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NASA Denies New Space Station Partnership With Russia
schwit1 writes NASA officials today denied they were negotiating a partnership with Russia to build a space station replacement for ISS, as suggested yesterday by the head of Russia's space program. Maybe the misunderstanding comes from NASA head Charles Bolden, who is currently in Russia. Bolden probably said some nice feel-good things to the Russians, things like "We want to keep working together," and "We will support your plans for your future space station." None of this was meant as a commitment, but the Russians might have taken them more seriously than Bolden realized.
like it or not Russia IS A LEADING nation. I know that we in the US and other parts of the western world like to look down on Russia but in many fields they are the leader, space exploration is probably one of their strongest points both historically and currently. Countries all over the world use Russian rocket technology to get shit into space, even the US. People still seem to look at Russia as it was prior to 2000, they have had a massive economic and political changes in since then yet so many can't seem to get past the old mindset or look beyond the douche that is putin.
Space exploration? Hardly. They haven't done any exploration since the Berlin Wall fell. NASA's putting probes on every planet they can, the ESA and JAXA are launching their own probes, even China and India are doing more exploration than Russia. The only real active area of research for Russia is on the ISS.
Russia's just a cheap source of rockets - and that has more to do with their low cost of labor and massive subsidies than the actual cost-effectiveness of their rockets. The fact that they're currently the only way to the ISS has more to do with the political failings of NASA than any redeeming quality they have.
PS: Russia's economy is still failing. It's not in the near-freefall it was in the 90s, but it still looks more like a big second-world country than a developed nation.
until it has been officially denied.
"Leading" is a relative term in a world dominated by the US. We're a fifth of the economy. We're most of the military spending. We have the most advanced weapons. Our culture is known world-wide. The Chinese could compete with us, if they get a few more years of 8% growth and they can figure out their aging population problem. The Europeans could also compete with us, if they'd ever get off their damn asses and give their precious sovereign right to veto every-damn-thing to the EU.
Russia clearly belongs in the next tier, right along with the Japanese and other regional powers. But it's not like Russia can bail out small Latin American countries without noticing the hit to it's budget. But the top tier clearly could. So could the Japanese.
space exploration is probably one of their strongest points both historically and currently
Russia has heavy lift capability, and that's basically it. I tried to find the last time they actually did exploration (as in probes, rovers, etc) and didn't see much of anything since the Soviet Union. Right now NASA, ESA, Japan, China and even India are all ahead of Russia as far as exploration goes, as all those organizations have active probes in space doing science. Russia is basically just hauling stuff into orbit.
Better known as 318230.
What in my post implied Putin cares what ordinary Americans think? I mentioned him trying to appease a Russian domestic audience with a space station, and potential difficulties he'd have reining in the Donbass rebels, but I said nothing about Western public opinion.
BTW, your premise is wrong to an extent at least. All my comments got a -1 troll, the AC posting that Russia was a superpower got to +4 insightful, and everyone criticizing that blessed comment also got -1 troll. Which means the Kremlin apparently loosed it's merry band of paid internet trolls on Slashdot.
The soviet union collapsed and now russia is run by a thug dictator for life as his personal toy with immature cult of personality on the same level as north korea
they invaded and vivisected georgia, and now invade ukraine because their feelings were hurt when slavic brothers ukraine announced it preferred to go with europe. its economy is tanking because its economy is just digging up oil
it is 140 million people. china is 1.3 billion. eu is 500 million. both diversified and growing economies with stable governments, not politically immature kgb goon worship
canada is small and weak over a large land area too. difference being, canada is at peace and with good relations with its neighbors. russia looks for every opportunity to piss everyone off. ultranationalism and 1950s imperialism is a fantasy of hurt egos and faded glory. it's a colossal weakness, not a strength. it only announces more aggression to come exactly as gets weaker
russia is a dying country. the 1950s and sputnik and yuri gagarin was its highest point. everything from then on was/ is downhill
in a hundred years, the trajectory that started with the collapse of the soviet union will continue. sibera will pass to china (outer manchuria, which russia won from china only in 1850, is going majority chinese population soon). and everything west of moscow will pass to europe by choice or by fire, as ukraine shows
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they are too few people over too large an area. their economy is too weak. and their politics is mafia level intimidation amateur hour, easy to topple and push around, if not outright inviting revolution when rabid ultranationalism loses its power
their much vaunted military will not keep up technologically and with a collapsing economy, and that's the only chip they have left that is weakening over time
the history of central asia is replete with giant empires that rise and fall. russia is but another to come to pass, and soon. i think this century, at least the next
no more deals with russia, especially on the space station. they are aggressive losers, any deals we make with them will not last and will be subject to further decay over time
to russian space scientists:
i suggest defecting to the west and private space companies. be the next sergey brin of space. he didn't make google in russia, and he never could have. the russian von brauns need to do the same
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
Almost in Europe? what weird ass map are you looking at? it is close to some European countries, most of which are not really indicative of Europe. Russia has plenty of pretty good cities, include Moscow, Yekaterinburg, Pskov, Vladimir and quite a few others, though I have not spent enough time in others to truly judge them. You are heavily focused on the western mentality and propaganda and forgetting that most of the wests wealth is centred around a very select minority (happy to admit I am in that minority). Whilst Russia is very similar in this respect china is NOT, it has a middle and upper middle class that vastly outnumbers the entire population of the US and this group is rapidly rising in wealth. China are already only second to the US in the official number of millionaires, china has half a billion middle class.
When you say you want to work together, it seems logical that people might get the idea that you would want to work together.
I would not call that 'misunderstanding' I would call that 'lying'.
And if you are an official spokesperson of the NASA, you should know how to say things.
Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.