Hey everybody, welcome back to the Elon Musk podcast.
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shape SpaceX. Tesla X, The Boring Company, and
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SpaceX is working with the Department of Defense on the
Starship program. And this is a huge leap for
SpaceX because currently they launched Department of Defense
satellites with the Falcon 9 rocket.
But with Starship, that's a whole other game.
It's huge. It can take tons of cargo to low
Earth orbit and beyond. And the Department of Defense is
greedy, and they want to stick their fangs into the Starship
program as deep as possible. They're frothing at the mouth of
this thing because it can transport cargo anywhere in the
world from point A to point B in about an hour.
So any amount of tonnage that the Department of Defense needs,
they can get it there within an hour.
And SpaceX could provide that if the Starship is successful.
Now they've already had a few test launches IFT 1, IFT 2.
They're coming up on IFT 3 sometime in February.
Hopefully, and if they are successful with this, will be a
game changer for SpaceX. The Department of Defense is
looking deep into space XS reserves and they know that they
can count on SpaceX to make a rocket that's going to be
sustainable for the near term and also the long term of the
Department of Defense for the United States.
So, and what does the Department of Defense need now?
They already have the Falcon 9, right?
They can transport stuff up into space, but they want to do point
to point. They want to do people from
point A to point B. But do they want SpaceX in
charge of this? That is the key.
The Department of Defense works with other contractors and they
make sure that they are in charge of the Rockets and not
the people and the the producers of the Rockets.
So they want to do this now with SpaceX.
And there's been some insight here from Irene Klotz.
The Department of Defense has requested take over Starship for
individual missions from Aviation Week network and wrote
a great article about this. Irene did a great job here.
So let's see here. I'm sorry.
Brian Everstein did the article, Irene posted it.
The Pentagon has approached SpaceX about potentially taking
over Starship for sensitive, potentially dangerous missions
as a government owned the government operated asset.
Instead of contracting the company to launch payloads so
the government would control the Starship, the particular
Starship or starships, they would launch them on their own
accord. Maybe they would launch them
through SpaceX. We're not sure yet, but they're
looking into it. How do you feel about that?
How do you feel about the government being in control of
starships? Because the Starship is supposed
to send people in cargo to the moon and to Mars in a peaceful
way, is it OK for the Department of Defense to get their hands on
the Starship and the technology behind Starship?
And if they can launch it themselves, is that a good
thing? Let me know in the comments
because I I have mixed emotions about this one because I think
it's important to realize that SpaceX isn't just in it for the
humanity benefit. Sending people to the moon to
Mars beyond is great, but they already do Department of Defense
stuff. They've sent up spy satellites
for the Department of Defense is they're up there already, so
they're already in bed with the Department of Defense.
Is this a game changer though? Is this a different thing?
What could they transport on Starship they could not
transport on a Falcon 9 and that's transporting troops and
cargo across the world, the Department of Defense
represented said. We've had conversations, It
really came down to specific mission where it's a very
specific and sometimes elevated risk or maybe a dangerous use
case for the Department of Defense where they're asking
themselves do we need to own it as a particular asset.
SpaceX, can you accommodate that?
Basically asking SpaceX, hey, can you build this Starship?
It's like when somebody builds the Department of Defense a
tank, and that tank is owned by the government Now the builder
doesn't own it anymore. The Department of Defense owns
that tank. Is this what's going to happen
to starships in the future? And they said we've been
exploring all kinds of options to deal with those questions.
You know, they they move cargo like I was saying, like they're
going to be moving cargo. They already have a Starship
contract with the Department of Defense to move cargo.
And eventually they'll have a contract to move people once
they human rate this. And of course, we know that it's
capable of carrying. I think Elon said 100 people at
a time. So if you could get 100 troops
anywhere in the world within an hour, would you do it?
If you're the Department of Defense, of course you would.
You'd buy your own rockets to do it too.
And you'd build your own Starship facility where you
could launch the starships. You could catch the boosters.
It'll be all under the watchful eye of SpaceX.
They'd build it, probably. They'd contract them to build
the launch pads, the landing pads, the Rockets, of course,
and or at least give them the blueprints, if you want to put
it in a very broad term, to build these things, to build the
launchpad, the landing pad, the chopsticks, the arms, the tower,
everything. And once SpaceX nails this, the
Department of Defense is going to be all over this.
I want to know, of course, like, I want to know what you think,
because I'm still, I know what SpaceX does already.
I know that they do this for the Department of Defense already,
Air Force already Space Force already NASA of course because
they're they're a department of the US government.
But is this a different thing with the government owning
starships? Is this a whole, this is a huge
leap. You know you making those assets
and then they go on to say if we can buy the commercial service
that's what we're going to do. But there might be some use
cases where we where there needs to be a government owned,
government operated vehicle. That transfer can happen on the
fly. So if they can buy a commercial
service, say OK, let's load up some cargo from Boca Chica
Starbase, Texas and fly it to some place, you know anywhere
else in the world, That's not bad, That's not a bad thing.
Just get the military to bring down their assets, to bring down
their cargo to Starbase loaded up on a Starship and then launch
it from now. That's not a big deal.
They do that all the time. They do that with cargo planes,
cargo helicopters, etcetera. This is a rocket though.
It's pretty big deal, pretty different.
But if the Department of Defense could do this and their own
property, how often would they do this?
It's a little bit scary that they would have that power to
get anywhere in the world within an hour.
Ish. How to say about an hour?
So Brian, you nailed it. That's a great article and it's
short. It's easy to read, but I think
we may be in trouble. I'm just saying this is very
powerful, this is very powerful. And I think we have to keep an
eye on this because there's just so many things could happen with
the Starship that it was just it was a game changer for
everything, for the cargo and the people and other assets that
the government and the Department of Defense can move
around. So I just want to have a
discussion with you today because I thought it was
pertinent. And I think the Starship, even
though we have Mars on the horizon, is it possible that bad
things can happen on Earth because of the Starship?
And does that sway your opinion about SpaceX?
All the other rocket companies do it, not the same thing.
They build systems for the Department of Defense.
So there's already precedent being set.
SpaceX, like I said before, takes cargo to space for the
Department of Defense. I don't know.
There's so many things, there's so many things to think about.
It's in my wheelhouse, but I'm not in the Department of
Defense. So I understand why they do it.
I really do. I understand why they would do
it. It makes tons of sense.
But is it the right thing to do? I don't know.
That's where I'm.
I don't know. So I want to have a discussion
about this. I want you guys to talk about it
because I think we need to. We need to make our voices heard
about this stuff. I think it's important that we
have a strong military, but I also think it's important that
sometimes you do the right thing.
I know, let's skip. But if this is a ton of money
for SpaceX, does it outweigh? Do they use this Department of
Defense money to build more starships?
To get more cargo to Mars? To get more people to Mars?
Is it worth it at the end of the day to get people to Mars by
doing this? By selling starships to the
Department of Defense? Possible billions of dollar
investment from the DoD towards SpaceX and towards Starbase?
And that's a lot of money. When you are a rocket company,
it's a lot of money. So yeah, there's a lot, there's
a lot to consider here. And hope you take this into
consideration when you think about SpaceX too, because even
though their aspirations are huge and monumental, and they're
going to get us to other planets and take cargo everywhere in the
solar system, that's wonderful. But what's the trade off?
I'll leave you with that. What's the trade off?
Let me know in the comments. Thanks for watching.
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Maybe I have T4, might be a good one.
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I still got to get settled in. It's a great time though for me.
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All right. Take care everybody.
I'll see you in the next one. Hey, thank you.
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