>>69777836There is literally nothing in LEO but other satellites, whereas the moon has stuff that could be repurposed or manufactured. That's like saying you don't understand the purpose of setting up a colony in the new world when you could just get furs from Russia or wherever. Plus I think you're overestimating the strength of the Moon's gravity. The Lunar Lander could get back into orbit on just a relatively little bit of fuel from its thrusters, meanwhile to get it out of Earth it took an entire skyscraper's volume of fuel and a bigass rocket