By Kurtis Archer and AFP | 2025-02-13

The Russo-Ukrainian conflict has dealt the heaviest blow to the Russian space agency since the fall of the Soviet Union, analysts say.

Russia's military operations have diverted Moscow's attention and resources from space exploration, and have created conflict between the Kremlin and the Roscosmos space agency.

Russian President Vladimir Putin sacked Roscosmos director Yuri Borisov on February 6, the Kremlin said, citing the need to "develop" the corporation after years of humiliating setbacks.

He has been replaced by Dmitry Bakanov, a 39-year-old deputy transport minister and former CEO of a satellite company.

Borisov often had extravagant ideas to develop Russia's space program, including putting a nuclear reactor on the Moon with China, but struggled to put them into action.

Once a spacefaring pioneer, Moscow has grappled with a loss of scientific talent and erratic funding since the collapse of the Soviet Union, causing it to lag behind competitors like the United States and China.

Setbacks

The shakeup at Roscosmos comes as Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine enters its fourth year.

The war prompted sanctions from previous partners, blocking Russia from access to electronics from the West that it needs for developing new space technologies and missions.

Outside the International Space Station, the West is largely unwilling to work with Russia in space. Many in the international community, both governments and private companies, are boycotting Russian launch services.

Russia's budget for civilian and military space endeavors has suffered international space cooperation breakdowns, military space asset failures and the overall economic problems Roscosmos faces as an organization.

"Russia is trying to keep its manned and military program at any cost, but the space industry of Russia is not doing well," Russian political analyst Pavel Luzin told The National in an article published February 4. "The number of engineers is decreasing, and the number of well-qualified engineers is decreasing even faster."

"Russia almost lost the ability to develop advanced satellites," he said. "All the big satellites orbited in 2022-2024 and planned for orbiting in 2025 are made with Western components imported before 2022 and sometimes before 2014."

Nuclear threats

Despite these setbacks, Roscosmos continues to make increasingly military-focused space efforts.

In November 2021, Russia successfully conducted an anti-satellite weapon test -- creating many thousands of pieces of orbital debris in space.

The United States and its allies have long been concerned that Russia is developing nuclear technology for use in space that could take out entire networks of satellites and disrupt militaries and economies down on Earth.

That concern became even greater last April, when Russia vetoed a United Nations Security Council resolution that would have prohibited member states from developing space-based nuclear weapons.

"As we have noted previously, the United States assesses that Russia is developing a new satellite carrying a nuclear device," then-US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan remarked at that time.

"We have heard President Putin say publicly that Russia has no intention of deploying nuclear weapons in space. If that were the case, Russia would not have vetoed this resolution," he said.

The following month, the United States accused Russia of launching a counterspace weapon and ascertained that American satellites in low Earth orbit were in jeopardy of being attacked because of it.

Many analysts say this is just one of several launches to advance a weapon system in space that Russia has been working on for at least five years. It is suspected that these space weapon systems could potentially both jam and physically destroy American and allied satellites.

A nuclear weapon used in outer space would not be a localized attack; it would be indiscriminate and the consequences would be catastrophic to all humanity, analysts say.

The radiation produced from the blast would be captured by Earth's magnetic field and would fry the onboard electronics of surviving satellites in low Earth orbit, rendering the environment unusable for an indeterminate period, W. J. Hennigan, who covers national security, foreign policy and conflict for The New York Times, wrote in the paper in December.

"Although they are almost invisible in our day-to-day lives, satellites increasingly control how we live," he said.

Weather forecasting, navigation, farming, pumping of gas, financial systems, and supply chains -- all and more would be disrupted.

'Everything to lose'

Russia's space capabilities are exceptionally dangerous because it is advancing counterspace weapons while at the same time relying less on space for its own operations.

"Today, Russia has little to lose from a disruption to space access, whereas the United States has everything to lose," the Center for Strategic and International Studies said in a report published last June 28.

"Russian space capabilities do not play a significant role on the battlefield," the report said, pointing out that Russia's version of the Global Positioning System (GPS) called GLONASS is "extremely unreliable" as almost all of its satellites are past their service lives.

To augment their connectivity, "Russian troops allegedly use illicitly procured Starlink terminals in Ukraine," the report said.

"On the other hand, the success of US military operations presumes the availability of space."

"A disruption to GPS satellites would force US troops to navigate by a compass and map, the same method used by their great-grandfathers when they swept across the beaches of Normandy to liberate Europe in 1944 and 1945," the report said.