US & Russia Pencil in Mars Launch by 2018

snilloc writes "The Washington Times is reporting that the US and Russia (and the Europeans are mentioned too) are planning for an eventual manned Mars trip. Suggested launch years are 2014 or 2018. The article discusses unmanned probes at greater length than the manned plans, but check out the Russian isolation experiment where 6 people will spend 500 days in a simulated spacecraft environment. (Sounds like a good reality TV show to me.)"

Comments

Yeah, that's nice, but...

[Sonny Yatsen]

China is definitely sending manned missions and no wussy probes. Why is everyone copying China?

Re:Yeah, Right...

[Troed]

The most important thing the rest of the world can do is to make everything non-american. The waste in effort and lives including USA in every day living is phenomenal and unnecessary.

Please - just stop it.

Won't happen (rant)

[swordgeek]

The way things are looking right now, I don't see Russia (or any other country) going along with the US on exploration, financing things, co-development of anything, or trade agreements.

The US as a nation is working VERY hard to be the biggest bully in the schoolyard. They're bombing countries at will (Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria next, and then probably Iran. Who after that?), they're violating international accords (the Geneva convention) and agreements (the Nuclear Non-proliferation agreement), they're violating the trade agreements they pushed hard for (NAFTA), and then they have the gall to turn around and accuse everyone else of doing the same.

The rest of the world--ALL of the rest of the world--is looking at the US with suspicion, mistrust, and fear right now. If a republican replaces Bush (I can't imagine him getting in again), then in five years the US is going to find itself completely isolated in the world.

Sigh.