Comment by madaxe_again
1 day ago
They say “the only US alternative”, which is true, but it’s not the only alternative - nasa paid for seats on Soyuz for many years, and I’m sure they could go back to doing the same. Perhaps China would be willing to sell seats on their launches. Maybe India will be in a position to offer human launches to the U.S. fairly soon - should be up and running by 2027, and they seem to hit their objectives most of the time.
Cooperation with roscosmos seems to have been largely unimpeded by Russia’s political and military actions over the years, so these all seem like realistic possibilities.
Yes, it will be a shame if the U.S. has no launch capability of their own, but short term partisan political thinking is much more important to the electorate than long term national strategic interest.
NASA still cooperates heavily with Roscosmos and American astronauts regularly fly in paid Soyuz seats. The latest one is Johnny Kim who launched in late April on Soyuz MS-27 from Baikonur and will stay on the ISS until december. And Christopher Williams is already scheduled for the next Soyuz mission.
China on the other hand will probably never happen because of the general political climate in the US and this administration in particular.
> American astronauts regularly fly in paid Soyuz seats
It's a seat swap arrangement, no money is exchanged.
https://spacenews.com/nasa-extends-seat-barter-agreement-wit...
Swap means they still get something in return, even if it's not cash. It's not like it was ever free.
Congress has forbidden NASA to cooperate with China for many years. It's been law since 2011: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wolf_Amendment
Also I believe that Russia isn't being paid for astronauts to fly on Soyuz. Instead, cosmonauts fly on Dragon. It's a like-for-like exchange which is mutually beneficial (both countries need the other's cooperation to keep the ISS operational, so these exchanges ensure that can continue if either Soyuz or Dragon are grounded for some reason.)
The ISS was built in the late 90s and China was already barred from joining back then.
Correct. The US paid for the Soyuz flights that they owed Russian astronauts, because they had no means of bringing them to the ISS.
My understanding is Russia wants out of ISS cooperation. Whatever contract there is, it will expire soon, and may not be extended.
>nasa paid for seats on Soyuz for many years, and I’m sure they could go back to doing the same
No. Obviously not.
>Perhaps China would be willing to sell seats on their launches.
That would be an extreme humiliation of the US and NASA. Abandoning civil space programs entirely would be preferable.
>Maybe India will be in a position to offer human launches to the U.S. fairly soon - should be up and running by 2027, and they seem to hit their objectives most of the time.
India is nowhere close to the capabilities of the US, China or Russia.