[boris]

The problem is this:

(a) The chinese have the advantage of all the technology we paid for and invented;
(b) The chinese have a command economy, so if the bosses say, "do it", the cost does not enter into the equation; people want to stay alive, so they do it.
(c) In the U.S. you must obtain funding in the hundreds of billions of dollars to make people "do it"; such funds are in short supply.

--Boris

[Cincinatus' Wife]

Very true but available. Some rearranging at NASA is necessary.

[Gunslingr3]

The chinese have a command economy, so if the bosses say, "do it", the cost does not enter into the equation; people want to stay alive, so they do it.

But costs do matter, ergo the USSR collapsed before fulfilling Braun's prediction.

Slaves don't work as hard as free people, working for their own self interest. It's why the U.S. standard of living crushes that of any slavocracy.

[Constantine XIII]

Couldn't the same argument have been applied to the USSR's moon program, though? We had more or less equal tech levels back then, didn't we?