Oxygen Chapter 3 Page 34

Nate shook his head. "Maybe three weeks."

"And what are they, exactly?"

"The Hab."

"Hab?"

"Habitation Module. For Ares 10. This is the tuna can our boys and girl are going to ride to Mars in. Where'd you get it?"

"Overnight delivery. It came in this morning from Tokyo."

"Where'd they get it?"

"An autonomous radical cell. We're trying to trace connections now, but it's difficult. One reason I'm here is to ask your advice. Why would terrorists be interested in your program?"

Nate leaned back in his chair. "For publicity, I guess. Isn't that the usual motivation?"

"They typically have a political agenda. But why would Japanese terrorists care about an American space program?"

"It's probably a nationalism thing. The Ares Program is a hundred percent American. Right from the start, we cut out the Russians, the Europeans, and the Japanese."

"Why? Aren't we working with them on that other thing?"

"The International Space Station?" Nate scowled. "That boondoggle! Do you know how many years late and how much over budget that thing ran? International cooperation is great PR for the politicians, but if you actually want to get something done, forget it. No way you could get to Mars that way—not in my lifetime or on my budget. Even NASA by itself was too big and bureaucratic to go to Mars. We had to create a NASA-within-NASA to make it feasible."