The Silver Lining To the Russian Conflict In Crimea

Assuming that the current conflict in Crimea doesn’t spark a nuclear war between the US and Russia, there is a silver lining to this crisis.

According to a recent article on NPR’s website, the Russians are threatening to shut down a number of GPS ground stations and stop sharing their RD-180 and NK-33 rockets with the United States. For those who have forgotten, the United States has shut down NASA’s Space Shuttle program and currently relies on Russia for all our space travel needs. This means that hostilities with Russia will leave the United States spaceless.

Neil deGrasse Tyson once noted that the principle reason for America’s space boom in the 60s, 70s, and 80s, was in no small part due to cold war hostilities with Russia. Our accomplishments in space were tied to the Cold War.

With that said, the conflict in Crimea has re-ignited the Cold War mentality and the US’s abandonment of NASA’s space shuttle program has left us at Russia’s mercy. So the silver lining here is that now there will be military pressure on the US Government to increase funding to NASA and to design and create the next generation of space-travel vehicles. We need to get our satellites into space somehow and we can no longer rely of Russia to do it. Welcome to the new Space Race!