That bilateral relationship has seen its ups and downs, but the two nations have been cooperating in space ever since the joint Apollo-Soyuz mission in 1975. Russian President Putin believes that’s the way it should be. According to him, “Thank God, this field of activity is not being influenced by problems in politics. Therefore, I hope that everything will develop, since it is in the interests of everyone…This is a sphere that unites people. I hope it will continue to be this way.”

Russian media reported on September 4 that the Energomash engine manufacturer had signed a new contract to supply four RD-181 rocket engines to the US Orbital ATK aerospace and defense company by 2021 for its Antares rocket that is used to launch NASA’s cargo tugs into space to provision the ISS. The RD-181 engine is a modification of the RD-180, which was developed specifically for Antares rockets. Orbital ATK examined many foreign and American engines, but ultimately chose the RD-181, which has superior technical specifications and is less expensive than the potential American-made options. Without these Russian engines, the cost to launch these key satellites that are used for military purposes would skyrocket. By comparison, the Delta rocket is the only alternative for launching large satellites into high orbit. It costs about 33% more per launch.

Russian rocket engines considerably increase the lift capacity of the launcher. It is hard to find a substitute for them. The US has been purchasing RD-180s from Russia for over 20 years. The Pentagon had to be granted a waiver from the packages of sanctions that have been imposed on Russia since 2014, as it finds that for at least the next few years it still cannot manage without these Russian engines.

It was reported in July that Energomash had signed a contract with United Launch Alliance (ULA) to supply six more RD-180 engines in 2020. The two companies had previously signed contracts for 22 engines to be delivered between 2017 and 2018. ULA relies on the RD-180 to power the Atlas 5 rocket that is primarily used for government launches, such as national security payloads and scientific research missions. Of the 19 engines Energomash got orders for in 2018, 17 are to be supplied to US contractors. ULA has plans to test launch its Atlas 5 rocket equipped with the Russian engine this November. Manned flights are slated for February 2019.

NASA is negotiating with Russia on further joint efforts to advance space programs, including the joint construction of the Lunar Orbital Platform-Gateway. A joint statement on cooperation aimed at establishing a research-focused space station that would orbit the moon was signed last September. The platform to be used as a staging area for deep space exploration. Once it is up and running, the project will be a logical continuation of the ISS international mission. Hopefully, Russia and the US will be able to work out other official and mutually advantageous agreements on space cooperation, including arrangements that will prevent the militarization of that domain.

While the US pressures other countries to reject Russian weapons and is adamant in its desire to prevent the Nord Stream 2 undersea gas project by threatening European companies with sanctions, its space contractors are allowed to purchase the Russian rocket engines the space program depends on. The law that makes this possible will remain in place into the next decade in order to keep the space program afloat. Waivers are possible for US companies, but strict compliance with the anti-Russian sanctions is a hard-and-fast rule for Europe. As the late Senator John McCain put it, “This is the height of hypocrisy! How can our government tell European countries and governments that they need to hold the line on maintaining sanctions on Russia, which is far harder for them to do, when we are gutting our own policy in this way?” Perhaps it’s time for Europeans, many of whom are opposed to the Russian sanctions, to ask some uncomfortable questions about the US stance on this issue.

“Failure comes only when we forget our ideals and objectives and principles.”

— Jawaharlal Nehru

“Those are my principles, and if you don’t like them . . .  well, I have others.”

— Groucho Marx

There is generally a degree of hypocrisy about the infliction of sanctions on a country by another country or group of countries. Those who impose sanctions assert that their target has done something terribly wrong which will be corrected following its recognition that superior beings are setting an international example of flawless moral rectitude, but it is doubtful that such perfection exists.

If the sanctioning countries were in reality superior in moral behavior to every other nation on the planet, this might possibly excuse such action in some cases;  but at times the unwelcome fact emerges that imposing sanctions is usually an act of sanctimonious humbug.

Take India and Pakistan, for example.  India conducted nuclear tests in May 1998 and Pakistan followed suit “to even the score” in an ill-advised counterstroke. There was outrage in Washington.  President Clinton, notable for his high moral standards, declared that India’s tests “clearly create a dangerous new instability in their region and…  I have decided to impose sanctions against India.” Then he took the same action against Pakistan.

Both countries were subjected to severe economic penalties at the instigation of Washington.  The World Bank and the International Monetary Fund were forbidden to help them, and there were many other punishments.  The western world, and especially Israel, which had been producing nuclear weapons for years, expected sanctions to have the effect of halting the nuclear weapons programs of both countries.

The US Assistant Secretary for South Asian Affairs echoed the President’s righteous indignation and told the Senate that “this action by India not only threatens the stability of the region, it directly challenges the firm international consensus to stop the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction.”

But today India and Pakistan each have about 130 nuclear warheads in bombs and ballistic missiles and their nuclear weapons programs are at full throttle.  There has been massive nuclear proliferation.  So what could have happened?  Why didn’t sanctions work?

What happened was that another paragon of moral integrity, George W Bush, decided to remove sanctions on India and Pakistan because “We intend to support those who support us. We intend to work with those governments that work with us in this fight [against terrorism].”

As Groucho Marx once said, with a cynical eye on the world around him, “Those are my principles, and if you don’t like them . . .  well, I have others.”

The latest sanctions on Russia are a prime example of malevolent spite, and are intended to make life as difficult as possible for its citizens in the hope that they will revolt and overthrow President Putin, just as sanctions on Cuba were intended to have Cubans topple President Castro, if the CIA couldn’t murder him first. (They tried many times.) The US has been punishing Cuba for almost sixty years, but, as observed by the Cato Institute, “the embargo has been a failure by every measure. It has not changed the course or nature of the Cuban government. It has not liberated a single Cuban citizen…”

Obama tried to end the petty, spiteful anti-Cuba campaign, but the psychotic Trump got things back to normal by announcing introduction of even harsher restrictions, including a ban on tourism.  That is intended to stop Cubans supporting their government. But workers in ports and airfields and hotels and night clubs and restaurants — and the vast majority of other Cubans — will condemn Washington, and not their government for their hardship.

Then there were the years of punishment of Iraq which penalized its citizens to a criminal degree.  The US attitude was summed up by Ambassador Madeleine Albright, who was asked on television if she considered the deaths of half a million Iraqi children a reasonable result of US sanctions. She replied “This is a very hard choice, but we think the price is worth it.”  This callous, pitiless, utterly heartless statement was indicative of US official policy — which continues, world-wide.

But that’s what sanctions are all about.  And the latest bout of jubilant vindictiveness centers on Russia. To the joy of the warmongers, and especially of NATO, so desperately seeking a reason for its continued existence, the Cold War has begun again.

But there’s a little problem for Washington’s saber–rattling psychos.

Unfortunately for US national pride, there are some things for which it has to rely on Russia. An embarrassing fact is that US astronauts are ferried to and from the International Space Station in Russian rockets, and that some most important American rockets rely on Russian engines.

So among its vicious measures to try to punish Russia the US Congress didn’t include sanctions that might be awkward for US space programs. There were no mainstream media reports about this humiliating tap-dancing, but one observation was that “Officials at Orbital ATK [an American aerospace and military equipment manufacturer] and ULA [a Lockheed-Boeing space venture] breathed sighs of relief as the US Senate voted overwhelmingly to exempt rocket engines from a sanctions bill targeting Iran and Russia. The amendment to the sanctions measure exempted RD-180 engines used by ULA in the first stage of its Atlas V booster and the RD-181 engines Orbital ATK uses in the first stage of its Antares launch vehicle. Both engines are produced by NPO Energomash of Russia.”

And the really funny thing is that the Russian-engined Atlas V rocket launches US spy satellites for the National Reconnaissance Office, the NRO. On 1 March NASA reported the seventieth mission by an Atlas V, when “a final launch verification took place at T-16 seconds, leading to the start sequence of the RD-180 engine at the base of the Atlas V core at T-2.7 seconds.” They couldn’t possibly mention that the RD-180 is made in Russia.

As observed by Britain’s Royal Aeronautical Society, “The information hoovered up by these satellites is radioed to ground stations around the world and then sent across secure networks to the US. The satellites are developed and launched by the NRO but once in orbit they are used by the NSA to intercept radio traffic.”

In 2014 there was a mega-patriotic principled move in Washington to ban Russian rocket engines from US rockets, and “the Senate voted 89-11 to approve a bill Friday that would ban the Pentagon from awarding future rocket launch contracts to firms using Russian engines.”  The Senators were obviously determined to stand firm on their principles and punish Russia.  You had to admire their virtuously moral decision.

But then things changed, and Space Flight Now reported that the ban had been lifted, so that “the Air Force could award launch contracts to any company certified to fly the Pentagon’s satellites, regardless of the country of origin of the rocket’s engines. The lifting of the engine restriction was backed by Senator Richard Shelby, a Republican of Alabama, where ULA’s rocket factory is located.” His amendment received full Senate support. (He received $40,000 from Boeing during the 2016 election cycle.)

How very principled.

The US Senate and House of Representatives support imposition of sanctions all round the world on the most principled grounds — except when their actions would interfere with the profits of the US aerospace industry and Washington’s ability to spy on us all from space.

To the despair and fury of the war fanatics in Washington and Brussels who are determined to increase the already dangerous level of US-NATO confrontation with Moscow, there are examples of  US-Russia cooperation which they cannot destroy.

The International Space Station is a heart-warming example of US-Russia teamwork which is anathema to every Senator and member of the House of Representatives and the Washington Post. Not one of them has ever mentioned the gratitude the US owes Russia for its many years of willing cooperation.  As recorded by NASA on 28 July — at the height of the Senate’s war-crazed anti-Russia hysteria — “This morning, a trio of astronauts will make their way to the International Space Station, launching on top of a Russian Soyuz rocket from Kazakhstan. They will join the three astronauts already living on board the ISS.”

Groucho Marx put it well by saying “Those are my principles, and if you don’t like them . . . well, I have others.”  He was joking, but the US Congress is deadly serious. What a bunch of humbugs.

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If the sanctioning countries were in reality superior in moral behaviour to everyone else on the planet, this might possibly excuse sanctioning in some cases; but at times the unwelcome fact emerges that imposing sanctions is usually an act of sanctimonious humbug.

Take India and Pakistan, for example. India conducted nuclear tests in May 1998 and Pakistan followed suit «to even the score» in an ill-advised counterstroke. There was outrage in Washington. President Clinton, notable for his high moral standards, declared that India’s tests «clearly create a dangerous new instability in their region and… I have decided to impose sanctions against India». Then he took the same action against Pakistan.

Both countries were subjected to severe economic penalties at the instigation of Washington. The World Bank and the International Monetary Fund were forbidden to help them, and there were all sorts of other punishments. The western world, and especially Israel, which had been quietly producing nuclear weapons for years, expected sanctions to have the effect of halting the nuclear weapons programmes of both countries.

The US Assistant Secretary for South Asian Affairs quoted the President’s righteous indignation to the Senate by repeating that «this action by India not only threatens the stability of the region, it directly challenges the firm international consensus to stop the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction».

But today India and Pakistan each have about 130 nuclear warheads in bombs and ballistic missiles and their nuclear weapons programmes are at full throttle. There has been massive nuclear proliferation. So what could have happened? Why didn’t sanctions work?

What happened was that another paragon of moral rectitude, George W Bush (he of «we found the Weapons of Mass Destruction» after his catastrophic invasion of Iraq) decided to remove sanctions on India and Pakistan because, as his spokesman explained, «We intend to support those who support us. We intend to work with those governments that work with us in this fight [against terrorism]».

As the great Groucho Marx once said, with a cynical eye on the world around him,

The latest sanctions on Russia are a prime example of malevolent spite, and are intended to make life as difficult as possible for its citizens in the hope that they will revolt and overthrow President Putin, just as sanctions on Cuba were intended to have Cubans topple President Castro, if the CIA couldn’t murder him first. (They tried many times.) The US has sanctioned Cuba for almost sixty years, but, as observed by the Cato Institute, «The embargo has been a failure by every measure. It has not changed the course or nature of the Cuban government. It has not liberated a single Cuban citizen…»

Obama tried to end the mindless, petty, spiteful anti-Cuba campaign, but the psychotic Trump got things back to normal by announcing introduction of even harsher sanctions, including a ban on tourism. That will teach these evil people to support their government. The workers in ports and airfields and hotels and night clubs and restaurants will condemn Washington, and not their government, for destroying their jobs.

Then there were the years of sanctions against Iraq which penalised its citizens to a criminal degree. The US attitude was summed up by Ambassador Madeleine Albright, who was asked on television if she considered the deaths of half a million Iraqi children a reasonable result of US sanctions. She replied «This is a very hard choice, but we think the price is worth it». This callous, pitiless, utterly heartless statement was indicative of US official policy — which continues, world-wide.

But that’s what sanctions are all about. And the latest bout of gutter vindictiveness centres on Russia. To the joy of the sabre-rattlers, and especially of NATO, so desperately seeking a reason for its continued existence, the Cold War has begun again.

But there’s a little problem for the warmongers…

Unfortunately for US national pride, there are some things for which it has to rely on Russia, and a difficulty for Washington is that US astronauts are ferried to and from the International Space Station in Russian rockets, and that some American rockets rely on Russian engines.

So among its vicious measures to try to punish Russia the US Congress didn’t include sanctions that might be awkward for their space programmes. There were no mainstream media reports about this embarrassing tap-dancing, but one observation was that «Officials at Orbital ATK [an American aerospace and military equipment manufacturer] and ULA [a Lockheed-Boeing space venture] breathed sighs of relief as the US Senate voted overwhelmingly to exempt rocket engines from a sanctions bill targeting Iran and Russia. The amendment to the sanctions measure exempted RD-180 engines used by ULA in the first stage of its Atlas V booster and the RD-181 engines Orbital ATK uses in the first stage of its Antares launch vehicle. Both engines are produced by NPO Energomash of Russia».

And the really funny thing is that the Atlas V rocket launches US spy satellites. On 1 March NASA reported the seventieth mission by an Atlas V, when «a final launch verification took place at T-16 seconds, leading to the start sequence of the RD-180 engine at the base of the Atlas V core at T-2.7 seconds». It would be too much to expect them to admit that the RD-180 is made in Russia.

The US Senate and House of Representatives support imposition of sanctions all round the world on the most principled grounds — except when their actions would interfere with the profits of the US aerospace industry and Washington’s ability to spy on Russia from space.

The International Space Station is a heart-warming example of US-Russia teamwork which is anathema to every Senator and member of the House of Representatives. Not one of them has ever mentioned the gratitude the US owes Russia for its many years of willing cooperation. As recorded by NASA on 28 July — at the height of the Senate’s war-crazed anti-Russia hysteria — «This morning, a trio of astronauts will make their way to the International Space Station, launching on top of a Russian Soyuz rocket from Kazakhstan. They will join the three astronauts already living on board the ISS».

Groucho Marx put it so well by saying «Those are my principles, and if you don't like them… well, I have others». He was joking, but the US Congress is deadly serious. What a bunch of pathetic hypocrites.

The engines will be used by Antares expendable launch systems to launch the Cygnus spacecraft developed by Orbital ATK to the International Space Station as part of NASA's programs. The RD-181 engine is a modification of the RD-180, developed specifically for the US Antares rockets. The single-chamber booster is similar to the dual-nozzle RD-180 engine flown on `’s Atlas 5, producing about the thrust of its larger cousin.

NPO Energomash produces a nearly identical engine named the RD-191 for Russia’s Angara rocket family. Over the last two years, while the Antares rocket has been out of commission, Orbital ATK has flown the Cygnus to the station using an Atlas V rocket, built by United Launch Alliance and flown out of Cape Canaveral Air Force station in Florida. The Antares program is to be re-launched this month to make the Russian engines in great demand again.

The United Launch Alliance (ULA) operator also plans to purchase 10-20 of Russia's RD-180 space rocket engines for heavy-lift Atlas V vehicles. The Russian engine will used at least through 2019. According to Arbuzov, a new contract could be signed after the November 8 presidential elections in the United States. The crew had already been selected and is being trained. The first unmanned test launch is expected in 2017 to be followed by a manned test launch is scheduled for 2018.

The engines that have already been shipped to the United States will be used for both test launches and the first manned flight along with those that are to be delivered between 2017 and 2019. The US has been using the Russian engines for 13 years. The program has been being implemented without a hitch.

There is opposition in Congress to the use of Russian engines. For instance, Republican Senator John McCain strongly opposes the idea. In 2014, US lawmakers banned the use of Russian engines after Crimea became part of Russia. In 2015, the Congress had to ease the ban to keep the US space program going.

ULA and the Pentagon have maintained that Russian engines are cheaper than the US alternatives. The RD-180 is used for the Atlas rocket, the workhorse of the US space fleet. A total of 70 Atlas V rockets with Russian RD-180 boosters had been launched successfully so far. If the Pentagon abandons the RD-180 engines, the cost of launching key satellites will skyrocket. For instance, the only alternative for launching large satellites into high orbit is Delta, which costs about a third more per launch. If there is a problem with Delta, the US will not be able to get missile warning and surveillance satellites into orbit. The much praised SpaceX rockets, which were recently certified for military launches, can't reach four of the eight critical military orbits.

The Air Force and some senior Office of Secretary of Defense officials have advocated using 18 RD-180 rocket engines until some combination of ULA, SpaceX and Blue Origin deploy rockets that have demonstrated they are reliable enough to loft hugely expensive and hard-to-replace military and national security satellites into orbit.

«We can hold our noses, buy RD-180s until that situation is created…and fly Atlases with RD-180s. The alternative is to fly our payloads on Delta, which is technically feasible, but much more expensive. And so, that’s the choice», Defense Secretary Ashton Carter told the Senate Appropriation defense subcommittee. «And we have chosen the choice of going Atlas, recognizing the distasteful fact that that necessitates purchases of up to 18 more RD-180 engines».

To break the dependency on Russian engines, in 2014 ULA has partnered up with Blue Origin, a private US-based aerospace research and development company, to develop the BE-4 LOX/methane engine to replace the RD-180. However, Arbuzov said these replacement plans could stretch well into at least until 2020 or, even more likely, 2024.

The US space program, including military satellites, depends on Russian technology. The issue is important enough to lift the sanctions on the Russian cutting edge engines. At the same time, the United States openly exerts pressure on the European Union to make it keep anti-Russian sanctions in force.

The sanctions make Europe suffer much more than the US.

US Senator McCain is right to say, «This is the height of hypocrisy! How can our government tell European countries and governments that they need to hold the line on maintaining sanctions on Russia, which is far harder for them to do, when we are gutting our own policy in this way?»

The rocket engines’ deal testifies to the fact that Russia and the US continue to cooperate in the field of space research, where America badly needs Russian cutting edge technology. It is also an example of egregious hypocrisy and double standards when Washington makes the allies do the dirty work for it. This is a very serious matter for the Europeans to think about. It also puts into question the very expediency of the sanctions. Is it worth it, if nobody but the US – the initiator of the sanctions – pays Moscow billions of dollars for rocket engines to boost Russian economy?