Scroll down to read this post.

 

Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black. I keep the website clean from pop-ups and annoying demands. Instead, I depend entirely on my readers to support me. Though this means I am sacrificing some income, it also means that I remain entirely independent from outside pressure. By depending solely on donations and subscriptions from my readers, no one can threaten me with censorship. You don't like what I write, you can simply go elsewhere.

 

You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are five ways of doing so:

 

1. Zelle: This is the only internet method that charges no fees. All you have to do is use the Zelle link at your internet bank and give my name and email address (zimmerman at nasw dot org). What you donate is what I get.

 

2. Patreon: Go to my website there and pick one of five monthly subscription amounts, or by making a one-time donation.
 

3. A Paypal Donation:

4. A Paypal subscription:


5. Donate by check, payable to Robert Zimmerman and mailed to
 
Behind The Black
c/o Robert Zimmerman
P.O.Box 1262
Cortaro, AZ 85652

 

You can also support me by buying one of my books, as noted in the boxes interspersed throughout the webpage or shown in the menu above. And if you buy the books through the ebookit links, I get a larger cut and I get it sooner.


More budget cuts to Russia’s space program

The head of Russia’s space agency, Roscosmos, revealed today that there will be significant additional cuts to the country’s space program in the coming months.

These cuts come on top of the almost one-third cuts imposed from the time the budget for the ten-year plan was first proposed in 2015 and its adoption early this year.

Genesis cover

On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.

 
The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.


The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
 

"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News

2 comments

  • Localfluff

    I understand it is slashed from $31 bn to “about” $8 bn. Minus 75% from last year’s proposal. But it will change when Russia together with Iran and Syria and maybe Oman, and now with the help of Turkey, occupies the Gulf states before the next US president is in office, and dictates the world oil price. Russia’s air force, aerospace and modern weapons systems is a perfect complement to the huge but a bit outdated armies in its allied Middle Eastern countries. Saudi Arabia spends more on the military, and on advanced weapons systems, than Russia, but their fiasko in Yemen reveals that they don’t know how to use them. There will be no effective resistance. The oil rich areas at the Persian Gulf are inhabited by a shia majority, maltreated by the rulers and supported by Iran (although they are arabs, not persians).

    Off topic:
    Bob, or any reader here, do you know of anyone reporting independently on Europe’s space program? I only find ESA’s own blogs and announcements, which is designed as propaganda for school children without any analysis or debate. I don’t know of anyone reporting on it like for example Anatoly Zak does on the Russian space program, and of course this and a few other blogs on NASA. I take it as an expression of the American exceptionalism, the US is very different from most other countries (maybe Canada and Australia is halfway like the US, europeans don’t have much independent journalism and certainly no kind of space culture, that’s just between the government, big industry and the science community).

  • Localfluff asked, “Do you know of anyone reporting independently on Europe’s space program?”

    The answer is no. Space News (a part of Space.com) has one reporter, Peter de Selding, whose beat is focused on the European launch market, but he is not independent and he does not cover the science part.

Readers: the rules for commenting!

 

No registration is required. I welcome all opinions, even those that strongly criticize my commentary.

 

However, name-calling and obscenities will not be tolerated. First time offenders who are new to the site will be warned. Second time offenders or first time offenders who have been here awhile will be suspended for a week. After that, I will ban you. Period.

 

Note also that first time commenters as well as any comment with more than one link will be placed in moderation for my approval. Be patient, I will get to it.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *