Quote:
Originally Posted by TLAM Strike
The Soyuz: now that is a proper spacecraft, it could take you to the moon if you let it.
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Put a big enough fuel tank on it, and the shuttle could get to the moon. Neither one is going to be landing, though.
The shuttle was a craft designed to have certain capabilities, but never had a chance to develop most of those capabilities. Every spacecraft is built for a specific purpose. You can press it into other duties, but a custom designed craft is going to fit those roles better. The shuttle was designed as a general purpose spacecraft, which means it could do a lot of things half as well as any craft designed for those roles.