Do not help Russia to reach the Moon

To meet the deadline, some officials want to enter into agreements with the US partners of the International Space Station to participate in the project Gateway station in lunar orbit. Canada, Japan and the Europeans should not be a problem. Russia, on the other hand, is working not only with China on the efforts of the moon; his own space operations are beset by problems ranging from mysterious holes in his

ISS

fault segment of the Soyuz system. However, the Russian space agency Roscosmos is proposing to participate in the Gateway project by building an airlock and providing an emergency launch capability.

The question remains open whether it can do so without US subsidies, but in any case, Russian participation would pave the way for a permanent base on the moon, perhaps in partnership with China. Any Russian rocket capable of placing an inhabited spacecraft into a lunar orbit could also send a lander to the surface.

A Russian lunar base would prevent the United States and its allies from dominating the Earth-Moon system and make it more difficult to establish a space trade regime conducive to free enterprise. The longer it takes Russia and China to gain a foothold on the moon, the easier it will be to anchor American interests there – and possibly elsewhere in the solar system.

Some members of the administration and the bureaucracy fear that if the Russians are excluded from Gateway, they will react by reducing or ending their role in the ISS in Earth orbit. They are now selling NASA seats on Soyuz capsules for more than $ 60 million per trip. However, by the beginning of 2020, the United States expects to recover the ability to send astronauts to the ISS, lost during the grounding of the Space Shuttle in 2011.

Since the early 1990s, NASA has ignored its traditional "no exchange of funds" rule covering international space cooperation agreements. For reasons that seemed strategically sound, the United States subsidized space efforts in Moscow, first with the Shuttle-Mir projects in 1994-1998, now with ISS and Soyuz flights, as well as with By purchasing RD-180 rocket engines to fuel the launch of the Atlas V vehicle.

Does America want to continue these arrangements? They have done nothing to strengthen Russia's good will and probably cause more problems than they are worth, especially when the President

Vladimir Poutine

Acquires leverage by threatening to ground American astronauts. NASA does not need Russian technology. The Trump administration can therefore face the Kremlin in a strong position.

To get to the moon, NASA is currently developing the big space launch booster and the Orion capsule. But he should not commit the mistake made with the shuttle, which for two decades was the only way for the United States to send people into space. Fortunately

Elon Musk's

SpaceX builds a rocket that could easily be adapted to go on the moon. An American commercial pitcher is a much better alternative than anything the Russians could offer.

Mr. Dinerman writes about space and national security.