2003-02-03 - 12:13 a.m.

We, and by "we" I mean Allen Dulles and the cultists of intelligence in the OSS who later tapdanced their way into the newfangled Central Intelligence Agency, brokered a deal with the disintegrating Nazi army to bring rocket scientists to American shores, with the simple intention of having them apply their knowledge of buzzbomb mechanics and V2 engines to the noble cause of launching living beings into space.

Dr. von Braun and the rest of his monocled colleagues kept up their part of the deal admirably, as well they might have given the awesome amount of manpower and resources we poured into them.

The Soviets, for their part, played the role of our foil nicely, launching a lemon-sized sphere that went "beep" to orbit menacingly over American soil to chivvy us towards the stars.

We heroically slashed the bonds of gravity and stepped up like demigods into the twinkling aether on teetering obelisks of pulp fiction and golden towers of hubris.

It's been a costly battle, keeping ourselves poised balletically between dear ol' Grammy Gaea and the terra incognita of the final frontier.

Rockets have exploded every with almost eerie regularity, destroying billions of dollars worth of satellites and equipment. The Cosmodromes and Cape Canaveral and French Guiana and the Chinese and the Japanese have all lost millions of man-hours and some of the most advanced technology on the planet in fleeting instants of flame that brought the heart of the sun to earth.

Mars has swallowed more than ten Russian probes and at least two famously expensive American projects, the Climate Orbiter and the Polar Lander. Former NASA man Richard Hoagland referred to the "Great Martian Ghoul" as being legendary among the rocketeers.

But as in all great human endeavors, the true costs are accounted for in the lives of the foolhardy and the brave.

Russia has taken the brunt of the cost, certainly, losing more than eighty technicians at Baikonur when a rocket exploded in 1960, and fifty more in 1980 when a rocket booster blew up the Plesetsk Cosmodrome. Vladimir Komarov, a ballsy Commie bastard to the end, became the first man to die on a mission to space when his parachute failed on re-entry in 1967. He was quickly followed by three more cosmonauts in 1971 when they burned into the atmosphere on re-entry from the longest endurance run on a space laboratory on record at the time.

On January 27, 1967, America lost Virgil Grissom, Edward White, and Roger Chaffee to a flash fire aboard the first Apollo during a simulated launch. The pall cleared as time marched on and America's space program coasted blithely along, losing Titan missiles and Delta rockets here and there, until January 28, 1986, when the Challenger, carrying the nigh-mythical public educator Christa MacAuliffe, went on to glory. In 1990, at least one noble airman at Edwards Air Force Base was killed by an exploding Titan rocket. And on February 1, 2003, the good ship Columbia, the oldest shuttle in the fleet, disintegrated 207,000 feet above the ground, taking with it six American astronauts and the first Israeli in space.

Fault of craft?

Twist of fate?

Act of war?

Hint of conspiracy?

Hand of God?

So ka?

Simpler.

Just more gravestones paving the road to the heavens.

*****

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