The Verge’s analysis article pointed out that after the embarrassing incident of astronauts being stranded on the space station, there are two main reasons why NASA still clings to Boeing: cost considerations and political leverage. The first is cost. What NASA buys is a fixed-price manned service. The public can think of it as buying a ticket from a carrier. The research and development, manufacturing, and testing of the vehicle are all the responsibility of the manned service contractor. All losses caused by overspending or overdue dates will be absorbed by the contractor.
Compared with NASA's own Orion spacecraft, the cost of flying per seat is more than half, and compared with the space shuttle or the no-cost Apollo project of the Cold War era, the cost is more than half lower.
As for political considerations, when NASA originally awarded the human services contract to Boeing's Starliner program in 2011, the latter's reputation was not as disreputable as it is now. At that time, NASA was forced to show some flexibility due to budget pressure and tried to outsource launch contracts to commercial companies with more cost advantages. Boeing has strong power in Congress. If NASA wants to achieve ambitious space exploration, it must win the support of Congress to obtain a budget.
Therefore, Boeing, which has more employees and stronger lobbying capabilities, won a Starliner project contract worth US$4.2 billion, while SpaceX's Dragon ship project, which performed far better than Starliner, only received a US$2.6 billion launch contract.
However, Boeing will have to absorb the $1.6 billion in additional costs caused by project overruns because NASA signed a fixed-price contract. Then-Boeing CEO Dave Calhoun complained that the company would never sign fixed-price contracts again.
Industry insiders pointed out that Boeing receives US$50 billion in defense contracts from the government every year, and it can afford to lose US$1.6 billion. If it were replaced by another company, it would have gone bankrupt long ago. Moreover, the Star Navigation project is so well-known that even if my grandma’s family is losing money, I still have to grit my teeth to complete this project.
When the Starliner spacecraft was released to return to Earth, NASA immediately sent heart-warming words, pointing out that everything went well on the return trip, and that it was confident in Starliner's manned mission. It paid special attention to Boeing's emotions in its words, for fear that the other party would give up and give up.
Boeing showed excusable indifference, saying only that it would decide on the next step depending on the situation. The company lost too much money on this project, including manpower, material resources and goodwill.
If Boeing wants to withdraw, will NASA give all the launch contracts to Musk's SpaceX?
Members of Congress who control budget allocation are deeply concerned about NASA's increasing reliance on SpaceX. The latter's problem is that it is highly personal - Musk has become increasingly irritable and extreme. After taking control of the world's only Starlink, Iron Man's further monopoly on space launch capabilities is unimaginable to politicians.
As a result, NASA can only carefully balance the project budget and political weight. It can neither abandon Boeing nor drag SpaceX to maintain industry competition. After all, a company like SpaceX is unique. Casey Dreier, director of space policy at the Planetary Society, said that he believes that SpaceX’s success has created expectations that others cannot achieve: such a dazzling achievement for so little money.