>>11755322>Musk: I want to go to help NASA goto mars, so I'll put a small tree on Mars from one of the rockets we have today (Atlas V/Soyuz/Space Shuttle) All of them cost a billion or so, he only had $160M or so at the moment. >Musk: Okay, so I'll just buy old russian ICBM and build a rocket myself. How hard can it be?>Russians: Fuck you little boy. *spits on Musk's shoes* (literally what happened)>Musk: Okay, so rocket is just piece of cylindrical metal/hydrogen/oxygen/and engine that burns those oxygen. Why don't I build that?>Musk: Builds a small rocket(Falcon1) that launched on their 4th attempt. >NASA: Woah there little guy, we see your effort, so we'll give you chance to launch to ISS on your rocket>Musk: Thanks NASA. We'll build a bigger rocket for that. >Musk: Builds a bigger rocket(Falcon9) and ferries cargo to ISS for 1/4th the cost of alternative on Cargo Dragon. >Musk: Now that we got F9, lets make it land so we can reuse it and reduce our cost. >Musk: 6 years later, they make reusable landing a normal part of their launch.>Musk: How about we make even large rocket (Falcon Heavy) for those special needs. *Does that*>Musk: Hmmm We need even larger rocket if we want to go to Mars/Moon and carry meaningful payloads. >Musk: Building/testing that right now>Musk: Oh yeah, we just put humans to orbit. 18 years from 1 person to ~7600 employees, 4 rockets, 3 dragons(dragon 1/cargo, dragon 2 crew, dragon 2 cargo) capsules, almost 90 rocket launches now, 50+ rockets landed/reused successfully, and launched 500+ satellites.
On top of that, a future that's as brighter/challenging as their past accomplishments.
Don't forget, at every step of their way, "NO YOU CAN'T DO THAT" skeptics lining up to shit up discussions.