Obama Quits the Space Race, Calls for Global 'Cooperation'

(Los Angeles Times) - President Obama underscored his desire to turn space into a place for peace on Monday, releasing a policy paper that advocated international science missions and opened the door for future treaties that could limit space junk and weapons above Earth.

But administration officials said the push for international cooperation did not mean the U.S. necessarily would ask its allies to join Obama's proposed mission to send NASA astronauts to an asteroid by 2025, which he outlined during a visit to Florida's Kennedy Space Center in April, or immediately seek a treaty that would ban space-based weapons.

"The United States will consider proposals and concepts for arms control measures if they are equitable, effectively verifiable, and enhance the national security of the United States and its allies," administration officials wrote in the 18-page policy paper.