X-Prize: Osama Bin Laden

In 2004 aerospace designer Burt Rutan and financier Paul Allen led the first private team to build and launch a spacecraft capable of carrying three people to 100 kilometers above the Earth twice within two weeks. They were racing against 26 other teams to win the $10 million X-Prize and to achieve international fame and glorious business prospects.¹

What should have happened in 2001 is someone should have offered $10 million dollars for Osama bin Laden taken in alive and lesser amounts for lower ranking officers dead or alive. That would have taken care of anybody’s problem. If humanity can offer $10 million cash to go to space and back twice in a two week period, they can find one person in Afghanistan.

1. http://space.xprize.org/ansari-x-prize [↩]