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Russia Patches Up Space Program

Posted on: Sunday, 9 March 2003, 06:00 CST

MOSCOW -- There were times during the post-Soviet lean years of the Russian space program that it became hard to believe this was the same program that spawned Sputnik and Yuri Gagarin.

Russian space exploration spent the 1990s with hat in hand. When it wasn't asking for handouts from the United States, it was planning to sell seats on Soyuz missions to those who could cough up $20 million.

Nothing illustrated these hard times as well as Russia's role in the rocky beginnings of the International Space Station. The U.S. thought bringing Russia into the project would save it $2 billion; instead Russia cost the effort $3 billion.

Now, as Russia is thrust into the unlikely role of lifeline to the space station after the Columbia shuttle disaster, its space program again finds itself forced to forage for money. The fact that it's a routine Russia knows well doesn't make it any easier.

NASA has announced that Russia will send an American astronaut and a Russian cosmonaut in a Soyuz spacecraft to the space station in late April or early May to replace the three crewmen on the outpost.

Those crewmen, two Americans and a Russian, would return to Earth in the Soyuz attached to the station as an escape vehicle.

The shuttle program is expected to remain on hold for up to two years, so Russia will need to build more spacecraft to carry crews and supplies to and from the space station. Russia's space agency, Rosaviakosmos, has $130 million budgeted to send two Soyuz craft and three Progress cargo vehicles this year, but it needs $85 million more to build six Progress ships next year.

Russia has asked NASA for help, but the Iran Nonproliferation Act of 2000 bars the U.S. from doling out cash to Russia's space program unless Russia proves it has not supplied Iran with nuclear weapons technology in the last year. Among the Russian entities suspected of passing along nuclear weapons know-how to Iran is RKK Energia, a builder of Russian spacecraft.

So far, the U.S. has been unwilling to set aside the act's provisions in the wake of the shuttle disaster. Undersecretary of State John Bolton recently discussed Russia's request with Kremlin aides but gave no sign that the U.S. would acquiesce.

"What we discussed was the importance of not having Russian assistance, whether officially acknowledged or not ... to any Iranian programs involving weapons of mass destruction or ballistic missiles," Bolton said.

Russia is just as steadfast in denying it has, in any way, helped Iran's efforts to acquire nuclear weapons technology.

"We hope [the U.S.] won't put additional financial pressure on [Russia] for the sake of some mythical political realities, because this country already has a lot of other problems," said Yuri Koptev, director of Rosaviakosmos. "Frankly speaking, we do not understand why ... the financial burden has been shifted to one country. That is wrong."

Today, Moscow spends a fraction of what it spent on its space program during the Soviet era. Russia's economy is too weak to sustain the vast infrastructure that supported the program before the Soviet collapse. And, Russians don't view the country's space endeavors with the same level of importance they once did.

"In Soviet times, people trusted in what the government said was important, and the government said space was important," said Dmitry Pieson, director of a Moscow-based consulting firm in Russia's space industry. "Now, when people are counting money, people see that Russia is struggling and isn't a superpower anymore, and their desire to have a strong space program is diminished."

The Russian space program's money troubles date back to the waning years of the Mikhail Gorbachev era, when the Soviet Union embarked on building and launching a space shuttle called the Buran.

Only one Buran ever flew, an unmanned version in 1988. The other 11 that were built were mothballed. Today, most of what's left of the fleet rusts away in hangars. In Gorky Park, the husk of a Buran lured Muscovites and tourists to a restaurant inside.

By 1992, Russia's wobbly democracy had been invited by the Clinton administration to participate in the International Space Station program. President Clinton's team believed the offer was more than a diplomatic gesture--it was supposed to be a money saver, to the tune of $2 billion.

Diagram of the Soyuz-Fregat launch vehicle. Credit: RSA

Soyuz craft in orbit. Credit: NASA

Instead, the U.S. had to send Russia $2 billion to ensure the completion of the station's power module and living quarters. The Russians missed deadline after deadline. The construction of the Zvezda, the module that serves as the station's living space, was launched two years late. It also fell short of NASA standards; it's too noisy and lacks enough shielding to prevent damage from tiny meteoroids hurtling through space.

As a result of Russia's participation, NASA was forced to spend $3 billion to keep the project aloft. The meager amounts Moscow budgeted for its space program led to the advent of space tourism, which as unseemly as it appeared to NASA, promised the cold cash Russia needed.

In the last three years, California investment magnate Dennis Tito and South African Internet tycoon Mark Shuttleworth have rocketed to the space station in Soyuz capsules, and each paid Russia $20 million for the privilege. In August, a Russian television station and Rosaviakosmos agreed to the creation of a reality TV show that would put contestants through cosmonaut training and send whoever came out on top to the space station.

Now space tourism, perhaps the bonanza Russia desperately needed, is on hold after the Feb. 1 breakup of the Columbia shuttle that killed all seven astronauts aboard. Tourists can join a Soyuz flight to the station only when three-person crews are sent, because at least two astronauts are needed to man the station. Two-person crews now will be sent, so that water and other supplies can be taken to the station.

Despite its money troubles, the Russian space program looks to the future with lofty goals. Last summer it proposed putting an international six-person team on Mars by 2015. The trip would take 440 days and cost $20 billion.

Russia's space industry also has been working on developing a new shuttle that would launch from the back of an airborne jumbo jet.

The shuttle would cost $2 billion to complete and could be ready in five years, said Mikhail Gofin, an executive with Molniya, the company behind the project as well as the design of the Buran.

Both projects would restore some of the Russian space program's sheen worn away during the lean years of the 1990s. Both also require massive cash outlays that Russia doesn't have.

"Our government has been busy with other economic problems, not with space," Gofin said. "Space exploration doesn't produce an immediate return on your investment."

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NASA

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