[anthuman]

I suspect more and more funding will go to the Space Force and less and less will go to NASA. Looking at the budgets, it's clear that the military has far more pull in washington than NASA. Seems like whatever the military wants, it gets. While NASA has to beg, plead and grovel for every crumb.

And if SpaceX, Blue Origin and the private sector become viable players in space, then NASA might be shut down or absorbed into Space Force.

With China, EU, Japan, India, etc getting involved in space exploration, it's inevitable that space is going to be a new frontier of militarization and privatization. Space Force and the private sector are natural players in this new arena. Not sure where NASA fits in this picture.

[thowaway9883]

The majority of NASA's missions are instrument-driven science missions designed to answer questions about space (ex: JWST). Neither SpaceX or Blue origin has displayed serious interest in replacing this function of NASA. They are mainly engineering organizations, and while they are effective at doing what they do, they are organizationally not pursuing models that research fundamental astrophysics, heliophysics, or earth science.