President Putin to Withdraw Russia from International Space Station
Russia has announced that it will be ending its participation with the International Space Station after 2024 and will instead devote its resources to the creation of its own orbiting space station. The announcement comes from Yuri Borisov, the CEO of Roscosmos the Russian state space agency, as the tensions between Russia and the West continue to heat up over the war in Ukraine and the way Russia has been using energy, food, and destruction as tools in support of their war efforts.
The announcement coming from Russia, while not unexpected, does through the future of the 24-year-old space into doubt, as the costs and logistics to keep the multinational space station operating to the goal of 2030 will become incredibly complicated without Russian participation. Even though Borisov assured Western states that Russia would meet its obligations until it formally withdraws, many can’t help but see the ending of Russian participation aboard the International Space Station as one of the final nails in the coffin of international teamwork that has occurred between the US and Russia since the end of the Cold War.
Russia is not the only country seeking to assert its independent operations in outer space. China has been pursuing the creation of their Tiangong space station for some time now, with the intent of…
