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Astronauts Criticize US Space Program

Retired¹ Astronaut Eugene Cernan is one of just twelve men who walked on the moon. He currently holds the distinction of being the last man there. 

"It is tremendously disappointing that I am here 40 years later and still hold that title or have that yoke² on my shoulders," said Cernan.

Cernan, along with fellow Apollo 17 astronaut Harrison Schmitt, celebrated³ the 40th anniversary of the December 1972 mission with fellow astronaut Jim Lovell at the Adler Planetarium⁴ in Chicago.

As they returned to Earth on that long-ago December 19, Schmitt and Cernan didn't expect that 40 years later they would be commemorating⁵ it as the end of an era.

"To say that I thought it would be 40 years, or what is really going to turn out to be 50 or 60 years before Americans are back on the moon, I would not have guessed that at all," Schmitt noted⁶.

"A half century ago, we went 250,000 miles, cracked the door open, and never walked through it into the future. The future is still out there," added Cernan.

A plan to return to the moon, which President George W. Bush proposed, was scrapped⁷ by President Barack Obama.

Amid deep budget deficits⁸ and an economy slowly recovering, U.S. lawmakers are not keen to spend more money on space exploration, something Cernan says is still only a small part of the overall U.S. budget

"We spend one half of one penny of every one of our tax dollars on space, all of space," Cernan noted.

Schmitt, once a U.S. Senator, says there is also a lack of willpower on the part of NASA.

"And from a fiscal⁹ point of view, it falls victim to being very small, and to not having a mission based on geopolitical reality, of the importance of the United States being the dominant¹⁰ space faring nation," Schmitt explained.

With the Space Shuttle now retired, the U.S.- based corporation Space X is developing a vehicle that can transport people to and from earth's orbit. A manned crew capsule could be ready in the next few years. 

But for veterans of the Apollo program, that's not enough. They believe NASA should prioritize a return to the moon with Mars the ultimate destination.