It's a shame that NASA became such a political football... In reality, I suppose, it always was, but the "lunar goal" cut through a lot of the political felgercarb. Once that was achieved, it was all downhill from there.
Ideally, that's what would have happened-- continue with Saturns while working on a small orbiter as a follow-on spacecraft, specifically for space station transport operations. In fact, this WAS one of the proposals that went up the chain to Nixon and his people. Bill Anders, LM pilot on Apollo 8 (he busted his chops to become *THE* expert on the LM, hoping it gave him the best chance of being on the first landing crew, but fate put him on the only lunar mission WITHOUT a lunar module... after that, he moved on, and actually ended up as a political consultant on the Shuttle proposals. He has written that basically after outlining all the choices, which varied from the most conservative, a smaller, simpler, reusable orbiter spacecraft that would be launched by a "low cost" launcher designed for the purpose (like many of the "low cost" launchers I've detailed in other studies), through a mid-grade proposal of a larger, more complex reusable orbiter with a partially reusable launch system, to the "whole hog" proposal, a large, complex orbiter and fully-reusable launch vehicle. The smaller, more conservative orbiter was intended to be a cheaper and faster to design system that would allow NASA to get practical experience on the complexities and problems associated with designing and maintaining and operating a reusable spaceplane-type orbiter, so that when they DID design a more complex follow-on vehicle at some point later on, they could incorporate those "lessons learned" into the larger, more complex replacement vehicle that followed. This was, in fact, the proposal that Bill Anders thought to be the best approach, certainly considering the budget climate that Nixon's people were proposing for financing a shuttle program. Of course he presented all the possibilities professionally but didn't hide his thoughts when asked. (IIRC).
Nixon's people gave him the "thanks and we'll let you know" speech and then retired to mull over everything and present it to the President... He heard nothing for a long time and then suddenly got a call from Haldemann (IIRC) asking him a question that took him aback... "which one is the most expensive??" "The fully reusable one" Anders said. "Which one will bring the most jobs and money to southern California?" (aerospace industry)... Unqeustionably this was "the big one" as he replied... "Okay, that's what we're going with! Thanks for your help!" and that was it... The shuttle decision had been made. (Anders wrote about this in a series of articles decades ago that I read awhile back).
Of course in time it became apparent that the "fully reusable" system was going to be TOO expensive and a bridge too far, and of course with the meager funding, NASA was forced into bed with the Air Force, after their two "blue suiters in space" programs had been cancelled-- first their "Dyna-Soar" spaceplane of the mid-60's, and then the "MOL" orbital spy station that replaced it. That basically put the Air Force into the driver's seat on "requirements" for the shuttle system, which forced the change from the smaller, lighter, "fluffier" straight winged with simple metallic heat shield Faget orbiter to the huge payload bay delta-winged orbiter capable of delivering the cross-range the Air Force supposedly needed for once-around polar launches (single orbit Vandenberg launches of the shuttle) and of course that shuttle was too "dense" (big and heavy) for the simpler metallic heat shield to work, forcing the change to the fragile tiles that would ultimately doom Columbia and drove up shuttle costs dramatically. It also drove the change to the "partly reusable" shuttle with a disposable external tank, and the decision to accept solid propellant boosters in lieu of a flyback booster stage.
Thus, the badly compromised shuttle we knew came to be...
Later! OL J R
