After nine years of hiatus in manned launches US back into space, acquiring the ability to send a man into orbit. Although scheduled for may 27 launch of the spacecraft Crew Dragon 2 and was at the last moment postponed due to the weather conditions on 30 may, no one doubts that the astronauts still fly. During the year the flights have to make two new American manned spacecraft — Boeing’s CST-100 and Dream Chaser Cockpit.
For Russia, this flight will mark the end of its monopoly on the delivery of crews to the international space station, which it has used since 2011. No political complications during this time could not affect its exclusive status as a space power-level. Neither the United States nor any other country could not do without the services of the Russian Federation for the delivery of crews.
However, now there is clearly question — but how Russia will respond to this challenge? Has been used the past tense to consolidate its position in space? While the US will have four new spacecraft (including Orion, designed primarily for missions to the moon), how many new products will Russia?
Just note that almost all of the replenishment of the space fleet of the United States is due to private initiatives. The name Elon musk, as previously Richard Branson, in this case is a landmark. The three ships appeared in the framework of NASA Commercial Crew Development, designed for cooperation between business and the state. The government gives orders for delivery to orbit crews and private contractors undertake to comply with them. Similarly, work launched in 2012, the program Commercial Resupply Services for the ISS delivered the goods. As you can already understand, NASA deliberately chooses one type of ship, and has several types. This is done in the framework of the American tradition of economic competition, that money did not go into one pocket, and in order not to depend on in an emergency from one contractor.
Russia still uses the spacecraft series “the Union”, the first of which flew in 1967. It is worth saying that more than half a century of operation is not unambiguously negative. “Union” has proven highly reliable machine. If the Americans of five “space” Shuttle lost two and they lost fourteen astronauts, the last catastrophe of the “Union” with fatalities occurred in 1971. Even with hindsight it is evident that the space Shuttle was largely a dead-end project, and the result of the involvement of the USSR in the race of reusable ships began billions of roubles spent on the creation of system “Energy” — “Buran”.
For this reason, it makes no sense to blindly copy the actions of the Americans, not to run a second time on ��such a senseless waste of money. In addition, it should be clear that today Russia is not a superpower, like the Soviet Union, she has no means to contest with America in the space on an equal footing. But for all that Russia can not take the existing position. The image of the country first launched an artificial satellite of the Earth, and sent a man into space, creates obligations.
The national space program can be as a means of rallying the population and one of the innovative technological projects of the movers of economic growth. However, the space, in contrast to atomic spheres, a long time did not received the same attention of the authorities. If “Rosatom” in 2005 headed by Sergei Kiriyenko, which was marked by certain achievements, the Roscosmos head of the business was appointed only in 2013, Igor Komarov.
The first major project in Russia in the post — construction of the Vostochny cosmodrome in the Amur region — has resulted in a series of scandals related to the embezzlement of money. If the Baikonur cosmodrome was built in the years 1955-1957, a little more than two years — in waterless desert, with the primitive technology of the time, the country has not yet come to himself after the war, the “Eastern” was built for another era, a very different technique. But at the same time from the decree to start construction before the first launch in 2016-nine years. And today, the spaceport has been held for five runs in four years, that does not justify the cost of its construction.
As for new projects, in the most distant future there is only one “ship — Federation”, which should replace the Soyuz, but its future is very vague and uncertain. It is not even known whether he ever flight, because according to the most optimistic official forecasts it is planned for 2025, with the date all the time tolerated. It is clear that if the Federation when something is implemented, she will not be able to be considered “innovative breakthrough”.
In any case, Russia is knocked out of such a profitable business as the delivery of astronauts and cargo to the ISS. Some alternative to the American project is not created and is not planned. “Federation” is generally designed as a delivery vehicle to the moon again, after the Americans, who plan to land there in the coming years. So propaganda sense of project is lost at all. Recall that before the “Buran” a lot of money in the USSR was “invested” in the project of creating a giant rocket N-1, intended for flight to the moon, where she never went. Thus, the story is a suggestion — you should never copy Americans, I must find my own way.
Given those modest means which have the Russian Federation for the space programme, is extremely VAzhno to make the right choice, what they should spend. It should be ambitious program, which will allow Russia to stake out its place in the cosmos today. Perhaps it may even be an unmanned flight, but associated with the achievement of such objects in space and their research that are still unexplored. The Soviet Union lost the US battle for “deep space”. America first reached mercury, Jupiter, Saturn and other planets. She staked the exploration of Mars. Now, you may return to this segment. Also, the Soviet Union lost the space astronomy — let us remember what a revolution in science, made a telescope “Hubble”. It may also be a point of force application at the present time.
Russia is in dire need projects that will help restore her national dignity in space. Since space flight became a major business sector of the Russian Federation can’t be outdone here. In early America, private companies have supplied the missiles and spacecraft, and NASA launched them. Now the concept has changed. Private corporations take over and runs, and their service, and the National Aeronautics and space acts only as a dispenser of funds. This revolution needs to happen in Russia. On the agenda should be the arrival of large Russian business in the space. And this is a public task.
