>>12893825NASA's budget is basically a steady state, more or less. It is basically fully booked up.
Are you familiar with SLS and Orion? They both took about a decade or longer at 2 or 1 billion a year to create for something like 20 or 10+ billion dollars. I'm underselling the cost but you get the idea.
NASA's Mars plans require two major development programs to start at that comparable cost(10 or 20 billion over a decade) and timescale(a decade to complete) for a Mars Transit Hab spaceship and a Lander and more junk. That hasn't started yet. Because NASA's budget is fully booked, there is no room for it and they won't start for at least a decade.
In about decade from now the ISS program will end and a new major development program can start in the wake of its budget wedge being opened up for a new development program. The NASA Mars plans would take up that budget space.
However, going to Mars is a subjective policy course. What NASA does is arbitrary and it's direction is programmed by interests groups that get their favoured policy in. Some want Mars, but others are more Moon inclined and want Moon activities to occur instead and that will compete with what happens.
So Mars stuff is a ways away.
That's the non Starship default NASA template. Starship is a wildcard that will change what actually occurs.
