Seems like there are two problems that need to be solved before then: 1) reentry and landing - seems mostly achieved, based on the "water" landing, if you were

Seems like there are two problems that need to be solved before then: 1) reentry and landing - seems mostly achieved, based on the "water" landing, if you were landing on mars you would need legs so the "tower catch" isn't relevant IMO 2) orbital refueling - this seems to be where the technical uncertainty is, they need to do it for the NASA HLS part of the Artemis 3 mission anyway If they fail at 2), neither Artemis 3 or "Starships to Mars" will happen. But if they succeed, why wouldn't they send them? Then 6-9 month later they can try and land on Mars, I personally think that the Martian atmosphere is probably much more predictable than Earth's atmosphere due to the greatly lower density,so if they get there I think they'll succeed at landing too. And that way they get enough data in time to design and build the planned crewed starships in 2028 So basically one (big) technical problem to solve - if they can launch fast enough in the next two years, I think they'll solve the refueling part within 10 launches and have enough time to make, launch and refuel 5-8 ships before the transfer window to Mars