Great analysis by Robert Zubrin. I agree with his analysis and opinion.
I feel sorry for NASA administrators, though. There is so much politics and beuracracy behind NASA receiving approval and budget to undertake missions like the Lunar Gateway and SLS that it's understandable why the public are disappointed by the outcomes.
When the foundation of NASA is a framework that can also expect them to lead putting humans on the Moon by 2024 without enabling their capacity to do it, mission proposals and execution will certainly be rickety.
Design by committee is not only inefficient, it also does not work. The only reason the traditional space race missions did work was because there was a clear and singular goal with a sense of urgency - and they just scraped through.
That's why today it's great that more and more, private companies and projects are getting off the ground. Companies like Axiom Space are going to be the real innovators in the space infrastructure arena from now on. Businesses (or projects that want to become businesses) have that clear goal and a sense of urgency to get things right the first time.
Op-ed | Lunar Gateway or Moon Direct?
