Withdraw from the 1967 Treaty on the Ownership of celestial objects and establish private property in space.
How much water will have to be lifted into space to be transported to Mars?
Give the Job to BURT RUTAN, he will figure a way to do it cheaper and better, without the need for NASA, Waaaaaaaaahhhhh,
Zubrin completely misses it on economies of scale, bigger is not more economical if you're only launching 2-3 times a year.
A medium-lift launcher that has a high launch rate will trump all of the supposed economic advantages of a HLV.
When you factor in the costs of developing a HLV, possibly a shuttle-derived HLV, it quickly becomes a shuttle program on steroids in terms of costs.
When there is enough of a market to support a decent flight rate for a HLV, then one will be built, and NASA doesn't need to build it, they just need to be another paying customer.
Robert Zubrin, who is part genius, part kook, has explained in the past why a lunar base is unnecessary...but I dunno if I agree any longer. I think it would be beneficial.
By establishing a strong space program and going to Mars, and going big, we can defeat the infestation of terrorism in the world. It will take a generation or two because the way to do this is to show the young people that there is no comparison between what their terorism can do versus what free people working constructively can do. When the children of terrorists look around and see that their enemy is sending people to Mars and accomplishing all these amazing things while terrorists are accomplishing nothing, they will use their power of thought and decide to live life and join those who are doing great things, not just end up pizza toppings as a goal
Seems like too many vehicles and coordinated launches, rendezvous, orbit insertions, etc.
Too many possible components & systems to fail on multiple platforms. Power supplies, propulsion, guideance/tracking, life support, hard/software, the human factors, the 10$ bolt failure...