The Association of Autonomous Astronaut's Five Year Plan is well on target. This plan aims to establish a world-wide network of local, community-based groups dedicated to building their own space ships and developing their own independent space exploration programs. The Five Year Plan began on St George's Day April 23rd 1995 with balloon launches around the world, including one held at Windsor Castle. There has been great interest from people around the world who recognise the importance of creating independent space exploration programs that are not restricted by government, military or corporate interests. Association of Autonomous Astronaut groups have been set up in London, Leeds, Glasgow and Bologna. New branches are being planned in Powys, Cardiff and Paris. There is also encouraging activity by Autonomous Astronauts across Europe and America. On the back page of this bulletin we provide a full list of current, AAA groups and some of the specific projects each group is involved with. Please contact us if,you are setting up your own Association of Autonomous Astronauts branch so we can add it to this list.

All too often those in opposition to the current government, military and corporate monopoly on space exploration fail to set themselves realistic goals. And all too often this failure, this lack of a structured and disciplined plan of action for obtaining independent space exploration, leads to cynicism, despair, defeatism and, in some cases, insanity. The Association of Autonomous Astronauts know that to achieve our goals we must firstly understand the terrain we are playing on. So our Five Year Plan emphasises the need for rigorous training. However, unlike our enemies at NASA we do not concentrate on physical capabilities, scientific careerism or military brainwashing.

Autonomous Astronauts must think for themselves. This is why the Association of Autonomous Astronauts research skills that use the imagination, requiring the ability to move in several directions at once, exploring the power to abolish thought constructs we are commonly socialised into believing like, for example, the concepts of space and time. Playing three-sided football has been a crucial component to training at East London AAA, who report that it improves competence in deception, even preparing players for learning how to change and adapt the terrain they play on.

The Five Year Plan also emphasises the need for spreading a diversity of ideas about space travel. Through a worldwide network of groups dedicated to developing their own independent space exploration programs, ideas collide with each other and new possibilities are made available. Unlike the bureaucratic structures of government space agencies, the Association of Autonomous Astronauts grows laterally, branching out in several directions at once. We understand that to achieve our goals, the form that we organise in and the way we connect to each other is as important, perhaps more important, then the propaganda we produce. (This aspect to the Association of Autonomous Astronauts is discussed in more detail in the short article 'MultiDimensional and Inter-Galactic'.)

Creating a critical distance between ourselves and our space exploration projects is another important element to the Five Year Plan. Autonomous Astronauts are constantly questioning what they are doing, looking at space travel from new angles, considering other possibilities and directions to move in. Only by doing this can the Autonomous Astronaut avoid the pitfall of basing their identity,on being a space explorer. We must be ourselves first and foremost, and Autonomous Astronauts only after that. If identity becomes cemented to the process of Autonomous Astronauts struggling to develop independent space exploration programs, how soon before these Autonomous Astronauts inherit a vested interest in maintaining the status-quo?

Finally, the Association of Autonomous Astronauts recognises that to fully achieve our goals we may well have to entirely re-invent current attitudes to space travel. But we are confident that our Five Year Plan which emphasises structured and disciplined projects that establish realistic short-term goals, rigorous training, a world-wide network and the constantly revised critical distance between ourselves and our space programs, will be enough to change minds. Only those that attempt the impossible will achieve the absurd.

Tags