If ESA were building reusable rockets and not instead persisting with a pork-driven employment programme that happens to have a side effect of producing rockets, I'd agree with you. Until then ESA deserve to be hammered with criticism - and especially by those whose tax money etc. is being spent on an approach that is hurtling towards obsolescence.
What are you talking about ? So far Ariane program seems to be a commercial success. ESA on a scientific point of view too.
It is true that Ariane 6 will not be reusable, although cheaper than Ariane 5, just like ALL reliable commercial launchers today (even tomorrow for ULA) outside of space X. It is clear that this is the future. However, these are only the first steps. I am not sure that today space X will be able to be profitable with it.
Talking about tax money, note that SLS will not be reusable too...
ESA's leaders have mocked and disparaged SpaceX's approach in recent years; why would they bother unless they considered SpaceX a serious threat? They must be worried. I'll also point out that SpaceX naysayers have a dismally poor record of predicting the future.
This isn't an EU/US thing and I totally agree with you on ULA, SLS and I might add Roscosmos etc. I wish ALL launch providers would move towards reusability because in the end that increases the opportunities for getting humanity exploring space properly again, which is what I'd really like to see. Clearly Europe has fantastic engineers: why aren't they leading this transition? Why is it only SpaceX, Blue Origin and Rocket Lab that are actively pursuing reusability today (notwithstanding paper studies etc. from other groups)?
In this case I'd say the benefit of the doubt should not be with ESA:
'Asked about how the Ariane 5 compares to lower-cost alternatives on the market today, such as SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket, Stefano Bianchi, Head of ESA Launchers Development Department, responded with a question of his own. “Are you buying a Mercedes because it is cheap?”
Ranzo, sitting nearby, chimed in and referenced the India-based maker of the world’s least expensive car. As he put it, “We don’t sell a Tata.”'
And:
'the US military says it pays more for launches because of its mission assurance requirements, which require extra steps to be taken for preparing and attaching the payload alongside myriad other system checks to ensure a safe ride to space for costly national security payloads. What does Charmeau think of this explanation?
“I would be surprised if SpaceX explained to commercial customers that they deliver bullshit to them,” he replied. “I would be extremely surprised by that.”'
Ariane 6 will still be significantly more costly that expendable Falcon 9s. It’s a terrible design that learned nothing from SpaceX breakthroughs before reuse was even possible.
