{"id":167842,"date":"2025-06-08T14:55:09","date_gmt":"2025-06-08T14:55:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/167842\/"},"modified":"2025-06-08T14:55:09","modified_gmt":"2025-06-08T14:55:09","slug":"trump-vs-musk-nasa-pentagon-rattled-by-iss-threat-officials-warn-space-program-caught-in-feud","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/167842\/","title":{"rendered":"Trump vs Musk: Nasa, Pentagon rattled by ISS threat- officials warn space program caught in feud"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> <img src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/121705105.jpg\" alt=\"Trump vs Musk: Nasa, Pentagon rattled by ISS threat- officials warn space program caught in feud\" title=\"Nasa logo, left, and Elon Musk (Image credits: AP)\" decoding=\"async\" fetchpriority=\"high\"\/>Nasa logo, left, and Elon Musk (Image credits: AP) <a href=\"https:\/\/timesofindia.indiatimes.com\/topic\/nasa\" styleobj=\"[object Object]\" class=\"\" commonstate=\"[object Object]\" frmappuse=\"1\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Nasa<\/a> and the Pentagon moved quickly this past week to contact alternative spaceflight providers after a public spat between US President Donald Trump and <a href=\"https:\/\/timesofindia.indiatimes.com\/topic\/elon-musk\" styleobj=\"[object Object]\" class=\"\" commonstate=\"[object Object]\" frmappuse=\"1\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Elon Musk<\/a> raised new fears about the government\u2019s reliance on <a href=\"https:\/\/timesofindia.indiatimes.com\/topic\/spacex\" styleobj=\"[object Object]\" class=\"\" commonstate=\"[object Object]\" frmappuse=\"1\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">SpaceX<\/a>.The situation escalated when Musk, responding to Trump\u2019s threat to cancel SpaceX contracts, said he would halt flights of the Dragon spacecraft, Nasa\u2019s only current vehicle for sending astronauts to the International Space Station (ISS). Though Musk later walked back the statement, it sent shockwaves through US space and defense agencies.Following the exchange, Nasa and the Pentagon contacted several commercial companies, including Rocket Lab, Stoke Space, and Jeff Bezos\u2019s Blue Origin, about the readiness of their launch systems, according to The Washington Post.Officials at Sierra Space, developing the Dream Chaser spaceplane, confirmed Nasa had reached out and emphasised the agency\u2019s interest in avoiding reliance on a single provider.Meanwhile, Boeing\u2019s Starliner, originally intended as a backup to Dragon, remains grounded due to technical problems. Officials at Nasa and the Pentagon were alarmed by what they viewed as a sudden and impulsive move, underscoring the vulnerability of depending on a single provider. SpaceX, which holds billions in government contracts, is responsible for ferrying cargo and crew to the ISS and launching some of the military\u2019s most sensitive satellites.One Nasa official described the moment as shifting \u201cfrom entertaining to terrifying,\u201d while a Pentagon staffer noted, \u201cThis is a real issue, not a TV show.\u201d The feud also appeared to be fueled by the administration\u2019s withdrawal of Jared Isaacman\u2019s nomination as Nasa administrator. Isaacman, closely linked to Musk, had previously flown with SpaceX.Nasa has long worked closely with SpaceX, despite previous concerns about Musk\u2019s behavior. But the latest episode prompted renewed debate about whether critical systems like national missile defense and astronaut transport should be entrusted to a company, or person, capable of making such sweeping decisions unilaterally. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Nasa logo, left, and Elon Musk (Image credits: AP) Nasa and the Pentagon moved quickly this past week&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":167843,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3844],"tags":[70186,295,11366,874,8723,70,413,1603,67916,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-167842","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-space","8":"tag-commercial-spaceflight","9":"tag-elon-musk","10":"tag-international-space-station","11":"tag-nasa","12":"tag-pentagon","13":"tag-science","14":"tag-space","15":"tag-spacex","16":"tag-trump-vs-musk","17":"tag-uk","18":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114648326056568201","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/167842","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=167842"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/167842\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/167843"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=167842"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=167842"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=167842"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}