The Moon Was Shining, The Stars Were Bright…

... Until the beginning of this decade, the main aim of Russian research into space was to draw level with the United States. Russian authors lamented, and not without justification, that the country did not have its own version of NASA, that its budget for space research paled in comparison to that of the United States. The report published by the RAND Corporation may offer a fresh perspective on this problem. If the Americans are not working on any truly breakthrough projects, and if their projects are plagued with technical difficulties, then is there any reason for Russia to copy them? The authors ...