“The province of all mankind.”

Words, I know words, I have the best words.

Donald J. Trump, campaign rally, December 20, 2015

You'd think that with fatalities from the coronavirus edging up to 100,000 in the United States, the US government would be concentrating on the pandemic. Wrong - apparently there's no time like the present to look to the future, and that's what the Trump administration is doing with the new Artemis Accords that are under development by NASA.

Named after the new Artemis moon program, the purpose of the Artemis Accords will be to formalize a number of co-operative aspects of space exploration as part of NASA's plans to return to the Moon by 2024. (Albeit for a given value of co-operative, as Terry Pratchett would say.)

Based on NASA's outline for the Accords, for the most part they're simply restating existing agreements and practices.  There's a lot of language like "reaffirms", "reinforces", and "consistent with", as in the Emergency Assistance section, which reaffirms NASA's commitment to the Agreement on the Rescue of Astronauts, as well as committing to take "all reasonable steps”* to “render assistance to astronauts in distress".

Other sections will discuss practical issues. For example, the section on Interoperability will call for international standards for systems - which makes perfect sense, you really don't want to find out that a critical connector needs an adapter when you're in a hurry to provide an oxygen supply in an emergency.**

It all sounds very equitable:  Peaceful Purposes, Transparency and Release of Scientific Data, Protecting Heritage Sites - well, let's be honest here, this is a bit self-serving, it's mostly NASA who's been leaving tracks and flags on the Moon, but still a good idea.

And then we get into what feels like the real purpose of this whole exercise:  the sections on Space Resources and Deconfliction of Activities.  Up until now, I didn't even realize that deconflict was a word, but the internet seems to recognize it as both a noun and a verb, although my Concise Oxford Dictionary doesn't include it.

The Space Resources section “reinforces that space resource extraction and utilization can and will be conducted under the auspices of the Outer Space Treaty, with specific emphasis on Articles II, VI and XI.”  This strikes me as an obvious follow-up to last month’s Executive Order endorsing commercial exploitation of resources in outer space – making the Accords the next paving stone on the road to Hell, as it were, although in the case, I don’t think they qualify as good intentions.

Because, unfortunately, none of those three articles actually say anything about extraction and utilization – instead, they talk about celestial bodies (like the Moon) “not being subject to national appropriation…by means of use or occupation (Article II), or that all the signators to the Treaty are responsible for ensuring that “national activities in outer space…are carried out in conformity with the provisions set forth in the present Treaty” (Article VI) and last but not least, that any States conducting activities in outer space should let everyone know the “nature, conduct, locations and results of such activities.” (Article XI).

How about Article I?  “The exploration and use of outer space…shall be carried out for the benefit and in the interests of all countries”?

Equally strangely, the Article from the Outer Space Treaty cited for Deconfliction of Activities doesn’t really match with NASA’s apparent intentions. This part of the Accords suggests that they’ll provide information regarding the location and “general nature” of operations which will inform the scale and scope of “Safety Zones”, zones which would be “respected” to “prevent harmful interference”.

"Safety zones" - I love a good euphemism.  Obviously this doesn't mean that the US would be claiming any territory, heavens no, they just want other astronauts to be SAFE, to avoid “harmful interference” with their activities – and who exactly is interfering with whom?  The initial phrasing makes it sound like respecting the safety zones will stop the other partners from interfering.  Sorry, but the shoe is on the other foot - Article IX stipulates that if any party to the Treaty is going to do anything that might cause harmful interference, they are obliged to consult with the other parties before proceeding with said activity, rather than calling on them to “respect” independently established zones. In fact, just referring to this as Deconfliction seems to be the wrong terminology – is this about safety or conflict?

It’s easy to see the hand - or perhaps pen - of the Trump government in action yet again, the same pen that has rolled back close to one hundred environmental rules in order to make life easier for industry: safety regulations for offshore drilling, controls on methane leaks, clean-water rules, reductions in coal-powered plants, and so on.

The Accords are currently in draft and haven't been officially discussed with any of NASA's partners in space exploration.  There will be no United Nations involvement, because the US administration sees no need to involve non-spacefaring countries in the discussion and wishes to expedite the process by bypassing the UN.  Sigh. the first lines of Article I again, in their complete form:

The exploration and use of outer space, including the moon and other celestial bodies, shall be carried out for the benefit and in the interests of all countries, irrespective of their degree of economic or scientific development, and shall be the province of all mankind.

Press coverage of the new Accords includes any number of references to the fact that up until now, NASA has been all about science, technology and discovery, rather than a tool of diplomacy.  How sad to see that come to an end.

- Sid

* "Reasonable steps" being measured on a scale from 1 to Matt Damon.

** That being said, I would think that there must already be agreed upon standards in place to ensure that different manufacturers in different countries are building connectors and hatches to the same set of specifications to permit docking with the International Space Station.

The Star Wars.

Until the recent GREAT REBELLION, the JEDI BENDU were the most feared warriors in the universe. For one hundred thousand years, generations of JEDI perfected their art as the personal bodyguards of the emperor. They were the chief architects of the invincible IMPERIAL SPACE FORCE which expanded the EMPIRE across the galaxy, from the celestial equator to the farthest reaches of the GREAT RIFT.

Now these legendary warriors are all but extinct. One by one they have been hunted down and destroyed as enemies of the NEW EMPIRE by a ferocious and sinister rival warrior sect, THE KNIGHTS OF SITH.

Scrolling introduction to The Star Wars, 1974

To celebrate this year’s May the Fourth and Revenge of the Fifth, I took a look at the original script for The Star Wars, an early 1974 draft by George Lucas for what would eventually turn into A New Hope.  This is also the script that concept artist Ralph McQuarrie read before creating the classic paintings that helped Lucas sell the movie to Twentieth Century Fox.

The Star Wars has the same broad canvas as A New Hope: a struggle against an evil Galactic Empire whose gigantic space fortress provides them with overwhelming tactical power. A rebel princess, an aged warrior-mystic and a young apprentice save the day with the help of two comic-relief robots and someone named Han. But it’s not as similar as it sounds…

In the 1974 script, Kane Starkiller, a Jedi-Bendu master who is more machine than man, is father to “ruggedly handsome” 18-year old Annikin and his 10-year old brother Deak.  After raiding Sith Knights kill Deak in a savage attack, Kane and Annikin leave their home on the fourth moon of Utapau, which fans will recognize as the name of the rocky planet where Obi-Wan duels General Grievous in Revenge of the Sith, and travel to the independent Aquilae system, ruled by King Kayos and Queen Breha.  They have three children: two sons, 7-year old Biggs and 5-year old Windom, and a daughter – Leia, the eldest at 14 (which finally explains why she’s a princess in A New Hope – her father was originally a king.)

Once on Aquilae, Kane and Annikin meet with another Jedi-Bendu, the elderly but powerful General Luke Skywalker, who leads the Aquilaean Starforce.  Kane reveals that he is dying and leaves his remaining son to become a Padawan Learner to Skywalker - we don't hear the term padawan in the movies until the first prequel.

Meanwhile, the New Empire plans its final assault on Aquilae, under the control of the grim General Darth Vader and spearheaded by the Empire’s masked Sith Knights, led by Valorum, the First Knight of the Sith.

Aquilae receives advanced warning of the imminent attack from Clieg Whitsun, their agent on Alderaan, the capital of the New Empire, which allows Aquilaean Starfighters to launch an attack on the space fortress.  During the chaos of the battle, a pair of panicked Imperial construction robots, See Threepio and Artwo Detwo, abandon ship in a lifepod and crashland in the planet's desert wastelands, only to be picked up by Annikin as he returns to the capital after forcefully collecting Princess Leia from her classes at the Academy.

King Kayos is killed in the assault, and his senate surrenders to the New Empire. General Skywalker kills the craven council member responsible for the surrender, and Queen Breha abdicates in favour of Leia – Lucas later revives the idea of a 14 year old planetary leader with Queen Amidala in The Phantom Menace.  

Luke, Annikin and Clieg smuggle the new queen and her brothers off the planet with the assistance of rebel agent Han Solo, an Ureallian who is described as “a huge green skinned monster with no nose and gills”. 

Kane Starkiller sacrifices himself by taking the power source from his cybernetic body to power one of the stasis packs used to conceal the two boys, and after a brief tribute to the old Jedi Bendu, they board a Baltarian freighter headed off-planet.

Unfortunately, the freighter is a trap.  The fugitives are split up and captured by Valorum, who threatens to use gas to subdue the Jedi, a strategy reused by the Trade Federation against Qui-Gon Jinn and Obi-Wan Kenobi at the beginning of The Phantom Menace.  Skywalker and Solo escape from their guards, free their companions, and make their escape with the assistance of the two robots.

They steal an Imperial ship and flee the spaceport, pursued by hunter-destroyer spaceships. As they prepare to fight off the Imperial fighters from twin lazer cannon turrets, Annikin confesses to Whitsun that he has fallen in love with Leia, who loves him in return. (A wise move by Lucas to change this up - it's cute when a 9-year-old Anakin falls in love with 14-year-old Padme in The Phantom Menace, it's a bit creepy when he's 18.)

Overmatched by the hunter-destroyers, Skywalker takes the ship into an asteroid belt* in a desperate attempt to lose their pursuers. The Imperial ships turn back, but the asteroids destroy the hijacked vessel, and its passengers board the lifepods as the badly damaged ship goes into orbit around nearby Yavin, one of the Forbidden Planets - forbidden by whom or why never seems to come up.  Clieg and Leia's pod refuses to eject, so Clieg bravely remains on the ship and manually jettisons the pod, only to die in the explosion that follows.

The three escape pods land safely on the jungle-covered surface, but Leia is captured by deformed aliens who are hunting and trapping the primitive Wookees** who inhabit the planet.

Annikin attempts to rescue the princess, but after killing most of the trappers he's knocked unconscious by explosive lazer fire as the survivors flee.  Chewbacca, one of the native Wookees who has been accidentally set lose by Annikin during the fight, frees his companions, one of whom picks up Annikin, and they vanish into the jungle. 

Annikin recovers at the Wookee villages, and after proving himself to the Wookees in ritual combat, he heads off into the jungle with R2, followed by Chewbacca.

Meanwhile, Skywalker, Solo and the two boys have found a scientific outpost occupied by a pair of helpful anthropologists, Owen Lars and his wife Beru, who reappear as Luke's adoptive uncle and aunt in the films.

The general and Solo go to scout the nearby Imperial base, leaving 3P0 to watch over the two princes.  They encounter Annikin at the site of the struggle with the trappers, and follow their trail to the base, which is under siege by the Wookees, who have been unable to overcome the Empire's more advanced technology.

While they plan their strategy, an Imperial squad discovers the two children and 3P0 at the outpost and takes them into custody.

Led by Skywalker and Solo, the Wookees successfully defeat the Imperials using a variety of primitive boobytraps and deadfalls (as repeated by Ewoks in The Return of the Jedi).  Once inside the base, they learn that Leia has been taken back to Aquilae.

Skywalker and Starkiller study plans of the Empire's space fortress from R2's construction database - the first and only time it's referred to as the "death star" in the script - and Annikin disguises himself as an Imperial pilot and leaves with R2 in a daring attempt to rescue the princess, as the general and Solo begin training the Wookees to fly the Imperial starfighters.

The Imperial squad returns to the base with Biggs, Windy and 3P0, where they are ambushed by the Wookees and the captives freed.

As Annikin lands on the space fortress, Vader is torturing Leia before placing her in detention. R2 locates her cell in the Imperial database, but the two are separated and Annikin is captured.  Valorum, the Prince of the Sith, who has somehow been demoted to a regular stormtrooper (perhaps due to the earlier escape?), turns his back on the Empire and helps Annikin to escape. They rescue Leia from her guards, and the trio is forced to escape through a garbage chute.  Vader attempts to crush them using the trash compactor, but they escape after the power is cut off by damage from the attacking Wookee pilots. They reunite with R2 and once again take to the escape pods.

The Wookee space fighter assault is successful, and General Vader dies in the cataclysmic destruction of the space fortress as Annikin and Leia kiss in their lifepod.

 
In the final scene, Queen Leia, "in all of her grandeur" and in front of a crowded throne room, gives Chewbacca a medal, upgrades the robots - no, really -  and declares Annikin the Lord Protector of Aquilae as Skywalker, Solo and Valorum look on approvingly from the sidelines.

Credits roll.

The good news is that Lucas was able to step back and take a second look at the story, resulting in a much tighter script for A New Hope: more dramatic, fewer main characters, a simplified plot revolving around the Death Star plans, and a lot fewer escape pods.

It's interesting to look at how the characters go back into the blender in order to return as the principals of the final version.  General Luke Skywalker is reborn as Obi-Wan Kenobi, and his name goes to the adopted farm boy who replaces Annikin Starkiller as the hero of the story.

Lazerswords, used by soldiers on both sides in The Star Wars, become light sabers, a more evocative name for a more elegant weapon that's used solely by the Jedi and the Sith, and the force of others, a meaningless bit of dialogue in the script, becomes the Force, the energy that holds the universe together.

Leia wisely becomes a more mature princess with serious attitude, Darth Vader gains a mask and membership in the Sith, and Jedi-hunter Prince Valorum of the Sith One Hundred vanishes, only to have his name reused for the Supreme Chancellor of the Galactic Republic in the prequel trilogy.  Han Solo goes from being green and gilled to human and hot, thereby creating the potential for a new romantic storyline, and Chewbacca retains his status as pilot - well, copilot, but still.

The Imperial City of the New Empire, located on the gaseous planet Alderaan and perched on a long spire that descends into the clouds, reappears as Cloud City, the tibanna gas mining city administrated by Lando Calrissian in The Empire Strikes Back.  The "death star" space fortress gets some capital letters to officially become the Death Star, and the Starkiller family is commemorated by Starkiller Base, the First Order planetkiller from The Force Awakens.

Speaking of the First Order, there's even a casual reference to a First Order trooper in The Star Wars, without any explanation of what the First Order might be.

I couldn't find any evidence as to whether or not the writers of the final trilogy derived the name of the Empire's successor from that one line. It's not impossible - Lucas was a creative consultant on the final trilogy, and apparently shared his rough scripts for the three movies. Based on the number of things that were recycled from The Star Wars, he may have suggested the name of the First Order, but my god, if that’s where it came from, what a small thread from which to weave such a large tapestry!

The bad news is that even after such an epic rewrite, the dialogue is still a problem. One of the key elements in science fiction story telling is the creation of a distinctive vocabulary and nomenclature that helps to establish the world in the story takes place, and although you can see what Lucas is trying to do, it just never quite rings true.

In the words of Jedi Bendu General Skywalker, may the force of others be with you.

- Sid

* The odds of successfully navigating an asteroid field are not discussed first.

** That's not a typo, Chewbacca was a Wookee before he was a Wookiee.

The Stand.

 

My apologies, this is a little dark, but recent news out of the United States suggests that several states are going to jump the gun and prematurely remove the greater part of the social restrictions that they've been using to control the spread of the coronavirus, as President Trump loudly proclaims his own genius while pointing fingers and deferring responsibility for a slow start on the government's response to the crisis.

This is all happening based on the confident assumption that things will be back to normal in the relatively near future, and all that will be left to do is to punish the innocent, and provide praise and congratulations to the non-participants, as per the list of project phases that I used to have posted over my desk at work many years ago.

Oh you fools.

COVID-19 is a warning, a microbial shot across the world's collective bow that should be taken as a declaration of hostilities.  It only illustrates our fragility as a species and our blindness as a civilization.

The current situation is nothing - welcome to Apocalypse Lite. In saying that, in no way do I wish to minimize the toll that the pandemic has taken.  It is tragic that, as I type this, almost 200,000 people have died due to the coronavirus, and more than a little frightening in that it reflects 7% of the total global cases, rather than the 3-5% originally predicted.  And that number is still rising.

Philip K. Dick once commented* that "the SF writer sees not just possibilities but wild possibilities. Its not just 'What if --' It's 'My God; what if--' In frenzy and hysteria."

So then, my God; what if? In frenzy and hysteria.

What if the mortality rate for COVID-19 was 50%?  I've read that eventually it will work its way through the entire population, like the common cold - what if it was killing every second person in the world while that was happening?

If COVID-19 had a 50% fatality rate, the people currently protesting the stay-at-home order in some US states would be hiding in their basements with the doors nailed shut, begging to be left alone - or more likely using the assault rifles that they had on display at the rallies to shoot anyone who attempted to get within a hundred feet of those doors.

I recently saw a photo of unclaimed coronavirus fatalities being inhumed in a mass grave on New York's Hart Island** - now imagine 800,000 corpses, half the population of Manhattan, truckload after truckload of bodies being desperately dumped into Central Park until avalanches of rotting corpses spilled out onto 5th Avenue and Central Park West.  Imagine every rat and carrion bird in New York State seeking out this unexpected bounty.

Imagine the smell.

Now take that picture across the entire planet.  If half the population of China was dead right now, would the remaining half even be able to bury all the bodies?  50% might take us across the invisible line that allows us to function as a society, breaking too many of the links that keep our world functioning.

Donald Trump has declared this to be a war, and he's not wrong in saying that.  The mistake is to think that the current crisis is that war in its entirety.  Wrong - this is just a skirmish, an affray, a brief crossing of lances before the real battle commences.

SARS killed 774 people in 2003, the 2014 Ebola outbreak killed 11,323, and the current list of fatalities is still growing - what happens next?  To paraphrase Winston Churchill, a much greater war leader than Trump could ever hope to be, this is not the end, or even the beginning of the end - only the end of the beginning.

And as such, we should be preparing for the real war, for the virus with 100% mortality that will eventually crawl out of some South American cavern or Tibetan crevasse or Alaskan sinkhole and sweep across the world like a black rain.

Trump wants to defund the World Health Organization - you idiot, you should take the four billion dollars you stole from the Pentagon for the Mexican border wall and spend every cent on building an army to fight the war that may lie in our future:  the WHO, the CDC, hospitals, researchers, medical schools, protective clothing, respirators, masks, disinfectants - and yes, body bags, because wars have casualties, and there will be no innocents in the viral war, only victims.

As per the Stephen King novel, we should be preparing to make our stand, and hoping against hope that it won't be futile, as so many last stands are.

- Sid

* From the introduction to The Golden Man, a collection of short stories published in 1980.  The introduction provides a wide window into Dick's personal life, and is perhaps better than some of the stories.

** Karli was tragically accurate last year when she expressed her concerns about being in Manhattan during an apocalyptic event.