Natalia Antonova

The head of Roskomos, Vladimir Popovkin, has insinuated that the embarrassing failure of Phobos-Grunt (which I wrote about earlier) could be attributed to a shadowy plot of some kind.

“I don’t want to blame anyone, but there are powerful means of affecting [the performance] of spacecraft out there,” Popovkin told Izvestia. “We cannot discount the possibility that they were used.”

To back up this claim, Popovkin pointed out that there is something “inexplicable about the problems with our spacecraft when they’re [on the other side of the planet and can’t be monitored properly].”

Vague insinuations of sabotage are a dogwhistle for those who are more than eager to write off any such failure on the work of Russia’s enemies abroad.

Unfortunately for Popovkin, any thinking person will immediately see his words for what they are – without a concrete theory as to how and why Phobos-Grunt may have been sabotaged, this looks to be a classic means of passing the buck.

Phobos-Grunt was not just a disappointment for Russia – it carried a Chinese Mars Orbiter and microorganisms that were supposed to be part of an experiment by the Planetary Society, which was aimed at testing how certain organisms survive in deep space (and whether or not they survive at all).

At a time like this, the need to point fingers is particularly high. People are coming off the winter holiday high, and everyone’s in a bad mood already – without the lifeless Phobos-Grunt spinning uselessly in a low orbit, ready to crash down to Earth, Icarus-style.

Yet admitting a technical failure makes an agency look way, way better than hinting at the possibility of sabotage. The fact that Popovkin merely hinted is what makes it look particularly bad – a bolder claim would at least make Roskmos look as though it’s willing to put its reputation on the line. As such, this is just an attempt to divert attention away from the controversy surrounding the doomed spacecraft safely, a.k.a. eating your cake and having it too.

Popovkin did much better when he pointed out the good reputation of Russia’s Soyuz rockets in the same interview – which have done a good job with missions to the International Space Station. At a time like this, it’s best to play up one’s strengths and admit one’s weaknesses – and unmanned Mars missions are certainly a kind of an Achilles heel for Russia’s space program at this time, while the Soyuz rockets, as cosmonaut Andre Kuipers told my colleague Olaf Koens recently, are a reliable classic.

Popovkin’s hints of sabotage also took away from another good point he made to Izvestia – and that is whether or not the constant presence of people in space is sustainable right now. Considering both space pollution and the global economic crisis, his doubt on this is certainly something to reflect on at this time – no matter how much of a bummer it would be to see the glittering lights of the ISS extinguished for the time being.