You know who else is a huge threat to regimes that want to control information!?

I propose a tax tax, it's a 50% tax on all taxes, that goes right back to whoever paid the tax.

Stop taxing everything, there's too many taxes already.

>A Sun-synchronous orbit (SSO), also called a heliosynchronous orbit,[1] is a nearly polar orbit around a planet, in which the satellite passes over any given point of the planet's surface at the same local mean solar time.[2][3] More technically, it is an orbit arranged so that it precesses through one complete revolution each year, so it always maintains the same relationship with the Sun.

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From wikipedia.

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sun-synchronous_orbit

>You would need to send fuel to lunar orbit or the surface to launch from there. It takes fuel to get it there.

Not if you make the fuel with lunar water.

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>The cheapest mission is direct from Earth's surface but limits payload to mars.

I mean, if you send less payload, it's going to be cheaper. ROI of a moon base would be pretty awful if you sent a normal sized ship or only one ship, rather than a giant ship or a fleet of ships.

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>The most effective all around mission is to refuel in earth orbit and go straight to mars.

That's kind of what I'm saying, but I would source the fuel (and more) from the moon rather than earth, and it would be in high earth orbit or earth-moon L5(or L4)

>The moon is not a stepping stone to mars. Other than a gravity assist, it would take far more fuel than a direct route from earth orbit.

Under what mission plan? Landing on the moon? What about rendezvous in high earth orbit, one spacecraft launched from earth with people and one spacecraft launched from the moon, without people?

Also I hate that a lot of people assume the stepping stone idea means it will land on the moon, instead of rendezvous with something launched from the moon, like in high earth orbit for example, which would reduce the delta v needed immensely compared to landing on the moon.