Russian Rocket Roulette: How crony capitalists are threatening Alabama jobs & national security

National security and potentially thousands of Alabama jobs have found themselves entangled in a web of crony capitalism surrounding the debate over the United States’ use of Russian rocket engines.

For over a decade now, the U.S. military has relied on Russian-made RD-180 rocket engines to launch its satellites into space. Last year, however, Congress moved to ban the military from using such engines as punishment for Russian President Vladimir Putin’s military incursion into Ukraine.

The National Defense Authorization Act, which banned the Russian rocket engines, said that Congress views both Russia and China as “a serious growing foreign threat” to U.S. national security space systems, and called on the Pentagon to develop “a next-generation” American rocket engine by 2019.

But while there is near unanimity on the prudence of ending the United States’ reliance on Russian technology for its various space programs, an immediate ban would create a years-long window in which the U.S. would not be fully equipped to launch some of the country’s most important defense assets into space.

United Launch Alliance (ULA), an Alabama-based joint venture between aerospace giants Lockheed-Martin and Boeing, currently uses the Russian rockets to accomplish its work for the U.S. Air Force. ULA is developing its own satellite launch rocket system, but it is several years away from completion.

The company, which employs roughly 800 Alabamians at its state-of-the-art 1.6-million-square-foot facility in Decatur, has been one of the U.S. government’s most reliable partners since its founding in 2006, but the Russian rocket engine ban would be a difficult blow for the company to withstand in the short term, placing hundreds of jobs in jeopardy.

Meanwhile, the ban would be a victory for Space X, the company founded by billionaire tech entrepreneur Elon Musk. Space X is developing its own rockets in California. The company has received significant press coverage for being a “private” space alternative to NASA, but in reality the company receives the overwhelming majority of its funding — billions of dollars — from the United States government. The L.A. Times called the arrangement “a public-private financing model underpinning long-shot start-ups.”

“Musk and his companies’ investors enjoy most of the financial upside of the government support, while taxpayers shoulder the cost,” explained the Times’ Jerry Hirsch. In total, his three companies — Space X, SolarCity and Tesla — have received more than $6 billion in subsidies during the Obama administration.

Musk’s lobbyists are also advocating terminating NASA’s Space Launch System (SLS) rocket which is being developed at Marshall Space Flight Center by thousands of Alabama employees.

Good to visit with @elonmusk again today pic.twitter.com/3VxXMMl0np

— John McCain (@SenJohnMcCain) March 5, 2014

Sen. John McCain (R-Arizona) has been one of Space X’s most vocal backers and is a personal friend of Musk, who supported the moderate senator’s comprehensive immigration reform efforts. At Musk’s behest, McCain played a prominent role in getting the Russian rocket ban language put in place, which would give his ally a competitive advantage.

Alabama Senator Richard Shelby (R-Ala), however, delayed the ban by inserting a paragraph into a spending bill that will give U.S. rocket engine developers the time to develop an American alternative to replace the Russian RD-180.

Shelby pointed to a letter from Air Force officials stating that as many as 18 RD-180s will be needed between now and 2022 as evidence that the U.S. needs more time to develop a replacement engine.

Shelby’s move sent McCain into a tirade.

“Why would I give a damn what he says,” the Arizona senator exclaimed when asked about Shelby’s change to the rocket ban.

“I can assure you there will not be a gap,” McCain added this week, arguing that banning the Russian rockets would not jeopardize national security.

The Secretary of Defense, Director of National Intelligence, and Assistant Secretary of the Air Force, among others, all disagree. Each of them have written letters to McCain or testified before the U.S. Senate that an immediate ban on the Russian rockets would, in the words of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Acquisition, “create a multiyear gap” in which the United States would not be able to launch certain national security assets into space.

Among those national security assets would be military satellites for GPS, missile warning, presidential secure communications, and weather, along with classified payloads used by the Intelligence community.

Senator McCain’s PR machine has revved up in Washington this week, leveraging his prominent post as Armed Services Committee Chairman to garner headlines for what on the surface appears to be an anti-Putin agenda. He railed against the Russian rockets on the Senate floor and held a committee hearing to discuss them.

In response to the attacks, Senator Shelby’s office noted how disingenuous Senator McCain has been in declaring that allowing the use of Russian rocket engines in the short term benefits “Putin’s friends.”

In 2013, the United States imported $27 billion in goods from Russia. Of that $27 billion, approximately $88 million or 0.325% was spent on Russian rocket engines.

Together, mineral fuels (oils), iron and steel, other metals, and enriched uranium accounted for more than 85% of U.S. imports from Russia in 2013. Other major U.S. imports from Russia included: fertilizers ($796 million); fish and crustaceans ($326 million), especially frozen, in-shell crab ($233 million); plastics and rubber ($238 million), especially certain types of synthetic rubber ($181 million); nuclear reactors, boilers, machinery, and mechanical appliances ($158 million) ; arms and ammunition ($151 million); wood ($143 million), and organic chemicals ($117 million). (Source: Congressional Research Service Memorandum; January 30, 2015.)

If proponents of banning the use of the RD-180 for military launches are truly genuine in their concerns about the United States sending money to Russia, one would assume that they would also push for a ban on the aforementioned imports as well as fight to ban the use of the RD-180 for NASA and commercial spaces launches – not just military.

Furthermore, policy makers seeking to cut off funds to Putin and his cronies would at least include “arms and ammunition” ($151 million), not to mention some or all of the more than $20 billion in oil and petroleum products.

The bottom line is this:

The ongoing game of Russian Rocket Roulette is designed to benefit the government-subsidized companies of a billionaire at the expense of national security and thousands of Alabama jobs.