To get a self-sustaining Mars base working and to be able to leave the base and go back to Earth would require some real nifty engineering and automation. Stuff that would transfrom the Earth before lift-off.
Think about it. To get off of Mars, you have two options really. Land the take-off rocket with the fuel in it or land it dry and then fuel it up. Landing a take-off rocket wet is super hard, especially on what amounts to virgin regolith. Fueling up the rocket means you make the fuel on the surface and transport it to the rocket. Also, super hard.
Supposing that you did manage to find a good pocket of the raw materials that you need for the fuel, you still have to have astronauts do that mining, or you need to invent reliable robots to do that for you. Such robots would completely transform the mining and resource extraction economy of the Earth. Then you need to get that fuel to the rocket somehow. Again, either you use astronauts or you invent a hell of a self-driving tanker, which, again, transforms the lives of all humans on Earth. There is the other issues of building the landing pad, the job site for mining extraction, the issues when the fuel spill everywhere with Earth 8 lightminutes away, the scientific issues of just mining willy-nilly into the regolith, the static electricity issues of super dry and thin air, yadda yadda yadda. Even with astronauts on Mars directing all the chaos, it's a nightmare of logistics and black-swan events to refuel a rocket.
Like, comparing the Apollo missions to the eventual Ares missions is foolhardy. The tech we got out of going to the moon is going to seem like brightly colored wood blocks compared to the F-35 that is the tech the Mars missions require.
I mean still, you gotta have robots handling fuel on an alien world and you still gotta land the rocket on something other than some random patch of dirt. Yeah, you can engineer things this way and that, make the rocket land on just about anything solid, reduce the fuel you land, make robots that are more reliable or expendable. Anyway you look at it the engineering challenges are massive. No matter what you're going to try, it affects Earth much more than than the way Tang and freeze-dried ice-cream did.
On what pad are you going to land the rocket? You've got to at least level the ground and clear it of debris before a landing. That's gonna take some big construction equipment, even in 0.4G, likely not with a human anywhere near. Likely, you'll need to pour something akin to concrete for the pad, which is not an easy job for a suited up human without any real rad protection. Robots are going to be a major part of any Mars mission as Mars is not a great place to be outside and doing skilled labor.
Think about it. To get off of Mars, you have two options really. Land the take-off rocket with the fuel in it or land it dry and then fuel it up. Landing a take-off rocket wet is super hard, especially on what amounts to virgin regolith. Fueling up the rocket means you make the fuel on the surface and transport it to the rocket. Also, super hard.
Supposing that you did manage to find a good pocket of the raw materials that you need for the fuel, you still have to have astronauts do that mining, or you need to invent reliable robots to do that for you. Such robots would completely transform the mining and resource extraction economy of the Earth. Then you need to get that fuel to the rocket somehow. Again, either you use astronauts or you invent a hell of a self-driving tanker, which, again, transforms the lives of all humans on Earth. There is the other issues of building the landing pad, the job site for mining extraction, the issues when the fuel spill everywhere with Earth 8 lightminutes away, the scientific issues of just mining willy-nilly into the regolith, the static electricity issues of super dry and thin air, yadda yadda yadda. Even with astronauts on Mars directing all the chaos, it's a nightmare of logistics and black-swan events to refuel a rocket.
Like, comparing the Apollo missions to the eventual Ares missions is foolhardy. The tech we got out of going to the moon is going to seem like brightly colored wood blocks compared to the F-35 that is the tech the Mars missions require.