Comment by Chip Saunders

Entered on: 7/28/2007 11:16:56 AM

Yes, I often find the conspiratorial view of things to be more likely, but history has borne out that such is the prudent point of view. Many of us who have been following the emergence of private space flight and the challenge it poses to gov't ownership of space have long forseen that gov't will eventually have to shut it down and/or co-opt its leading stars. Thus, I am suspicious of any large corporate arms manufacturer who is in incestual bond with gov't that then tries to pretend it is a 'friend' of a comany like Scaled Composites. With their access to the facility, it is not beyond imagination or practicallity that sabotage (both of SCI, and by extention, confidence in private space comopanies in general) could be what occurred here.

Burt Rutan is far too trusting, and is advised by people who are insufficiently paranoid.