Hi EP

I still think dumping the Saturn Vs was short-sighted and stupid. With four SRBs and reusable lower stage it would've achieved as much economy as the Shuttle without killing crew. But no one wanted ~ 200 ton LEO payloads in the 1970s.

A personnel reusable vehicle would've been far easier than the kludge that the STS became - a bigger Dyna-Soar would've been ideal.

All-in-all the mess that was STS was due to the fact that Nixon wanted to can the whole manned space effort but he couldn't totally kill the aerospace industry without disastrous economic effects. So we ended up with ~ 30 years of doing sweet FA and 14 dead astronauts.

Adam