"After walking away from a previously planned joint mission to Jupiter, NASA has asked the European Space Agency if it can furnish a lander or ice-penetrating probe for a rejuvenated U.S.-led robotic spacecraft to visit Jupiter’s moon Europa."
source: http://spaceflightnow.com/2015/04/10/nasa-invites-esa-to-build-europa-piggyback-probe/
Translation: Once again, we'll put up most of the money and build the rocket to get them there so Europe can steal the glory again just as they did with Titan. Most of the time when you hear about the Huygens probe, it's a great achievement for the ESA (European Space Agency) and if NASA's involvement with Cassini is even mentioned, we're lucky to get a footnote. When the ESA discovers life on Europa, that will be a great moment for them. Why don't we just put a Russian rocket on the mission to make our humility complete?
Not only could NASA have easily built the Europa landing/ice-penetrating probes but private enterprise here would have greatly benefited too! But I guess that would make too much sense after spending countless billions of U.S. taxpayer dollars and decades searching for life!
See Also: http://roberthaskell.blogspot.com/2015/07/americas-contributions-to-space-race.html
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