The Case for Mars: The Plan to Settle the Red Planet and Why We Must [Brossura]

I read the first edition of Dr. Zubrin's book when it first appeared. Since then I have come to admire greatly his personal qualities of intelligence, technical acumen, commitment, and vision; what he's done to promote a sane, productive, and progressive humans-in-space program is extraordinary. His book makes a clear, convincing case for redirecting the efforts of NASA, in conjunction with private enterprise, toward mounting a "manned" mission to Mars within 10 years. He explains how this is doable and why we owe it to ourselves and our descendants to do it. Zubrin's one of those people who lead the way in human progress, and I hope that everyone who reads this book and agrees with his recommendations will write their representatives and help persuade them to take a look at them and to take action. Zubrin's showing us that we don't have to buy into the creeping paradigm of human limits, that we can use our intelligence and ingenuity to solve our environmental, social, and technological problems and create a positive world of the future. The answers are out there. Going to Mars would help spark interest in our young people to take up careers in science and engineering. Developing that human capital would do more to resolve global problems than anything else. Read this book and feel hopeful again.

Interesting and informative. Zubrin has the mind of an engineer and the heart of a dreamer - exactly what this book calls for. He explains clearly what appears to be a practical, relatively low-cost route to Mars, and why Mars should be our next goal. Why haven't we done this already??

If you think the Space Shuttle and the ISS are great, this book will shatter that illusion. This book describes what we should have been doing instead with all those billions. As I write this review the future for the US space program looks bleak; a better example of America's decline cannot be found.

Zubrin makes a convincing argument that without a new frontier the historically vital spirit of America will be snuffed out by growing bureaucracy, irrationalism, and stagnation. (Any of these sound familiar?) Zubrin shows why Mars is the future frontier that America and all humanity needs, in order to continue to innovate and for democratic ideals to survive. In the solar system, Mars is the place most like earth and has the variety of resources that colonists will need.

When the first town is built on Mars they should name it after Zubrin, in recognition of his ground-work in this book. To reach Mars any time soon, maybe we should pass over bureaucratic NASA and just give Zubrin and his Mars Society the funding to make it happen.

Zubin claims we can send the first explorers to Mars for $30 billion total, spread out over 10 years. I recently read he is now saying $50 billion is more realistic. Either way, this is cheap. To put this in perspective consider that the entire US defense budget for just one year is $600 billion.

Zubrin has shown the world a cheap and reasonable path to Mars. After reading this book, I am confident Americans will one day go to the next-most-habitable planet in the solar system. Even if only to visit the Chinese colonies there.

I bought and reviewed Dr. Robert Zubrin's original The case For Mars...5 stars see my review. I bought his second revised edition at the Aug 2011 Mars Society (I'm a life member) convention in Grape Vine Texas. The book reads well with no boring parts.

DR Robert Zubrin with the help of engineer Baker are the co inventors/sponsor of Mars Direct a low cost method of landing 3 people on Mars and after 1 1/2 years for exploration take them back to Earth. Also a more evolved later program Mars Semi Direct allows at low cost 4 people to land on Mars and back. These programs are without big expensive "Battle Star Galactica" ships built in space with the help of the ISS and no moon base needed.

Also lots of spacecraft have landed on Mars and orbited it to give us a better understanding of Mars after the first book was published. We know know that in the far past Mars was a wet, warmer world that may have had enough time for life to evolve. We now know that there is lots of frozen water under parts of the Mars regolith and occasionally liquid water for a short time may make it to the Mars surface before gassing off. Because of Mar's low atmospheric pressure liquid water can't exist on the surface today.

The revised book has some great B/W pictures and charts of the different velocities, exhaust pressures and times needed to get to Mars using the different methods discussed.The use of the Opposition and Conjunction launch methods are discussed and why the Opposition method is less desirable. Some of the charts were a little difficult for me to understand but I got the vast majority of it. Lots of easy to understand chemical formulas for making rocket fuel, plastics and other materials from the Martian atmosphere.

There is a good section on making bricks on Mars for living spaces as well as thin Kevlar like structures for domes. Information about growing crops and why Mars is the only place in the solar system besides Earth for an eventual self sustaining colony that can grow its own crops and make their own supplies and materials to live. Mars has all the elements needed, a slightly longer than 24 hour day needed for photosynthesis with seasons about twice as long as Earth's. The moon does not. Venus is a seething run away Greenhouse effect hell world.

The book details the creation of a Mars base and later mars colonization and the role Mars would play on the mining of the belt asteroids as well as mining on Mars. Later terraforming Mars is discussed.

The solutions of the radiation problem ,no gravity to Mars and not needing a lunar base to go Mars are discussed.

The need of deliberate global Mars warming by melting CO2 ice with huge space mirrors, greenhouse gases producing organisms, use of CFCs to raise the Mar's pressure to get a runaway increase in pressure to a few hundred millibars is shown, enough for simple plants to exist and make more oxygen through photosynthesis.

Extinct bacteria life may be under the Mar's regolith as confirmed by the Mars meteorite ALH84001 found in Antarctica as is pointed out in the Special Addendum in the back of the book.

Appendix 2 gives great reasons why we MUST go to Mars and why its so important for the surival and expansion of the human race.

This book has it all! Here is a top notch book by Dr Robert Zubrin with Richard Wagner's help. If we use either the Mars Direct approach or the Semi Direct Approach to get a manned mission to Mars INMO Dr Zubrin should get the Nobel Prize. INMO a manned Mars mission, building a Mars base and eventually colonizing Mars is that important. Read The Case for Mars revised edition ( if you can't get the revised edition for some reason get his first edition) to learn the importance of going to Mars and what it means to the entire human race to prosper, expand and maybe finding extinct or living life under the Mar's regolith and answering " Are we alone in the Universe?" Both books 5 stars. New material in the revised edition so I liked it even more. 5 stars plus!