[imron]

> Adapting these rockets for reusability testing would have meant basically redesigning them from the ground up.

And now they're going to have to do that anyway if they want to compete with SpaceX, so what the GP said is true, it's something established players should have done a long time ago, and they're going to be noncompetitive for a period of time as a result.

[snrplfth]

Correct - they just went down the wrong optimization road, so the incremental development program for Falcon 9 landing is nothing they could have replicated.