'Shuttle, space station were mistakes'

"It is now commonly accepted that was not the right path," Griffin said. "We are now trying to change the path while doing as little damage as we can."

Asked whether the shuttle had been a mistake, Griffin told the daily: "My opinion is that it was. It was a design which was extremely aggressive and just barely possible."

Asked whether the space station had been a mistake, he said: "Had the decision been mine, we would not have built the space station we're building in the orbit we're building it in."

Griffin announced September 19 that the United States will send four astronauts to the moon in 2018 in a major return to its pioneering manned missions into space.