Russia can compete with SpaceX, Kremlin claims

The Silicon Valley entrepreneur’s SpaceX company made history on March 30 when it launched and landed a used rocket. No one has ever done that before. And the breakthrough has forced Russians to grapple with the decay and struggle of their own national space program.

The SpaceX milestone was “an important achievement,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters in Moscow on Friday. But he said it is important to remember that Russia is “developing groundbreaking technologies, too.”

Independent space experts do not share Peskov’s optimism, however.