Translated material
Shadow of astronautics
The space industry, according to the authorities, is one of the priority. Innovation, world leadership, investment - sounds attractive. And we are building cosmodrome. In fact, however, it seems that space is more ideological than an economically calculated project.
Cosmonautics Day is a traditional reason for politicians to recall Gagarin, satellite, squirrel and arrow, and in general everything that Russia will be remembered in the world, in addition to the hydrogen bomb and the conditional Perestroika. In fact, the protein with the ETC arrow with a bomb in common, because they were invented within the same arms race, but Gagarin is still naturally heroes, but no one will definitely say that about the founder of the atomic project of Lavrenty Beria.
The current anniversary of Gagarin’s flight is never an anniversary, but the Russian authorities could still not miss the theme of space. Putin visited the planetarium and promised money for the space program. This is such a compliment from the head of government-if you find something interesting, albeit for yourself personally, spend more budget funds on it.
The money, as Putin reminded, a lot of money is spent on space programs - only this year the state will “shine” space for 150 billion rubles. And of which 30 billion will go to the construction of the new Vostochny cosmodrome.
“East” is such a fetish of the Russian authorities. It is clear, of course, that after the collapse of the USSR, Baikonur was suddenly discovered in Kazakhstan and Russia only rents it. Probably, from the point of view of some widely understood security, the situation is when the space power has only one cosmodrome (Plisetsk) in its own territory and it is morally outdated-this is wrong. However, the motivation for the construction of the cosmodrome seems controversial.
The favorite project of Roscosmos will cost the country a crazy amount: from 250 billion rubles. And despite the fact that the funds were missed as part of the space program, these expenses will give almost nothing to science or army. The construction of the cosmodrome is a purely logistic and engineering task, and without special innovation - only investments.
With the motivation for financing the space program itself, too, not everything is clear. No, in general, it is clear that if we are leaders and pioneers, then you should probably not lose this leadership (although it may not have interfered with losing leadership in any infant mortality). And it is obvious that the aerospace industry is such an incubator of innovation for all others. Say, according to some estimates, from the introduction of aviation innovations in other sectors of industry, the economic effect is four times greater than the actual aircraft. The purely scientific value of space research is also difficult to deny.
In addition, in late Soviet times, until the mid-2000s, Cosmos stably underfunded and now, if we want to save something there, and even more so to increase, we must catch up. Therefore, to invest with a leading pace.
All this, together, motivated the authorities to include the space industry among five priority areas. In our Miraclegrad, Skolkovo even has a whole cluster engaged in communications and space technologies.
Cosmos mainly, if not exclusively, and historically is a military project. This does not mean that the civil use of technologies is impossible, but in Russian conditions this greatly interferes with this kind of reconnect. Examples of the reconnects are single. When Vladimir Putin tried to recall them in his exceeding article on defense, he was only able to remember the project “Sukhoi Superjet 100”, in which only a glider is actually from Russian innovations, and everything else is technological and innovative-completely from the west. Not the most successful example, but others are not that hundreds were discovered.
But the cosmos in its peaceful part is the unambiguous pride of our country, since it was there that we stably held the first place until the 79th-80s, not in the example of the production of any tractors or, God forbid, refrigerators.
But proud of special achievements during their formation as politicians is more difficult. Because, even believing in the ideology, they “saved the country from decay and banditry”, you understand that there is a little positive in this. And the mythology of power by definition should contain positive. The absence of a positive agenda, which can be “sucked” by the gullible population, forces the current politicians to assign someone else's agenda - from victory in the war to the successes of Russian ballet and sports. At the same time, the victory in the war or the flight of a person into space as an ideology is more reliable, because they represent the completed process (Gagarin has already flown and that’s all) and nothing is impossible to destroy there, you only need to defend the myth (it would be better to do this the same as the “doctor of historical sciences”, the political technologist Medinvsky, but if it doesn’t work out otherwise, it will come down).
Cosmos in this context, rather, is one of the ways of legitimizing power, creating a myth about the successes of the country and its rulers. In the space of mythological, of course, the “rational” justification of any projects and investments is possible. Cosmos is our everything, Gagarin - our everything and, therefore, we really need the Eastern Space. In the meantime, there is expensive oil, you can not think about “is it a little expensive?”, Nor about who will pay for it.