Article Russia talks a big future in space while its overall budget is quietly cut

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https://arstechnica.com/space/2023/10/ru...ietly-cut/

EXCERPTS: The leader of Russia's space corporation, Yuri Borisov, discussed his country's future ambitions in space on Tuesday at the International Astronautical Congress. He spoke expansively about Russia's plans to build a new space station in low-Earth orbit, the Russian Orbital Station, as well as other initiatives.

[...] It all may have looked and sounded good on the international stage, but the presentation had something of the feel of a Potemkin Village, which refers to fake villages designed to impress the Russian empress Catherine the Great two centuries ago. Put another way, most (if not all) of the presentation was based on vaporware rather than hardware.

Shortly before Borisov took the stage, Russian media sources revealed that the country's budget for space activities is due to drop over the next two years—rather than rise to meet the challenge of these ambitious new space programs... (MORE - missing details)

[Yazata]

Russia has good engineers, lots of cutting edge technology, and big ambitions. But funding all of it will be hard in a time of war.

So I continue to expect Roscosmos to be drawn closer to the Russian military, providing expertise for military space initiatives. I expect those to receive funding priority. Russia will want to remain competitive with the US Space Force.

The civilian space exploration stuff might be more doable, at least in the short-term, in cooperation with another country who can help pay for it.

Cooperation with the US and Europe seems to be out at a time when they are fighting what amounts to a proxy war with Russia.

There's China which definitely has money and big space plans of its own. They would probably like to have access to all of that Russian engineering. But Russia remains leery of China I think, because Moscow fears becoming a client-state of Beijing. Russia continues to think of itself as a great power. I suspect Russia sees China more as a rival than as a friend.

My speculative intuition is that India might be the best fit for space cooperation with Russia. India's ISRO is an ambitious low-budget space program with human spaceflight ambitions and some successes under its belt. There might be synergies there that could result in some joint programs, the space station perhaps, to match some of the things China wants to do. India is a BRICS member and doesn't participate in the US/European sanctions against Russia. And like Russia, India is unsettled by China's increasingly arrogant assertiveness, including occupation of neighboring Tibet and territorial claims against India itself.

Brazil is another possible partner for Roscosmos, I guess. It's a BRICS member that's indicated interest in space but doesn't have a space program to speak of. But it's an increasingly wealthy up-and-comer among the world's nations. Teaming with Russia could offer them a way to get into space fast.

[Yazata]

Here's the current list of partners for China's International Lunar Research Station:

China hopes to build this in the 2030s, following first crewed lunar landings in the late 2020's.

ILRS signatory

China
Belarus
Pakistan
Azerbaijan
Russia
Venezuela
South Africa

Of these countries, apart from China only Russia has a significant space program.

For comparative purposes, here's the signatories of the Artemis Accords

Most of these countries don't have significant space programs either. Europe does collectively, with its European Space Agency (ESA) and India with its ISRO.

Argentina
Australia
Bahrain
Brazil
Canada
Colombia
Czech Republic
Ecuador
France
Germany
India
Israel
Italy
Japan
Luxembourg
Mexico
New Zealand
Nigeria
Poland
South Korea
Romania
Rwanda
Singapore
Spain
Saudi Arabia
Ukraine
United Arab Emirates
United Kingdom
United States