Showing that Russian President Vladimir Putin pays attention to more than the 2016 U.S. election, Putin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov mentioned Elon Musk’s SpaceX after launching a rocket for recycled materials. Russia’s manned Soyuz MS spacecraft has evolved from Soyuz 1, first launched in 1967, capable of carrying three-crew. Evolved over 50 years, Soyuz MS is currently the world’s only manned space vehicle capable of delivering humans to the International Space Station. Peskov mentions Musk who feverishly works under a multi-billion-dollar NASA contract to resume U.S. manned space operations after the Space Shuttle Atlantis flew its last flight July 8, 2011. Never before in NASA’s history had a spacecraft been retired without a suitable replacement vehicle. Putin knows that Musk’s SpaceX is getting closer to resuming U.S. manned space-flights.
Russia’s state-run space company Roscosmos currently collects about $75 million for a one-way trip to the ISP. When Musk goes manned space operation with his Dragon spacecraft, Roscosmos won’t add big bucks to its annual budget of !86 billion rubles or about $3.3 billion. Today’s NASA budget of $19.5 billion, spending most of its budget on contractors like SpaceX, Boeing Space Systems and Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin, all get billions from NASA to complete the next generation manned spacecraft. As it stands today, Musk has the best shot to resume manned space operations in 2018 or sooner. Boeing’s CST 100 spacecraft has been lagging behind SpaceX’s Dragon 2’s manned capsule. Paying close attention to anything American, Peskov admitted the Kremlin tracks Musk’s recent developments. SpaceX has been moving swiftly to a manned Dragon spaceship.
NASA hasn’t given up on producing another generation spacecraft after retiring the Space Shuttle in 2011. Estimating its about 10 years away from Orion manned spacecraft, NASA plans an asteroid mission for 2026. All hopes today are on Musk’s Dragon spacecraft closing in on manned space operations. Expected to carry up to seven astronauts, Musk’s Dragon spacecraft promises to be the next generation of space-flight to complete Musk’s eventual goal of a mission to Mars. Musk hasn’t talked about returning to the moon but, with China’s Shenzhou spacecraft and Russian Soyuz looking to go to the moon, SpaceX might detour from Mars to the moon. “We follow technological breakthroughs very carefully in the Kremlin and in the relevant state institutions,” said Peskov, admitting that the Russian space agency follows developments at SpaceX’s Hawthorne, Calif. facility.
Peskov knows that for all the problems with the Russian economy, the space program is a source of pride, much like it was before NASA’s Space Shuttle was grounded in 2011. Competition is fierce enough. But we have all grounds to suppose that we can make a worthy contribution to this competition,” said Peskov, showing the same rivalry to the U.S. seen since the USSR launched Sputnik Oct. 4, 1957. Four years later, Russia launched cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin into space on Vostock 1 April 12, 1961. Less than a month later, NASA’s Mercury capsule sent astronaut Alan Shepard into space May 5, 1961, officially starting the space race. President John F. Kennedy told a fired-up audience Sept. 12, 1962 at Rice University, he expected NASA to land a man on the moon before the end of the decade. Kennedy was assassinated Nov. 22, 1963, never to see his dream come true.
Delivering on Kennedy’s promise, NASA sent Apollo 11 to the moon July 20, 1969, leaping ahead of Russia’s space program. While running unmanned space operations to Mars or other deep space probes to Saturn and Jupiter, NASA lost its edge in space when the last Shuttle flight ended in 2011. “Heartfelt congratulations,” Russian Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogzin told Musk, commenting about future Roscosmos projects. “It is extremely important to retain, for more than just the purposes of prestige, the status of a great space state, which has to correspond totally with new work, new ides and new technology,” said Rogzin, expressing Russia’s passion to continue leading the space race. Letting private space companies like Space X, Boeing and Blue Origin take the lead, NASA has done everything possible to encourage space entrepreneurs like Musk and Bezos.
All the squabbling in Washington can hide the fact that private sector space companies have been one of the great success stories in U.S. history. With NASA not having a new spacecraft until at least 2026, it’s up to entrepreneurs like Musk to ferry the next generation of astronauts into space. Russia stands to lose a $150 million round-trip for U.S. astronauts to the ISP. When SpaceX’s Dragon spacecraft ferries U.S. astronauts back to space, it’s going to redeem the tragic loss in 2011 of manned U.S. space operations. While SpaceX is a private company, the whole nation will swell with pride watching Musk launch astronauts back into space. Whatever the budget-slashing mood in 2017, Trump must not forget the importance of the space budget for national morale. When the Space Shuttle was grounded to Mother Earth, all Americans contracted to the new mediocre reality.
