It was hailed as a post-Cold War collaboration for the good of humanity: two old rivals joining forces to launch the International Space Station (ISS) more than 20 years ago.
“The International Space Station is considered the most complex human feat of engineering, science and collaboration ever managed,” says the US National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA)..
But as relations between Russia and the West become increasingly tense over Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Moscow officials announced on Tuesday that Russia will abandon the ISS after 2024 and focus on building its own competing space infrastructure.
Russian space officials told their American counterparts on Wednesday that Moscow now expects to remain on the ISS at least until its own orbiting outpost is built in 2028, NASA’s chief of space operations told Reuters.
Regardless, analysts say they are concerned that Russia is leaving behind one of the last vestiges of cooperation with the West that will delay scientific research and potentially lead to further militarization of space.
“There have been rumblings of this for a while, but it’s a sad day,” said Mubdi Rahman, the founder of Sidrat Research, a Toronto-based space technology company. “Even before the invasion of Ukraine and everything [Russian President Vladimir] In Putin’s various aggressions, there has been some fragmentation in the space community with nations wanting to go it alone.”
CBC News explains what Russia’s move means for the ISS, space exploration and the politics of the great beyond.
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Who is currently participating in the ISS?
First launched in 1998, the main organizations working on the station, according to NASA, include the space agencies of the United States (NASA), Russia (Roscosmos), Canada (CSA), Japan (JAXA) and Europe (ESA ), which includes the following participating countries: Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Norway, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and the United Kingdom.
However, Russia and the United States are widely seen as the key players, analysts said.
Canada’s contribution, for example, has represented ownership of only about 2.3 percent of the station, said Adam Sirek, a professor at Western’s Institute for Earth and Space Exploration. University in London, Ontario.
Why is Russia leaving now?
With Russian forces shelling Ukrainian cities and Western sanctions affecting Moscow’s economy, there had been rumors of Russia abandoning the ISS for some time.
Yuri Borisov, who heads Russia’s state-controlled Roscosmos, made the announcement about Moscow’s planned exit from the initiative on Tuesday during a meeting with Putin.
Russian President Vladimir Putin participates in a video call with the ISS crew at the Novo-Ogaryovo residence outside Moscow in 2020. (Alexei Druzhinin/Sputnik/Kremlin Pool Photo/The Associated Press)
Russia, Borisov said, would fulfill all of its current operational commitments before leaving.
Russia had previously indicated it intended to leave the station after 2024, while NASA had wanted it to continue operating until 2030.
Some analysts, however, see Russia’s announcement as more of a PR move than anything else.
“In my opinion, it’s not a story,” Michael Byers, a University of British Columbia professor who studies outer space policy, said of Russia’s announcement. “The Russians say this periodically,” he wrote in an email; then they continue to work on missions.
A NASA spokesperson told CBC News that the agency is committed to running the ISS until 2030. “NASA has not been informed of the decisions of any of the partners, although we continue to build future capabilities to ensure our significant presence on low Earth. orbit.”
When asked about Russia’s withdrawal from the station, a CSA spokesperson told CBC that it is aware of press reports “but has not been informed of the decisions of any of the partners.”
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Russia’s planned withdrawal from the International Space Station means the US would have to move quickly to fill the station’s capacity, says former NASA astronaut Garrett Reisman. “We should have seen this coming,” he said.
What is Russia currently doing on the ISS?
Russian cosmonauts, technology and transportation systems are responsible for a number of key functions of the ISS. Russia built mostly half of the station launched in 1998, while the US built the other half.
The ISS was originally conceived so that technology could be shared between different countries; participants depend on each other.
For example, NASA’s solar panels provide much of the station’s power, while Russian technology stabilizes the ISS, keeping it where it needs to be in orbit around Earth.
“Sharing resources to conduct research in space has been one of the highlights of the ISS program,” Sirek said.
In addition, Russia has been responsible for transporting cosmonauts to the station for recent missions. NASA contracted out transport missions to private companies like SpaceX.
“To be quite frank, the US and the rest of the world still do not have a viable and well-proven solution to get to the ISS,” said Sidrat Research’s Rahman. “Russian space vehicles have been the reliable ones to get people to the ISS.”
This illustration shows the different contributions to the ISS from different countries. Russia has four. (NASA)
Are the tensions between the West and Russia affecting the construction of the station?
Geopolitical conflicts have not visibly spilled onto the decks of the ISS.
Last week, Russian and European astronauts made a seven-hour spacewalk together where they installed platforms on the ISS, deployed nanosatellites and replaced a protective window, it has been reported. NASA.
There is no current suggestion from Russian officials that Moscow will stop providing transportation or other support to the station before they abandon the program.
Earlier this month, before Tuesday’s announcement, NASA and Roscosmos announced an exchange agreement that would allow NASA astronaut Frank Rubio to fly aboard the Russian Soyuz MS-22 spacecraft to September and Russian cosmonaut Anna Kikina would fly on SpaceX’s Crew-5 Dragon. Nothing was said in Tuesday’s announcement to suggest that those pre-existing partnerships would be cancelled.
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If Moscow goes as planned, getting spare parts for Russian-made components at the station is sure to be a challenge in light of sanctions and general supply chain issues in building new parts from scratch , Rahman said.
What happens on the ISS?
The station hosts a number of research projects that could not be carried out anywhere else. For example, it is used to conduct experiments on how weightlessness affects the human body over the long term, according to NASA, and is “the only place to test technologies that will take humanity further into space.”
The CSA and Roscosmos have also been coordinating several projects on the ISS, Western University’s Sirek said, including research into space radiation to allow humans to live longer outside of Earth.
“These partnerships and collaborations using Russian technology and parts of the Russian segment of the ISS have increased the performance of Canadian research,” Sirek said.
MDA, the Ontario-based company behind Canadarm2 on the ISS and a key Canadian company involved in the station, declined to comment.
Is Russia’s move a precursor to a new arms race in space?
Space-based technology is already crucial to military campaigns on Earth, including the war in Ukraine, Rahman said, as nations struggle to maintain control of sensitive information and communications systems.
“That’s why nations like China and India make sure they have an operational and well-funded space program,” he said.
The ISS is photographed by crew member and cosmonaut Pyotr Dubrov from the Soyuz MS-19 spacecraft, in this image released April 20. (Pyotr Dubrov/Roscosmos)
For now, Rahman said, it is unclear whether Russia’s recent move could signal a return to the 1980s and fears about space lasers or the “Star Wars” program to shoot down intercontinental ballistic missiles.
But he says the move is likely to raise concerns among military planners and lower hopes for cooperation on joint scientific projects for the benefit of humanity.
“The militarization of space happens the moment the rocket is launched,” Rahman said. “There’s a lot more going on than we’re aware of in the public eye.”