20 Years Of Non-Stop Peaceful Cooperation In Space
“What if we built a bridge, between and above all nations, to jointly discover the galaxy’s great unknowns?” Join us this fall as we prepare to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the International Space Station. As a global endeavor, 240 people from 19 countries have visited the unique microgravity laboratory, which has hosted more than 2,800 research investigations from scientists in over 100 nations.”
Why the International Space Station Deserves Consideration for a Nobel Peace Prize, ISS National Laboratory
If you add the Shuttle-Mir program in the cooperation goes back over 26 years to the first mission in February 1994. So basically a generation grew up seeing the U.S. and Russia work together in space.
I’ve been pushing this peanut up the hill for at least 10 years. When I originally proposed it while at NASA, senior managers seemed uninterested. I received comments like “The prize can’t go to a group.” “Who would accept the award.” “The ISS isn’t a great technical achievement.” Ken Human, an official at JSC and later Stennis also promoted the concept with little success. The message ought to be to nominate the “partnership” for the prize. Unless the administrator puts someone in charge to officially manage the nomination campaign, it will continue to languish. Glad ISSNSL is finally joining a an advocate – what took so long?
You know university professors are allowed to nominate candidates for the Peace Prize. I know there are a number of professors besides myself who post here. Maybe we could get together to organize a campaign. If a number of professors, from different institutions in different nations get together to do it jointly it should make an impression on the prize committee and get the ISS partnership some notice.
Great idea. This is an initiative that requires a coordinated effort. NASA needs to put a person in charge as project manager to lead this and work with the international partners on a comprehensive plan.
Actually NASA would not be qualified to make a nomination. Indeed, since they are part of the ISS partnership such a campaign would probably be considered a form of self-nomination and so it would be better if they were not involved. Here are the rules on who may submit a nomination.
https://www.nobelprize.org/…
Qualified nominators
Revised September 2016
An international group of university professors who have no direct connection to the ISS would probably give it the best chance at being selected.
CS have been told in the last several years that it was illegal and inappropriate for CS to be pushing an external entity like the Nobel committee to offer the prize to a government entity like NASA. Apparently there were other thoughts a few years ago when you and Ken were pushing it.
Peaceful? Ask Ukraine and Georgia how peaceful it has been. Ask the Syrians.
Now that the Soyuz gravy train has come to an end and we are not bribing Russia to maintain the “peace” lets see how long “peace” is going to last.
Huh? Ukraine and Georgia fought in space? Syria?
I wonder how much Project Paper Clip etc—in particular MSFC’s contributions (including those from former adversaries) to NASA’s civilian space mission—may have paved the way for our cooperation on the high frontier with our former Cold War enemy.
The ISS is an international project involving 14 countries: Russia, the USA, Japan, Canada and members of the European Space Agency Belgium, Germany, Denmark, Spain, Italy, Netherlands, Norway, France, Switzerland, Sweden. This is where the cooperation between countries can lead.