Dean wrote:
So what? A lot of military developed equipment has useful civilian
applications. I drive a HUMMER...and then there's GPS...

Don't forget the MRE's

And for what its worth, the Saturn boosters were not military in
origin.

Actually, they were somewhat military in origin; Saturn I was going to
be used for the Army's Project Horizon, a plan to build a military Moon
base: http://www.astronautix.com/articles/prorizon.htm
....and the US Air Force started the F-1 engine project that ended up
being used on the Saturn V's first stage. They couldn't think of
anything to do with it, so NASA took over the program:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/F-1_%28rocket_engine%29
Air force funding also played a role in the development of the RL-10 and
J-2 LOX/LH2 engines, which were intended to be used for _their_ Moon
base program, Project Lunex:
http://www.friends-partners.org/part...cles/lunex.htm

Pat