President-elect Donald Trump has already expressed his interest in the Mars missions. In one of his meetings with Elon Musk, the CEO of Tesla and also the founder of SpaceX, Trump apparently discussed possible Mars exploration partnerships.
Trump reportedly discussed public-private partnerships with the SpaceX CEO at the meeting, fueling speculation that the two may partner on a future Mars mission.
This news comes courtesy of the Washington Post, which cites reliable sources.
"He met at least once with Trump and, we're reliably told, discussed Mars and public-private partnerships," reported the publication.
The Mars Mission
Musk has already thought about exploring Mars and his dreams of building a colony on the red planet are no secret. It is anticipated that SpaceX could launch the first human journey to Mars as early as 2024.
Musk has been vocal about bringing humans to Mars and envisions people residing on the planet in the next 40 to 100 years.
"What I really want to do here is to make Mars seem possible - make it seem as though it's something that we could do in our lifetimes, and that you can go," Musk has said in the past.
According to the latest report, the Trump administration could possibly look to "insert a mission to the lunar surface, probably international in character, as a step on the way to Mars."
Interestingly, both Musk and Trump differ in their political views. Musk's ambitious proposal incorporates his wish to build a fleet of huge spaceships that could take a considerable number of people during a particular period to Mars.
The Moon Mission
Earlier this month with historian Douglas Brinkley, Trump spoke at a length about the Apollo program and how the incident brought the country together in the 1960s. According to sources, Trump has shown interest in John F. Kennedy's earlier assertion of sending a human mission to the moon's surface.
Brinkley also noted that the United States remains the only country to put a human mission on the moon, as well as sending a mission to Mars. However, Trump is expected to not bring any specific proposal regarding the mission to the red planet, as that could evoke controversies and unwanted media coverage pertaining to the mission's budget.
Douglas also shared that Trump may not talk about his space missions during his inaugural discourse.
"He might say something vague and morale-building about the moonshot in his inaugural, but if he got into something specific, that would seem to me a late-spring kind of thing," he said.
It is highly likely that the Republicans and the newly elected president would consider a mission to the moon as a stepping stone to the Mars mission.
Something similar was planned during former President George W. Bush's tenure, when NASA compiled a program named Constellation.
