“We ask you to help them.”

Yo Putin

A group of Russian senior citizens recently gathered to deliver an unusual message to the country’s president Vladimir Putin: bring those American astronauts home! “There are two American astronauts in space right now,” one man says in a Telegram video flagged by Ars Technica, referring to the astronauts currently stuck on the International Space Station by technical problems with their ride up, Boeing’s troubled Starliner spacecraft.

“They have been in trouble for two months,” he continued, while flanked by four women in the video. “Their Boeing broke down on the way. The engines failed, they somehow made it to the International Space Station. And now they don’t know how to get back. We ask you to help them.”

The video, posted Monday, is apparently part of a long running propaganda series, according to Ars, in which a bunch of random elderly Russians espouse on random topics such as how Russia should take back Alaska or lob unfounded accusations that Americans bombed the Nord Stream pipeline.

The videos are a sad bit of staged propaganda that seem to be geared towards a domestic audience, meant to boost Putin’s image and the Russian space program. But in this particular case, they do have a ghost of a point.

Space Race

It’s true though that NASA and the Russian space program closely cooperate when it comes to ferrying astronauts back and forth to the International Space Station, plus co-launching uncrewed resupply shipments.

But as for NASA’s response to Boeing’s troubles, not once has Russian help been mentioned. And it looks like the two stranded American astronauts will stay for several months, possibly returning home in a SpaceX capsule instead.

We can only speculate at Putin and his security apparatus’ rationale for forcing a bunch of senior citizens to talk about the Boeing Starliner boondoggle, but it’s clearly a risk-free move that bolsters the Russian space program while also denigrating American efforts in space.

Setting aside issues with Starliner, the video masks the true picture of space: America is once again in ascendency, and is racing with fellow superpower China when it comes to influence and ambitions in space.

And Russia, despite its deep history in space, is limping along.

More on Boeing Starliner: Boeing Official Says He’s Not Surprised Company’s Starliner Spacecraft Got Astronauts Stuck in Space