TH UPDATED: September 27 , 2020 THE SCRAMBLE FOR MARS (2060) BACKGROUND GUIDE TRITONMUN XXI (VIRTUAL) –NOVEMBER 7TH, 2020 1 BACKGROUND GUIDE TABLE OF CONTENTS Head Chair Letter…………………………………………………………………………… 2 Vice Chair Letter……………………………………………………………………………. 3 Position Paper Guidelines…………………………………………………………………... 4 Committee Background……………………………………………………………………. 5 The State of the Universe.……………………………………………………………… 5 The Beginning of Colonization…………………………………………………………. 6 The State of Earth.………………………………………………………………………. 8 The Modern Space Race………………………………………………………………… 10 The Great Migration……………………………………………………………………. 12 Concluding Remarks……………………………………………………………………….. 14 Helpful Timeline……………………………………………………………………………. 15 Questions to Consider………………………………………………………………………. 16 Suggested Sites……………………………………………………………………………... 16 2 HEAD CHAIR LETTER Dear Delegates, My name is Samantha Ivezich (she/hers) and I am incredibly excited to be chairing this virtual committee for TritonMUN XXI. Starting off with a little bit about myself, I am a second- year pre-medical student going for a major in human biology with a minor in philosophy and bioethics. Outside of academics, I serve as the V.P. Finance for Model UN @ UCSD and travel with our competitive team (when we’re actually traveling, of course). I also am involved with our Esports and gaming organization here “on” campus, Triton Gaming, serving as the Marketing Lead. Obviously, my involvement covers a pretty wide and chaotic range, so feel free to ask me about literally anything (within appropriate reason) involving college life; I’ll be happy to answer as best I can. Although this committee is based on pure theoretical fantasy, I feel it would benefit delegates to “study up” on international law regarding space and extraterrestrial colonization as well as the intersection of government and private corporations in dealings with space travel and habitation. Also, some base-level space and Mars knowledge wouldn’t hurt as well! However, these are just suggestions, do whatever makes sense for your personal character arc and interests. As with most crisis committees, prior preparation doesn’t necessarily guarantee success; it's what you do in real-time and how you react to situations that counts the most. Ultimately, this committee is what you delegates choose to make of it as quite literally anything could happen. Wrapping up, I want you delegates to have as much fun preparing and participating in this committee as we had creating it. Since this is purely fantasy, I am completely okay with the premise of this committee being taken in crazy and inventive directions. Existing in an online platform may present new challenges and be a bit different at first, but I ask you all to bear with us and me as we try to make the best out of a complicated situation. I know many of you have been itching to get back into the MUN after quite some time of inactivity over the past few months, so let’s make this a great one! I wish you all luck and safety, feel free to contact me with any questions or concerns during your preparation! Best, Samantha Ivezich Chair | Scramble for Mars [email protected] 3 VICE CHAIR LETTER Hi Everyone! My name is Arushi and I’m your Vice Chair for the Mars Board of Trustees. I’m so excited to be chairing this committee and look forward to hearing all your thoughts! I’ve had the opportunity to chair many conferences in the past, including one in The Hague, but this will be my first time taking part in TritonMUN. I’m a second-year international student at UCSD and I’m majoring in Molecular Synthesis. The integration of molecular biology and chemistry is something I find really interesting and I hope to pursue something related to genetic engineering in the future. I believe that gene alteration has a massive scope in our lifetime and it’s something I’m extremely passionate about. Scramble for Mars is a really fascinating committee because of its possible implications in the future. I don’t believe that it’s out of the question that humans could inhabit another planet and introducing topics like these to the future leaders of the world is a great way to stimulate the advancement of such possibilities. I can’t wait to meet you all virtually in November, stay safe and good luck with your research! Sincerely, Arushi Dev 4 POSITION PAPER GUIDELINES TRITONMUN POSITION PAPER GUIDELINES • Position Papers are due at 11:59 PM on October 28th, 2020 o Requests for extensions must be sent by the advisor to TritonMUN by October 19th. • Position Papers can be submitted by one of two ways: 1. The Google Form linked here, https://forms.gle/s17Z92qLMMcfjMAt9 (Advisors will be emailed a Google Form link that can be used by advisors) 2. Email to: [email protected] • Please Note: This email is strictly for submissions of position papers. You will not receive a reply from this email. For any concerns that require a response, please email [email protected]. • In place of a position paper and in order to facilitate an engaging crisis committee, delegates should submit their first 3 personal crisis notes, up to 2 pages. • Crisis notes should be single-spaced in Times New Roman 12 pt. font. • At the top of each paper, include your character, name, committee and topic. • Please refer to the delegate resources tab on the website for information on how to write a personal crisis note. 5 COMMITTEE BACKGROUND THE SCRAMBLE FOR MARS As previously stated, this is a sci-fi/fantasy committee. The actual background of what happened, the colonization of Mars, the rise of corporations, is fabricated by the TritonMUN staff. That said, these questions are real and the threat of this committee becoming a reality is just as ever present. Specifically, you all are members of the Mars Board of Trustees, a collection of corporations and states placed in charge of managing and maintaining Mars. As members of this board, you are all tasked with a duality. Simultaneously, you must maintain the day to day operations of Mars. Managing power, water, food, and communication are critical to keeping the populace in check. In this aspect, remember that your decisions have consequences and “failure” will result in distrust and chaos, even deaths and suffering of the people. That said, you may make any decision you like. Should you value profit over people (as many of you may) this is acceptable. The other role you will serve is the overall task of state building. You and your fellow delegates will need to decide how much of the current system should be changed, and how Mars will be operated from a governmental standpoint. Further, you will consider how multiple governments and private corporations should intermix. With this in mind, we will now cover the background of this committee and how we got here. The State of the Universe The year is 2060 and the world has gotten bigger. No longer is humanity contained to a single planet. Since the mid 2030’s we have gone beyond, now occupying Mars and beginning the exploration of Saturn and Venus. Space travel has accelerated far beyond its roots and has truly opened up the final frontier. In 2024 Elon Musk’s company, “SpaceX”, reinvigorated the interest in space travel and exploration when its rocket “Starship” became the first rocket to travel beyond the ISS in over 50 years. Partnering with NASA, the Starship model took humans back to the moon through the Artemis program and Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) initiative 1 , providing an effective vehicle to transport crew and supplies back and forth and defying previous single-use rockets. With this successful use of Starship as a “lunar shuttle,” the Martian 1 https://www.spacex.com/updates/nasa-selects-lunar-optimized-starship/ 6 Exploration Program was set even further forward than expected, exceeding previous time tables and launching first in 2028. This first mission, coined Ares I, first took astronauts to Mars without yet landing on the surface, but circumnavigated around the planet, similar to the initial Apollo missions. It wouldn’t be until 2033 with the launch of Ares IV that humans first touched down on the surface. (SpaceX 2020 Starship Prototype)2 The Beginning of Colonization The Ares IV mission marked one of the most significant developments in human history at this point. For the first time ever, mankind had moved beyond Earth in quest of a new home. The crew consisted of six brave astronauts who were given the task of assembling pieces of a future Martian community, utilizing unmanned payloads sent to the planet both before and after their arrival. Just as the first six touched down on martian soil came the next stage of the plan, the Ares-Hermes missions, tasked with the creation and population of martian colonies. Known as 2 https://www.wfit.org/post/spacex-starship-update#stream/0 7 the “First 50,” the crew of these missions were composed of fifty scientists, engineers, designers, and computer scientists all tasked with developing a successful civilization for the next generation of colonizers. However, the Ares-Hermes mission came with a catch – the crew would never be returning to Earth, living out the rest of their days on Mars. Building upon the simple structures temporarily raised by the initial six astronauts for their arrival, these specialized professionals were tasked with building a lasting and sustainable community even after the Ares IV crew returned home. Although this early model was very basic, every Martian colony to come would base itself upon its design. The very first Martian colony, named “A New Hope,” included a series of small 3D-printed houses and gardens within large domes oxygenated through generators and massive swathes of trees. Outside the early domes were giant generators built of parts flown to Mars on various payload missions and more Martian soil.