Lets hope that it is a promise for innovation and not a threat of dirty tricks. people should not be declaring it as some kind of "Musk victory". These guys do not play fair and have deep pockets.

You can beat Musk to Mars one of two ways:

1) You innovate better/faster than SpaceX and get there sooner

2) You slow down SpaceX by legal/ political/other means until your company can get a lead.

Given all the dirty tricks[1],[2] & possibly [3] that ULA (50-50 partnership Boeing & Lockheed) has played in the past, I would not put it past them to do #2.

[1] https://defensesystems.com/articles/2014/04/28/spacex-protes...

[2] http://spacenews.com/ula-vp-resigns-following-remarks-on-com...

[3] https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/implication-...