[af_vet_rr]

I hate to break it to you but the Russians are pretty good at building heavy lift boosters and they have shared their technology with us.

Not only that, but had we kept the Saturn around for just our heavy lift needs, and the Shuttle had been designed to be primarily a people mover, we would be way ahead of where we are at. It's not unreasonable to think that we would have multiple space stations and a true Lunar presence.

Just the thought of the Saturn with a few decades worth of improvements in materials and propulsion systems alone....

[RadioAstronomer]

If we had pushed the X-15 to its logical conclusion instead of cacelling it, IMHO, SSTO would be a reality today. Heavy lift for "stuff", SSTO for people.

All I can say is "just damn". :-(