When NASA approved the STS sytem way back in Jan of '72, remember we were just winding down Apollo, a stopgap Skylab system was on line and in '75 the Apollo Soyuz rendevous was just a window dressing to end the Apollo Era. Now, any efforts to get us into space was justified, but I feel the gap between 75-81 was TOO LONG for the space program, alot of people lost jobs and direction. The shuttle concept was ambitious from the start, (READ BAD TILES!!!) never could figure out the DOD payloads and Mil-Spec Crews, but we returned to space in April of '81 with alot of fanfare. It's like we developed a space truck, but the ISS components were years in the future and from the mid 80's to 90's nothing to launch except a few probes , labs, and trying to repair satellites in earth orbit (REMEMBER SOLAR MAX?)
Just a mild rant, but in theory the concept was workable, but became way TOOO COMPLEX when everybody wanted to fly everything the best way possible.
Oh yeah, we along with the SOVIETS and others should have developed a manned capsule for ISS use at least 20 yrs ago to work alongside the shuttle/Iss combo.
thank you................