future in ways we cannot yet understand. We need to respect this fact and realize that our industrial base is people.
Engineers need to be inspired, too. They push the boundaries of the possible and ultimately they want to see their work inserted into programs and making a difference.

Other nations are not standing still. As their economies grow, so do their aspirations in space and their capabilities to achieve them.

The exodus of engineering talent from the U.S. space industry might not be as dramatic an impetus for change as Gagarin beating us into orbit. But it represents an equally clear and present threat.

The solutions are not simple but we must be proactive. Government and industry must collaborate on a long-term strategy, one where the government enables the space industry to keep investing in innovation without it eroding profitability. And we need a steady, predictable flow of R&D dollars so industry can plan accordingly and maintain the proper people and capital levels over the long-term.

As serious as the situation is, I'm ultimately an optimist. You see space still inspires the dreams of a new generation.