It was conservative in that IIRC the criticism against F9 at the time, landing/1st stage reuse was seen as technically feasible, but economically not. VS critic

It was conservative in that IIRC the criticism against F9 at the time, landing/1st stage reuse was seen as technically feasible, but economically not. VS criticisms of starship (even before people starting hating on Elon)... it's not technically impossible, but Starship stacked with multiple F9 resuable tier generation leap in requirements. It's another level of difficulty in terms of undertaking. IMO economically, F9 + starlink pretty good business model. Starship + _____? It's not Moon or Mars. IMO once DoD gives SpaceX a few 100 billions in Golden Dome contracts, starshipwill start to seem much more viable / inevitable once it's fate is tied to strategic space weaponization. On topic DoD, let's not forget there's probably trillions $$$ of wasted technically feasible / moonshot prototypes from US MiC over the decades. Starship might end in that pile, but I'm optimistic it won't be, not because space but weapons in space.