America’s space shuttle program burned through almost $200 billion over the course of three decades from 1981 to 2011, but it failed to live up to expectations. A new examination has arrived at a sobering conclusion: “By every measure, the shuttle had fallen short of even the modest hopes that had surrounded it. And the shuttle remained flying only because every effort to replace it with a better-winged, reusable craft also failed.”

According to Matthew H. Hersch, a professor of the history of science at Harvard University, in his latest book, Dark Star: A New History of the Space Shuttle, this was not due to any technical failings or management errors. Rather, it stemmed from “the shuttle’s design and its fundamental lack of purpose.”