The curious case of Russia’s charm offensive with NASA this week

In a significant development, the longstanding absence of high-level meetings between NASA and its Russian counterpart, Roscosmos, has come to an end. The last face-to-face encounter occurred in October 2018, during the Trump administration. Since then, the landscape has dramatically shifted due to events such as Russia's invasion of Ukraine and the leadership changes within both organizations. This week, Dmitry Bakanov, the newly appointed head of Roscosmos, visited the United States for the Crew-11 mission launch in Florida, which featured cosmonaut Oleg Platonov. This visit marks an important step in rekindling dialogue between the two space agencies, as Bakanov also engaged with NASA's human spaceflight team at the Johnson Space Center in Houston. Interestingly, NASA's coverage of this visit has been sparse, while the Russian state news agency TASS has provided extensive updates. Reports indicate that Bakanov and Acting NASA Administrator Sean Duffy discussed the future of the International Space Station (ISS), with Bakanov stating, "The conversation went quite well. We agreed to continue using the ISS until 2028. It’s important that the new NASA chief confirmed this. We will work on the deorbiting process until 2030." Duffy echoed sentiments of collaboration despite existing geopolitical strains, emphasizing the importance of maintaining partnerships. He remarked, "What’s unique is we might find disagreement with conflict here, which we have. We have wild disagreement with the Russians on Ukraine, but what you see is we find points of agreement and points of partnership. Through hard times, we don’t throw those relationships away. We’re going to continue to work on the problems that we have here, but we’re going to continue to build alliances and partnerships and friendships as humanity continues to advance in space exploration."