https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mars_2020
In government terms? That is nothing. We’ll burn that much on defective F-35 fighters in a year.
And we are not “just” assessing the mineral content of the soil—not even close.
https://mars.nasa.gov/mars2020/mission/science/
(If you’re that offended by the cost, I will Venmo you the 0.1 cents per year this is taking out of your tax bill.)
Except…NASA apparently spent all of $80 million on a helicopter that will work on Mars. One has to wonder what the military-industrial complex could accomplish with a bit of financial discipline and oversight.
With $80m, the military industrial complex would figure out that pink and yellow don't work well for urban camouflage.
That is, the military requirements are much more intense than we often realize.
Also, rifles are really good at shooting through shit. We're talking rifles from 1890s. People don't realize that a bullet from a rifle punches through steel plate (and then buy steel body armour like the plebs they are). Modern ar15/ak rifles are wusses by comparison- we traded big badass bullets for smaller ones that are lighter and easier to carry.
More awesome weapons like the rpg-7 basically create a stream of molten metal that goes right through armored vehicles. Or you use depleted uranium or tungsten, which get more dense as they heat up from friction of punching through things.
In the near future we'll have even more badass things like railguns that will go through meters of steel/ceramic/admantium.
So yeah, that mountain may not save you. Meanwhile, mars will be the same.
The vast majority of combat causalities are from explosive fragmentation anyways.