Moscow’s Counter-Sanctions May Be Crippling Russia’s Space Program Even More than Western Sanctions, Russian Experts Say

Paul Goble

Staunton, April 10 – There is near universal agreement that Russia’s space program is at the point of collapse, but there is an intense debate going on among Russian experts as to why its international isolation has grown to the point that it has. Some blame Western sanctions, but an increasing number blame Moscow’s own counter-sanctions.

In some respects, this argument recalls the one eight years ago when in the view of many Russians, Western sanctions were not as hurtful to ordinary Russians as were Moscow’s counter-sanctions which among other things led to the destruction of tons of foodstuffs at the border and thus depriving Russians of them.

And just like in 2014, most Russian analysts are suggesting that Russia’s counter-sanctions have not had much of an impact on the West but have shot Russia in the foot or even in some more sensitive place, an indication that the Kremlin like the Bourbons has learned nothing but forgotten nothing since that time.

For a detailed discussion of just what sanctions the West has imposed on the Russian space program and also just what counter-sanctions Moscow has put in place, see profile.ru/scitech/prervannyj-polet-kak-mezhdunarodnaya-izolyaciya-skazhetsya-na-rossijskoj-kosmonavtike-1057518/.