2023-08-07 23:17:00
This lunar epic might restore the image of a Russian space policy which has skated since the end of the USSR. As proof, the Luna-25 program was to end seven years ago. A colossal delay has been accumulated. The fault with a lack of interest for the space of the Russian political elites.
Isabelle Sourbès Verger is a researcher at the CNRS, specializing in space policy. ” If you look at the Russian space budget, she says, for decades it has hovered around five billion dollars. The American space budget is around 60 billion dollars. Unlike the United States or China, the space program has not been used as a flag of national greatness. »
And even if the end of the Luna 25 program is a pure coincidence, with the current context, according to the researcher, the war in Ukraine has changed the situation in terms of space. Russia will no longer cooperate with the Europeans for its future lunar missions. The collaboration with the Americans on the International Space Station, the ISS, is also over.
« A new cooperation with China is being set up, observes Isabelle Sourbès Verger, especially in the exploration of the Moon. On the Sino-Russian side, we want to show that we have a different project from that of NASA. The United States has shown its desire for commercial exploitation of the Moon’s resources. China and Russia are going to do a scientific exploration of the Moon. »
Given this strategy, it is difficult to imagine a commercial enterprise financed by public aid. This model, originally from Space X in the United States, is currently unthinkable in Russia.
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