> the one-way plan isn't to send a ship-full of people with suicide pills
Maybe I got caught up in the ridiculousness of the article's sensational tone, but even so there is no technical reason to actually plan on never having return flights. This relates directly to your other statement:
As I wrote in the parent comment, the presence of water on Mars allows for the production of rocket fuel on site. This ties in to where I mentioned extended infrastructure such as a space elevator and a Moon base, because those too will make trips back and forth economical (instead of scraping everything together for a singular "by the skin of our teeth" mission like this one).
While perhaps a return may some day be possible, the point is people are being recruited without that promise. So that, e.g. they realize that if they get sick, or seriously injured, or even just change their mind, there is no way to get back.
Maybe I got caught up in the ridiculousness of the article's sensational tone, but even so there is no technical reason to actually plan on never having return flights. This relates directly to your other statement:
As I wrote in the parent comment, the presence of water on Mars allows for the production of rocket fuel on site. This ties in to where I mentioned extended infrastructure such as a space elevator and a Moon base, because those too will make trips back and forth economical (instead of scraping everything together for a singular "by the skin of our teeth" mission like this one).
I wrote about these points for a reason ;)