Quote:
Originally Posted by kinetic
You are kidding , right?
Steve
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No, I'm not....no one wanted it except NASA and a few others. They tried killing the thing several times. One of the votes for the budget appropriation bill to build the station passed by 1 vote. That's how close it got. It was an extremely unpopular program, that was only saved because they managed to get it to a stage that everyone was willing to put up with. Clinton had a pretty hard time trying to sell it to Congress, and so did NASA. Even some of the other countries which have contributed to the station had misgivings. It was only the idea of national prestige for some that managed to keep their ends of the bargain going. Some, like Russia, the ESA and Japan had already committed to the project and couldn't pull out without losing heavily.
In the end, they blended what would've been the Russian MIR-2 concept and their own Space Station Alpha (which was a 4 man crew sized station) concept. Even there, Clinton only managed to convince Congress to opt for "Plane A".