Former NASA administrator Richard Truly told a National Research Council committee on June 26 that he was utterly confused about NASAs current direction. (credit: J. Foust)

NASA may have had its issues over the years, from strained budgets to programs running behind schedule and over budget, but one thing it has never suffered from is a lack of advice. While the space agency has its own sounding boards, in the form of the NASA Advisory Council and the Aerospace Safety Advisory Panel, there have been plenty of external reviews of the agencys aims and efforts, often created at the behest of the White House or Congress. The result has been a steady stream of reports offering insights and recommendationsalthough that advice often remains trapped on the pages of those reports, never to be implemented by NASA or its overseers on either end of Pennsylvania Avenue.

Another exercise in studying NASAs present situation and offering advice for the agency is underway. The fiscal year 2012 appropriations bill that funded NASA included report language directing the agency to undertake an independent assessment of its strategic direction. That study, the report mandated, would evaluate whether NASAs overall strategic direction remains viable and whether agency management is optimized to support that direction.

NASA brought in the National Research Council to perform the NASAs Strategic Direction study, which is currently underway. The committee has held a pair of public meetings, including one in late June that included presentations by a number of current NASA officials, including administrator Charles Bolden. The June meeting also featured three of Boldens predecessors: Richard Truly, James Beggs, and Sean OKeefe. The perspectives of those former administrators in particular provided some interesting insights into both the agencys past and its future.

Some former administrators, in their comments to the committee, raised concern about the future direction of NASAor, more accurately, a perception that the agency lacks direction. I cant tell you how many times in the last few years I have been asked, What do you think of NASAs new direction? recalled Truly. And I cant answer that question. I am utterly confused.

Truly, who served as NASA administrator from 1989 to 1992, left the space field behind after leaving NASA, eventually taking a position as director of the Department of Energys National Renewable Energy Laboratory in Colorado. He described himself to the committee today as a citizen who lives way out there in the country who watches NASAs activities from afar.

Truly said that after President George W. Bush announced the Vision for Space Exploration, whose elements included the retirement of the Space Shuttle, he got comfortable with the idea of ending the shuttle program to help fund the future exploration systems. But I never dreamed that the president then would not make another speech about the Vision after his January 2004 address at NASA Headquarters, Truly said, and the program was not properly funded. He sounded disappointed that, when the Obama Administration decided to cancel the Constellation program in 2010, it did not decide to keep the shuttle going.

The confusion he said he experiences about NASAs direction should be a concern, he warned. But if Im confused, and you multiply me by the millions of citizens who may also be confused, this is a dangerous situation for NASA. And thats the reason that makes this study so important.

Beggs, who was NASA administrator from mid-1981 through 1985, also expressed concern about NASAs direction in his comments to the committee later the same day. He noted NASAs 2011 strategic plan includes six specific goals, from extend and sustain human activities across the solar system to public outreach and fostering innovation.

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NASA's past considers its future