It’s been a while since Russia ceased to appear among the space powers, but the war of Ukraine has taken its capacity to minimums that had not been seen since the beginning of manned space flights, in the 60saccording to The Moscow Times, citing state media. And the situation has no signs of improving, at least for the next decade. As other countries seek to build lunar colonies and next-generation space stations, Russia barely manages to send astronauts to orbit and has no plans to go much further.
Lev Zelenyscientific director of the Space Research Institute of the Russian Academy of Sciencesadmitted on April 9 in the Russian Space Forumduring the commemorations of the 65th anniversary of the flight of Yuri Gagarinthat Moscow has no plans for manned missions to deep space or the Moon in the next decade. The only major project still in progress is the creation of a new Russian Orbital Stationwhich is already blurring. It recently became known that Russia would reuse its aging module from the International Space Stationwhich other space agencies plan to deorbit in 2030, for the Russian station.
‘Of course, Russia should have a manned lunar program, but We must find difficult and unconventional solutions to go from lagging behind to taking the lead.‘said Zeleny.
Russia’s last attempt to have a lunar presence resulted in a resounding failure. In 2023, Roscosmosthe Russian space agency, launched the ship Moon-25 on board the rocket Soyuz-2.1b. It was the first lunar mission for Russia, after the 1976 mission. Soviet Unionand had the objective of landing near the south pole of the Moon. Although the launch went well, Luna-25 crashed into the surface during a maneuver prior to landing on the moon, due to a technical failure.
Russia versus the United States and China
Shooting statistics confirm the decline. In 2025, Roscosmos carried out 17 orbital launchesas reported at the beginning of the year by the Russian deputy prime minister Denis Manturov. It is exactly the same figure that Russia recorded the previous year and places Moscow on the same level as little New Zealandnotes The Moscow Times.
In comparison, The United States increased its launches from 145 to 181, while China went from 68 to 91. This means that Russia is more than ten times behind the United States and five times behind China. Excluding the pandemic period, the current level of Russian launches It is the lowest since 1961the year in which Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin made his historic first flight, when there were 9 launches.
This is partly due to reduction in fundingsince most of Russia’s budget is invested in the invasion of Ukraine, which began just over four years ago, in which it loses more than 30,000 soldiers per month.
Roscosmos assures that it will once again be a space power in the next three or four years
Although the deputy general director of Roscosmos, Grigory Maksimovtries to reassure public opinion by stating that the state corporation ‘will enter among the three main space powers in the world’ in the next three or four yearsreality does not invite optimism. The space expert and popularizer Vitaly Egorov points out that, of the 20 launches planned for 2026, three have already been delayed due to technical failures.
These include a serious accident on the launch ramp of Baikonur at the end of November, which derailed the mission Progress MS-33problems with a higher stage of the Proton-M and a failure in a firing test of the new rocket Soyuz-5. ‘The three failures have different causes, which in general does not leave the state of the Russian space industry in a good place,’ concludes Egorov.