i think it would be cool to add an exterior view option to see your ship from all angles ( the numpad could be used to look around inside your ship like in star wars galaxies or aces high 2 where
mouse is to look and wheel to zoom out and numpad 4 looks left 6looks right 8 looks up 2 looks down)

This has been suggested already. If you change your view a couple times with 'F9', you can already look around the exterior of your ship. You will not be able to look around the inside of your ship because, if you read the backstory, your pilot essentially has a VR helmet on allowing for you to "be" the ship for better reaction times.

while you're in the external view, you can turn off mouse look and change the camera position. though amusing, it serves no purpose in-game and given the camera is fixed, as soon as you move away, you end up pretty much blind until you restore your view to your ship.