Ukrainian war, what will happen to the International Space Station
Russia talks insistently about wanting to leave the International Space Station. But how true can this be? The in-depth study by Enrico Ferrone
In the tam tam of information, it is always sensationalism that has the greatest hold on the public of readers and listeners. And so it is for the fate of the International Space Station, which in these days is particularly stimulating Italian attention, given that Samantha Cristoforetti has been among the guests since the end of last month, on her second mission on the outpost at 400 km. from the earth.
But to disturb the already troubled relations between Russia and the rest of the world there is now an interview given to TASS by Dmitry Rogozin, administrator of the Russian space agency Roscosmos .
"The decision has already been made, we are not obliged to talk about it in public." This is what the former deputy defense minister and before that ambassador to NATO but certainly Vladimir Putin's protégé expressed himself, today at the head of one of the most important instruments of visibility, but also of aggression in the hands of Moscow's power. To read it like this it seems the umpteenth threat to the Western world.
We know of this politician who is so close to the president that he knows the communication levers well to the point of having shared on his social profile a video about Zelensky asking his fellow citizens to lay down their arms, which later turned out to be a fake; but this time let's try to elaborate some more in-depth considerations.
After 22 years of activity in space, we can say that we know the International Space Station quite well. To the point of knowing that its genesis dates back to an action by American President Ronald Reagan who in 1983 convinced Congress to finance a strategic defense program that would have made the nuclear arsenals scattered throughout Soviet territory obsolete. What he liked to call the evil empire.
It was the SDI (Strategic Defense Initiative), known as the "space shield". A defense system articulated on four different bands, corresponding to as many phases of the trajectory of a hypothetical intercontinental ballistic missile launched from a polygon or a submarine. The cost of this program was very high, over 60 billion dollars for an innovative technological development involving a large number of resources and scientists. The story is well known and has been told in many versions. Several analysts blame the shield for the dissolution of the Soviet empire, intimidated by the aggressiveness of the capitalist enemy and terrified by the inability to sustain adequate expenditure for the challenge. And what to do with all that is stored in terms of industrial knowledge and skills? Everyone liked the idea of creating a peaceful cooperation in space that would put in common the orbiting modules of Salijut, Mir and the Apollo not used for lunar expeditions, there were many nations willing to cooperate and it was also a good one. opportunity for the two former rivals to control each other in a space not much larger than a football stadium, but sufficient to carry out some experiments and above all, to showcase their skills.
And so, already in June 1992, George Bush (father) and Boris El'cin signed the agreements that brought the representatives of 15 nations to Washington on January 29, 1998, including for Italy the Research Minister Luigi Berlinguer, to sign a memorandum that would establish the framework for cooperation between the partners on the design, development, operation and use of the largest international project ever conceived.
It was undeniably a huge step taken by almost all industrialized countries, excluding China, which was already enjoying Western hostilities even then. The Station was built piece by piece in orbit starting from the first Russian segment, launched on November 20, 1998 aboard an unmanned Proton rocket reached two weeks later by the space shuttle Endeavor, carrying NASA's Unity module, to be then completed on 5 June 2011 with an estimated time of over 1,000 hours of work and more than 200 extravehicular trips. However, if today we traced its history here it would have the flavor of a de profundis that we sincerely hope not to have to recite.
At that time at the head of the European Space Agency (ESA) was Antonio Rodotà, a high-level technician who came from the world of industry and had many skills in both industrial policy and international relations.
Italy had good job opportunities, mainly with the construction of multipurpose modules to be able to integrate the shuttle compartment and then the Harmony (Node 2) and Tranquility (Node 3) rooms with a commitment of about 520 million euros through the programs ESA and 260 million euros with national programs. It should also be remembered DOME, a three-meter diameter hemisphere with six side windows and an upper window, an all-national project to allow visual contact of the astronauts with the outside of the orbiting station.
Now Russia is talking insistently about wanting to leave it. But how true can this be? With a rather reassuring attitude, at least towards his regime, Nathan Eismont of the Russian Space Research Institute, said in a television appearance that the operation of the International Space Station (ISS) would become nearly impossible if Russia withdraws from the program. And it is technically permissible since the station's almost circular orbital position is due to the periodic operation of the two main motors located on the Zvezda service module. So it is up to the Russians to replace the devices and connect their contacts when necessary. However, they must have been annoyed in Roscosmos for the fact that since December 2008 NASA, with the signing of an agreement with the company Ad Astra Rocket of Houston, defined the development of the VASIMR plasma propulsion engine, which could have made the existing propulsion system is already obsolete, with a reduction in the costs for their maintenance.
Another factor that was not appreciated by the Kremlin is certainly the aggressive policy of SpaceX, which with the reusable first stage of its carriers, has substantially reduced the cost of each launch and therefore also the price to pay for the agencies that send personnel. aboard the Station. If for this reason, Elon Musk's entrepreneurial ability has also disturbed our European administrators who have not yet been able to respond to the American challenge. But that's another story …
Well, when on July 30, 2020, testers Robert Behnken and Douglas Hurley validated that America would resume Western astronauts traveling on their own vehicles thanks to what Regozin defined as one of the "talented businessmen who pollute the orbit », this operation has definitively wrested the monopoly that Baikonur had held since 2011, the year in which the Atlantis shuttle performed its last service. So after the long period in which the Soyuz were the only vehicle capable of bringing astronauts and cosmonauts to the Station – at a cost of 85 million dollars per passenger – but with a rather archaic technology conceived by Sergej Pavlovic Korolev in 1966, today there is a new competitor and a better price too.
There seem to be two elements, probably not unique as we will see, which are making Putin well ride the role of the statesman offended by his former friends while our feeling is that Russia wants to get rid of this exorbitant cost and is only looking for a good political motivation and economic to use this action as an intimidation.
But there is obviously something else that the press projected to make judgments and considerations not always with the necessary objectivity must have forgotten: the decision to get rid of an economic burden greater than any scientific interest and visibility is in the process of being long before the aggression against Ukraine took place. Vladimir Soloviev, flight director of the Russian segment has publicly proposed a new enterprise that can bring together all the experience accumulated in many years of design and human stay in space, starting from the early seventies. A strategic patrimony attractive to many powers. And since Donald Trump, when he was president, made known his intentions to return the United States to the moon, somewhere a warning light went on because our natural satellite could once again be an element of competition with the great western monster: but for such an enterprise it is better to have allies. Luna 26, Luna 27 and Luna 28 could have easily found a shore with the Chinese lunar probes Chang'e 4, Chang'e 5 and Chang'e 6 so bringing together the projects was the thought to achieve good results faster and get back on track with different companies. Visiting the OBOR (One Belt, One Road) forum in Beijing in May 2020, Putin complimenting Chinese President Xi Jinping said: “We are successfully collaborating in space and there is every possibility that we will advance in this cooperation. The supply of our rocket engines to China is the order of the day. There are all the possibilities to do it ». It seems strange that no one has noticed these words and that nothing has been asked of us about the aims of the bilateral agreement between Russia and China with a rich package of collaborations for lunar and cosmic exploration.
It is understandable – and honestly very dangerous – that the two giants united by certainly undemocratic regimes turned to each other, some to propose more powerful engines, some to offer specifically targeted electronic technology. A response after all to the Trump presidency's intentions regarding the return to the moon of the United States with a "generous" enlargement but only to their most loyal allies. Last year, another agreement between Dmitry Rogozin and Zhang Kejian, director of the China National Space Administration went quietly and yet the document indicated the desire to have the technicians of the two eastern empires work together to create research facilities on the surface and around the orbit of the Moon, with the determination in the future to increase its human presence.
We consider these notes to be useful only to understand that neglecting some signals for public opinion and perhaps also from too distracted diplomacy, in the end they play the game of those who exploit hostile attitudes to forge new and dangerous alliances.
Therefore, we believe that the rupture of what blatantly can be called "friendship" between Nasa and Roscosmos was foreseeable for some time and on the basis of this knowledge, it was no bolt from the blue or indication of betrayal. head of the Russian space agency.
But then it is the American space agency itself that no longer seems interested in the continuation of the use of the space station for a long time. And in fact, for some time in America they have been thinking about the future of the SSI with the docking of at least three modules of the private Axiom station, to then separate and become independent starting from 2025, the year in which the doors of space tourism may perhaps be opened. . Is this date compatible with a possible divestiture by Russia? Difficult to predict, in such a hot moment in which weapons have taken command of every negotiation. As observers, we must hope that dangerous sudden maneuvers to deorbit without control a work that cost a hundred billion dollars will be avoided and that an unnecessary tragedy that would be a great burden for the whole of humanity is avoided.
This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Start Magazine at the URL https://www.startmag.it/innovazione/russia-ucraina-stazione-spaziale-internazionale/ on Mon, 02 May 2022 08:23:10 +0000.