Justifying his stance on NASA seeking a `Plan B' to address Congressional concerns about the Constellation program, NASA administrator Maj. Gen. Charles F. Bolden Jr., specified that he was, in no way, looking avert President Obama's proposal to restructure the country's human spaceflight program.

In a statement released by NASA on Thursday, General Bolden said: "The president's budget for NASA is my budget. I did not ask anyone for an alternative to the president's plan and budget. I strongly support the priorities and the direction for NASA that he has put forward."

General Bolden's statement came in response to reports that it was after the go-ahead from the General that Michael L. Coats, director of NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston, tried to determine "what a potential compromise might look like" with Congress over NASA's track for the future space programs.

According to an email that Coats wrote to Stephen J. Altemus, Johnson Space Center's chief engineer, General Bolden "agreed to let us set up a Plan B team" - noting that `Plan B' was his phrase, not Bolden's.

Coats had also written that Bolden would soon meet with Representative Bart Gordon (D-Tennessee), chairman of the House Committee on Science and Technology, to discuss three priorities: development of a spacecraft, development of a heavy-lift rocket, and a rocket test program.