Saturday 11 April 2009

A Colony On Mars : Chapter 18

. Saturday 11 April 2009

CHAPTER – Other Nations want in
June 1, 2008
Meanwhile back on Earth things were happening that could effect the
Mars Project. “Mr. President, the Chinese Ambassador.” “Welcome, Mr.
Ambassador, let's have a seat on the couch over here and you can tell me to
what I owe the honor of your visit. Could I offer you something to drink?” “Oh,
cut the crap, Chet, you know why I am here, We want in on the Mars program.
We want our own colony with our own people running it.” “So, Ambassador Jing,
why are you telling me this?” We make no claim on the planet Mars, only to the
parts of Mars that we have opened up, and developed.


You are free to develop your own program any way you want so long as
you don't violate any of our territorial claims. As you know we claim any cavern
that we have pressurized and populated and any cavern, any part of which is
within two hundred Earth miles of any cavern we have pressurized and
populated.” “We are aware of that Chet but what we are seeking is your help in
developing our program. We want you to help us in all fields of development to
establish a Chinese presence on the planet that does not violate any of your
territorial claims.” “We would be happy to oblige you Jing but we have one
stipulation that you must agree to in order to gain our full support.” “What is that
Chet?” “That we have the right to approve any people that you want to send to
Mars either on our space craft now or your own space craft any time in the
future. You know very well that anyone you send must be of good character
and be able to pass a fluency test in the English Language and that you
acknowledge that the English language is the official language of Mars and that
all communications on Mars, to Mars or from Mars be in English. You know
how many difficulties that this planet has had because of language differences,
we just want to prevent that happening on Mars. If you agree to that then we
will share all that we know about Mars with you, We will train your people for a
price, we will transport your people, for a price and will assist you in any other
way that we can in establishing your colony on the planet. We will also allow
your people to visit our facilities at any time.” “That is where the rub comes in
Chet, we are Chinese and proud of it. Sure I am fluent in English but I doubt
that I could pass your fluency examination. The kinds of people that have the
skills for this kind of endeavor certainly could not pass. Also I am not so sure
that my Government would go along with English being the official language of
Mars.” Then Mr. Ambassador I suggest that you start from scratch and develop
your own program on your own terms. I am sorry Jing but I saw you without an
appointment because I was given to understand that you had only a couple of
quick questions and now I need to see my regularly scheduled guest, the
ambassador from Japan.”
President Harford did the same song and dance that he had just done
with the Chinese Ambassador. The Japanese Ambassador also left in a huff.
The President then buzzed his secretary. Get the press secretary in here right
away. “ Flint I have a job for you.. Get a recording of my last to conversations
from my secretary, listen to them then make up a position paper expressing
those tenants and see to it that all of the nations on Earth that might be in a
position to make a similar request get a copy. Also make sure that the Speaker
and the Sennett Majority leader each get a copy along with a note that I would
like to be able to sign this position into legislation. You can have the legislation
drafted for them it will make the job easier. I am sure that we have the backing
of both sides of the Isle on this one so it will be good for relations. Tell them
they can attach it to the next bill they pass unless think it is a bill that I might
want to veto.”
Two weeks passed and so did the bill. Then the President received a
visit from four different ambassadors at one time. They represented
respectively The UK, Canada, Australia and New Zealand.
“Mr. President I am expressing the sentiments of all four of us and our
countries when I say that we very much approve of your position that English
only should be spoken on Mars and that any candidate that is sent should be
subject to your approval.” “Our four nations have met on this matter and we
would like to join the Mars program. Here is what we would like to offer. We
are willing to reimburse the United States for 40% of everything that you have
already spent on the Mars program over the last twelve years. We would like
to continue to reimburse the United States 40% of everything that you spend in
future years, but we would like to provide candidates for your approval of all
future colonists that are sent to Mars by either the United States Government or
sent by Mars Colony, Inc. until the population of Mars is 40% from our four
countries then we would like for 40% of all future colonists to be chosen by you
from candidates that we provide to you. When you breakthrough into Utopia we
would like for 40,000 of the first 100,000 people to reside in Utopia to be
selected from candidates that we provide to you. Beyond that we would all
caverns developed in future years be allocated as follows, any cavern with a
floor space of more than one hundred square miles be jointly populated. And
that all smaller caverns be allocated so that Australia gets ten % of them, New
Zealand gets ten percent, Canada gets ten percent and that the UK gets ten
percent as our own domains. The United States gets sixty percent.”
“That is very interesting but you are aware that I personally do not have
the authority to accept or decline your offer. What I suggest is that you
gentlemen sit down with our representatives who will be chosen from the
administration as well as from the House and the Senate and hammer out a
deal that we can all live with. There is one thing that I can tell you right now and
it is unofficial. There are certain guidelines that we use to select our
candidates, these rules fly in the face of some of our own civil rights legislation
but we have been getting away with it so far.
1.We do not take race into account.
2. We select equal numbers of men and women.
3. And here it gets a little sticky, we do not accept any candidate with
homosexual tendencies, we feel it would not be accepted by our people who
presently reside on Mars.
4.This one is really sticky we have not as yet selected a candidate
outside of the following, Christians of any denomination, Jews, Agnostics and
Atheists. We just don't want any religious conflicts. So far we have not
selected any professed Atheists, but we do have a few Agnostics. None of the
people that we have selected have any real strong religious feelings at all.
Next, we have been requested by the colony to provide them with Catholic and
Protestant Chaplains and at least one Rabbi. These people and their
necessary equipment have already been selected and will depart on the next
flight. Beyond that we would accept any chaplain candidates that you care to
nominate but those would be sent at your expense.
5.Frankly I don't think congress is going to go for your deal about
separate domains. Here is what I think you will end up with. After you
reimburse the United States for 40% of what we have spent so far you will be
allowed to send 50% of all future candidates until you reach parity then you will
be allowed 40%. You must also be aware that we have a small private sector
emerging on Mars. These people travel as paid passengers on our ships. We
presently charge five hundred thousand dollars dollars for the trip from Earth to
Mars and one hundred thousand dollars for a return flight or $550,000.00 for a
round trip ticket. We have just launched a new space ship we christened Mars
Runner. It is as large as our two other ships combined. Mars Runner belongs
entirely to the United States. We have sold our interest in the other two ships
Mars Supply One and Mars Supply Two to Mars Colony, Inc. but the United
States has retained control of who The Company hauls up to Mars and what
cargo they carry. You will have to negotiate for what cargo rights, business
rights, property ownership rights you will be entitled to on Mars. All real estate
other than what we call the Government cavern is owned by the company.
They will be free to develop it any way they please. They have agreed that the
United States share in the proceeds of any sales or leases of real estate. Only
residents of Mars are eligible to own real estate on Mars but corporations in
good standing are allowed to lease real estate.
6.So far we have no laws on Mars but the community is working on a
criminal and civil code at this time. Mars presently has the status of a U.S.
Protectorate. Common laws that apply to all Protectorates apply to Mars.
7.We have no civil or criminal courts on Mars but they are working on
that. We have not surveyed any real estate on Mars.
8.We have never had a crime committed on Mars and it is a good thing
because we have no police on Mars.
9.So far we have a private ownership bank chartered by two citizens of
Mars who were United States Civil Service Employees who finished their
employment contracts with the government. They have been in operation for
several months and are affiliated with City Bank in the United States. We would
not want to see any other banks on Mars until the population exceeds 30,000.
10.Burger Boy's has opened a restaurant outlet on Mars and Super Store
should be open within a matter of Days with a temporary store pending the
development of Utopia where they have a franchise to open one store for every
40,000 population. All other business fields are wide open.
These things also you need to take into consideration when you are
negotiating with our people. Don't be fooled by congress, Mars Colony, Inc.
has the hammer and they are the ones that will ultimately call the shots.
You would probably save yourselves a lot of red tape if you negotiated
directly with Mars Colony, Inc. and eliminated the middleman. Congress will
probably legislate in favor of any deal you strike on future development, land
use, business, etc. Congress will be more interested in some of the social
issues we discussed.”
“Mr. President, do you think we could”. “Hold it right there, this is not a
negotiation, I just gave you some pointers, save your negotiating for the big
shots. Sorry but I have another appointment waiting. I wish you all the best of
luck.”
They negotiated for almost a year and ended up with a deal that closely
resembled the deal that the President had outlined when they talked to him in
his office.
They also acknowledged that there was a distinct possibility that if the
Mars colony applied for statehood at some future date, when they were ready
the application would probably be favorably received and that if that happened
all the residents of Mars would either be admitted as Citizens of the United
States or would be granted Green Card, resident worker status.
They didn't care much for that clause and it had never occurred to them
that what the United States had planned for Mars was the eventual doubling of
the size of the Continental United States and adding as many as three hundred
million new citizens. Needless to say the UK consortium eventually lost interest
in the deal.
“Why give those blokes our best and brightest, the Prime Minister Said.”
Mars Colony, Inc. did start placing recruitment ads on the internet
soliciting applicants from those four countries.

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