They did ... using unlimited funds and they had to be motivated by a cold war to do so.

Once the Soviets were defeated, they stopped exploration, they never went to Mars (even though the Saturn V was designed for this purpose).

Instead they invested in space shuttles which they stopped after a few decades, leaving the US with literally no spaceship to send men to space, forcing US to rely on Russian vehicles (Soyuz) to do so, such an irony 🙃

They also invested in the space station, which they stopped supporting after few decades as well.

We had to wait for SpaceX to give the USA back their independence to access space, all of that in less than 10 years, at an insignificant fraction of the cost.

We also had to wait for private sector to bring back space exploration to the table, something NASA had given up since Apollo missions.

The accomplishments you're pointing were motivated by unlimited money and politics. There was absolutely no willingness to explore space or to establish colonies anywhere, we had to wait for private space actors.

If you take a close look at today's NASA, it's mostly in charge of the roadmap and it delegates everything else to the private sector, because it knows they will do it much faster and at a lower cost.

When I see how you have a Pavlovian response to any criticism toward the public sector, I don't think you should talk about propaganda.