Russia’s Space Challenges

Russia has delayed publication of its state program of space activities for 2021–2030, after letting its previous 2012-2020 plan go partially unfulfilled. Vladimir Putin may be the authoritarian leader of Russia but even he must pay attention to the politics of space.

One decade ago, on the 50^th anniversary of Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin’s inaugural flight into space, 49% of the Russian population said they believed space exploration would improve their lives within the next 20 years, with 63% saying it also would improve the economy, according to the Levada Research Center, a Russian non-governmental organization. A full 45% in the poll believed that Russia was stronger than other developed nations in the field of space exploration. VCIOM News, another Russian publication, found that 91% of Russians in 2021 expect their country to participate in space programs. The only milestone of greater import to modern Russians is the country’s victory in WWII. It presents Putin with a grand challenge. Expectations for the lagging space program far exceed Russia’s capability to meet its goals in a unilateral cosmonautic effort. Yet despite the financial constraints and public statements to the contrary, Putin is proceeding with his plans to modernize and militarize its space program.

While Western sanctions related to the 2014 Crimean annexation reduced the country’s ability to purchase the advanced space electronics produced overseas its needs to move forward in outer space, last year Putin still moved forward with his plans. He signed a presidential decree approving the foundations of new state policy in the field of space activities, according to the Russian publication Kommersant. First Deputy Director General of “Roskomos” Yuri Urlichich, said that Putin’s decree set new goals for the space program that, specifically, affected the development of the orbital constellation of satellites and improved access from the territory of Russia to outer space. By mid-2021 it proved to be an embarrassment and source of anger for the Russian people, according to Paul Goble of the Jamestown Foundation. The program’s decline is evident in the enormous cost overruns for building the space port on Russian territory and numerous failures on the launchpad itself. That hasn’t stopped Putin.

Problems plaguing the space program, according to Goble, translate into declining domestic support for Putin’s regime. He can no longer point to Russia’s superiority over the West or China. The technological advances in the Russian space program once fueled other parts of the economy. Today the civilian economy receives no benefit from it nor does the ideological outlook appear optimistic for future advances. Putin is being forced to play a new hand; trying to ensure his power and that his country doesn’t fall further behind its competitors by weaponizing space.

Pavel Luzin, an expert on the Russian armed forces, says that “It is this consensus that was exploited from the early 1960’s by the Soviet authorities and that has been exploited by the Russian authorities since the early 1990’s to ensure the legitimacy of the distribution of power and wealth within the country and of Russian decision-makers’ actions in the international arena.” The Russian people view the success of the space program as an indicator that Putin’s economic and political policies are on the correct tract.

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On July 12 Dmitry Peksov, press secretary to President Putin, announced that the state will continue to take the lead in space “exploration” as private companies in Russia do not have the capital. He then stated that he hopes Russian billionaires will invest in Russia’s program. Dmitry Rogozin, the head of Russia’s federal space agency Roscosmos, earlier in the week had appealed to billionaires to help with the cost of the space program, which is tightly linked to the country’s military complex.

Although Moscow has publicly declared its complete commitment to the demilitarization of space, Putin has overseen the development of space lasers systems designed to “to destroy or damage satellites from Earth or disrupt [the US] ability to use satellites,” according to recent Congressional testimony by US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin. The financial cost of the space program to Putin has decreased domestic support for his regime but it has not dulled his intention to build a modern space force capable to taking on the West. To remain in power, he must appease the population, the oligarchs and the Russian military. According to the Annual Threat Assessment by the US Director of National Intelligence, “Despite flat or even declining defense spending, Russia will emphasize new weapons that present increased threats to the United States….[and] will remain a key space competitor, maintaining a large network of reconnaissance, communications, and navigation satellites. It will focus on integrating space services… into its weapons and command-and-control systems.”

While the West must watch developments in China, it cannot overlook that Putin will continue to push his space program despite sanctions and the financial costs. He is continuing to train Russia’s military space elements, field new antisatellite (ASAT) weapons capable of disrupting and degrading US and allied space capabilities, and test its directed energy weapons. It is what he wants and what the Russian population expects of their leader.

DARIA NOVAK served in the United States State Department during the Reagan Administration, and currently is on the Board of the American Analysis of News and Media Inc., which publishes usagovpolicy.com and the New York Analysis of Policy and Government. Each Thursday, she presents key updates on Russia.

Quick Analysis

Putin’s Saber Rattling

Earlier this week, President Biden reversed his 2022 decision, authorizing the provision of antipersonnel land mines to the Ukrainian government. It follows an earlier Administration authorization to allow the use of an advanced American missile system capable of striking as deep as 100 miles inside Russian territory. The US election season may be ending, but both Russia and the West show no indication of stepping down the conflict. Russian propaganda continues to swell as the Kremlin increases its threats to use nuclear weapons against the West. Last week Andrey Sushentsov, program director of the pro-Kremlin think tank Valdai Discussion Club (VDC), published an article on growing nuclear tensions in the region. Official Russian language in the last few years has been threatening. Since the US election, rhetoric like that in the Sushentsov article, has approached the level of nuclear blackmail. The VDC article’s main theme centers on Russia’s intent to directly confront the West militarily if the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) becomes involved in Russia’s conflict with Ukraine. “On the one hand, these threats are intended to frighten the West, but on the other, Russian propagandists themselves are starting to believe in the inevitability of escalation,” according to Ksenia Kirillova of the Jamestown Foundation. On November 11, Sushentsov wrote that “The conflict will reach a completely new level, with unpredictable consequences for Europe and the entire world.” Kirillova points out that Putin’s distorted image of the world is divorced from reality and is causing the Kremlin to issue demands that are impossible to fulfill. Financial and other Russian resources needed to support Putin’s war are growing scarcer at the same time. This week the Kremlin announced a reduction of payments to its soldiers. Recently North Korea acknowledged it was sending soldiers to fight in Ukraine as Putin is running out of bodies to use as cannon fire. The war is not going well for Russia. One question floating around the Washington intelligence community is whether Putin will act out of desperation before President-elect Trump assumes office. In recent months the Russian propaganda machine is spewing out materials from fairly reputable analytical platforms inside the country. Kirillova says that “Kremlin ‘experts’ do not conceal that such threats are only intended to break the West psychologically, as they themselves are not prepared for full-scale nuclear war.” Despite Russia’s lack of preparation for an all-out war with the West, the expanding nuclear rhetoric carries with it an increase in the threat of a full-scale war in multiple theaters of operation. In June 2023 a founder of the Russian Council on Foreign and Defense Policy, Sergey Karaganov, called for “delivering a pre-emptive strike of retaliation” on Poland to force the West to surrender. In the previous month, Dmitry Suslov, a direct of research programs at the policy center proposed organizing “a demonstration nuclear explosion” aimed at intimidating the West. In September, President Putin announced a reappraisal of Russian nuclear doctrine after speaking earlier in the year at the plenary session of the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum and jokingly calling Suslov a “scary person.” Pavel Baev, writing in the European Daily Monitor, says “Putin intends his announcement to mark an escalation of nuclear brinkmanship and influence the proceedings of future Ukrainian peace efforts.” Putin is expanding the list of environmental conditions that are acceptable for using a nuclear weapon and incorporating it into Russian military doctrine. Baev adds that “The ups and downs of Russian brinkmanship are disconnected from the kinetic battles of the war, correlating instead with Ukrainian peace offensives, such as Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s first peace summit in Bürgenstock, Switzerland.” Despite the increase in vitriolic language, in a You Tube video published a week before the US presidential election, Karaganov openly assured the West the primary goal of the escalation is to break the American spirit and that of the West, not outright nuclear war. By Election Day in the US, with political prognosticators predicting a win for former president Trump, Karaganov changed his tune and called for an increased role in nuclear deterrence. Kirillova points out that Western concessions to Russia are unlikely to reduce the risk of nuclear escalation. The distorted reality inside the Kremlin continues to push that President-elect Trump is an adherent of “world government,” that Ukraine will create a nuclear weapon, and Russia must prepare for a nuclear conflagration to achieve its ambitions for a new world order. President-elect Trump has indicated he will not agree to concessions that destabilize Europe, the Middle East or other regions. Going forward a strong US foreign policy may be the most stabilizing course the West can count on to restrain Putin and his intent to rebuild the Russian empire. Daria Novak served in the U.S. State Dept. Illustration: Pixabay

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