Will The ISS Program Survive In Its Current Form?
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Keith’s note: Bill Nelson is pushing the whole ‘pay no attention to the man behind the curtain’ thing when it comes to the relentlessly brutal attack on Ukraine by Russia. While the slaughter only grows in Ukraine, in outer space it supposed to be calm (I guess). To be certain, one would hope that some form of international cooperation will survive this real-time genocide. Meanwhile (see below) A large part of the world is working very hard toward totally screwing over Russia with the intent of having a long-term effect. So “normality” is not a thing that many people expect to be seeing for a while.
Russia’s space budget is cut year after year and the U.S. no longer really needs them. They have either shunned other nations’ space efforts or other nations have shunned Russia’s. Or both. The Russian space program is now isolated from the rest of the world. Since Russia is broke and China has sparkly new space hardware – and money – they do not really need Russia either.
So … where is the impetus to cooperate with the same powers that seek to undermine Russia going to come from? To be certain, the space station has weathered a lot of terrestrial politics in the past 20 years – but nothing on this scale where warnings about “World War III” appear on the lips of senior diplomats. If the ISS program stays intact when this is all (hopefully) over, then, as I have said before, the program most certainly deserves a Nobel Peace Prize.
Russian Cosmonauts Are Being ‘Brainwashed’: Ex-NASA Astronaut Scott Kelly, Newsweek
“I’m a patriotic American, as a former military officer and an astronaut, and I would expect the Russians to be patriotic,” he told Newsweek. “What kind of surprises me is that, at least from an appearance perspective, most of them are really far down the rabbit hole, you know, believing that this was a necessary action to prevent Nazis and NATO from destroying Russia. And I know this because some of them have told me this. “So that part surprised me. How easily some of them were misled and brainwashed, I guess you could say, and don’t believe what is really happening. I mean, I’ve had discussions with them about the atrocities that are committed, and they believe it’s all fake, that it’s Ukrainians committing them and blaming them on the Russians, or it’s just made up.”
Austin says US wants to see Russia’s military capabilities weakened
“Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin insisted Monday that Russia was failing in its Ukraine incursion, with Austin explicitly saying that the US wants to see Russia’s military capabilities weakened. “We want to see Russia weakened to the degree that it can’t do the kinds of things that it has done in invading Ukraine,” Austin said at the news conference.”
Russian official admits sanctions are crippling the economy as the country grapples with a selloff and mass shortages, Fortune
“In revealing testimony before the Duma parliament, the head of the Central Bank of Russia (CBR) told the country’s lawmakers she had to throw everything but the kitchen sink just to prevent a full-blown run on the banking system. “The sanctions imposed against Russia affected the situation in the financial sector, spurred the demand for foreign currencies, and caused fire sales of financial assets, a cash outflow from banks, and surging demand for goods,” said Elvira Nabiullina in prepared remarks first published in English on Friday.”
The question that should be asked is not “Will it survive in it’s current form” but “Should it survive in it’s current form”
I go back and forth on this thought myself.
Curse Russia for the atrocities, they deserve every punishment we can give them.
But ,just because they “deserve” an unending darkness, does not mean that cutting off all hope is what is best. We are called to give the possibility of salvation to the unsaveable, for our own souls’ sake if not for theirs.
Maintaining cooperation on a goal as grand as extending humanity’s reach beyond the Earth itself is holding out a single extended hand to say that we can move past this, and you can still have an amazing future if you stop this madness.
it’s a Hail Mary play, quite literally. But worth it to try, at least that’s what I think right now. Cut off everything except this one bright spot, to give them a reason to believe that things will be better if they relent.
I see the very same thing that Scott Kelly describes among the well-educated people I know inside the country. It’s heartbreaking. I found this article to be an interesting read on the mental gymnastics behind this situation: https://cepa.org/why-russia…
Had some back and forth on Facebook with a well-known Russian space journalist who “reluctantly” decided to support the invasion. He didn’t believe the Russian casualty and damage statistics were real.
People seem to buy old lines like ‘NATO is out to get us’ and there’s a whole lot of whataboutism of convenience. People naturally want to be patriotic and are predisposed to accept stories that are consistent with that. Putin has spent so many years discrediting, imprisoning, and murdering potential rivals, that most see him as the only alternative, as distasteful as they may find him.
There are repercussions from speaking out against the current Russian regime. Which could involved one’s livelihood and family.
Yes, I’ve studied the country for 40-odd years (and lived there, as well). There is a difference between honest opinion and what you say to cover your backside when talking with people you don’t know. What I speak of is people who really do accept the nonsense fed to them by state media. There are many many of them.
I feel bad for my friends in Russia but one must realize that not just the astronauts, but most of the people working for Roscosmos, Energia and the other ‘state-owned’ companies owe not only their meager salaries, but also their food and their apartments to their employers. I’ve known one or two over the years who lost their jobs and when they lost the job they lost everything. They only know what Putin and their news media tells them.
As far as ISS surviving, I am not worried about losing the Russians. They have provided a needed and at times crucial back up to US capabilities over the last twenty years; but if there were no need for a backup then we could easily get along without the Russians. A couple of their modules are the oldest and most susceptible to effects of aging. Some of the capabilities they provide like Soyuz or Progress are no longer so critical and we have lots of alternatives. Russians already decided to join forces with the Chinese for lunar exploration. I suspect the Chinese will be carrying them because Russians have demonstrated no ability to pay their own way. They’ve shown they no longer have any technologies worth emulating.