While I do agree it's delusional, back in the day when they were talking about going to the moon people thought the same thing, I think that's where the word "lunatic" comes from.
So honestly I'm willing to give him the chance and see if he can really make it happen. I don't think it will happen any time soon but I think we will live to see it.
Most of the issues are readily knowable, there is little mystery in terms of how stupidly hard it is make a colony happen if you actually look at the logistics and engineering instead of the dream.
Simple basic things like calculating food requirements alone for a small colony make you throw your hands up.
I could happen through shear brute force of sending so much stuff and supplies from earth, but no one is going to pay for that, not even Elon.
No bucks, no Buck Rogers.
A working colony on the moon is vastly easier because of the distance, and most likely financially viable through tourism.
A sustainable colony on Mars is a pipe dream, and I'm a huge proponent of going to mars.
Oh for sure it's an insane feat. My guess is they would need to send several Starships worth of supplies before they even send anyone, and the actual starship carrying humans would need to have enough supplies to last the trip. (I forget how long, several months I think at least?)
Before they even think of sending anyone they need to make sure it's possible to grow stuff on Mars, as well as create oxygen, and have tools etc to be able to do anything like dig, mine, process minerals etc... it only makes sense to send people if they can eventually be self sufficient. How do you make advanced things like chips or solar cells from scratch for example.
And going back to sending supplies, not only do they need to be sent, they need to land in roughly the same location, and also be conditioned so they last. Ex: food.
So yeah the more you start to think of all the logistics involved the more crazy it really gets. But somehow, I think it's still going to happen. I think it will be a return mission though. They'll send people there for a couple months and then they will come back. The logistics of that seem slightly simpler than actually leaving them there.
And yeah I feel they would want to do the moon first as a pilot project. I wonder if that is the next step after they retire the ISS.
Come to think of it the feasibility of this whole thing could make a great video.