I don't understand why we're doing this. They will eventually be contaminated in the next 500 years and that's not long evolutionarily speaking. As tech becomes cheaper and the third world starts breaking into the "modern era", we'll have more failed satellites embedded in the sides of every moon in the solar system. And NASA legitimately struggles to make these devoid of life. An exuberant little nation punching a little above its weight category certainly won't.
Exactly. Also, In 500 years, it may be possible/economical to sterilize large bodies before sending them to outer space.
I think its a good idea that NASA (and other space agencies) are so careful about this. I wouldn't want any life (or the traces of past life) to be wiped out by organisms from earth.
Flying a mission to intentionally study a moon is a bit different than accidentally contaminating it while getting no useful data. Titan isn't a likely candidate for contamination anyway and if we ever do find life there it is likely to be distinguishable from Earth life. Enceladus, on the other hand, is one of the likeliest places for Earth-like life in our solar system and much more succeptible to contamination.
Since the orbiter is out of fuel and will eventually crash into something, Saturn makes the most sense.
Those are proxy wars and/or puppet governments, which is a different thing to colonisation. There is somewhat more regard for the rights of the native inhabitants than in the past.
If we ever find alien life, the Outer Space Treaty prohibits colonisation in the sense we're using here. Of course this is a very easy treaty to sign up to at this point in our development of space travel. If space travel ever becomes cheap enough to enable exploitation of resource on distant planets I imagine those laws will see some amendments.
