That was one of the NASA justifications for ISS.
I do recall that it was either Mr. Fletcher, or Mr. Goldin, one of whom
indicated in a rather round-about way that the construction of the ISS was going to give NASA the experience & know-how to do on-orbit assembly
of interplanetary spacecraft [translation: Manned Mars ships].
Well...the actual results of the ISS work, with the delays, cost overruns, and the negative public reaction generated, have [no pun intended] ran that justification into the ground.
Jacob