For his meeting with Kim Jong-un of North Korea, Vladimir Putin has chosen to show off one of his pet projects: a modern cosmodrome he had built in the remote forests of eastern Russia to demonstrate his great aspirations in space exploration.
The Vostochny cosmodrome came into service in 2016 and is in the Amur region of Russia’s far east, not far from the Chinese border and about 930 miles (1,500km) from the port of Vladivostok.
Since then, the cosmodrome has hosted nearly a dozen launches – most of them successful – and served as an important propaganda tool for the Kremlin to boast of its space programme.
Putin ordered the construction of the spaceport to reduce reliance on the Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, which gained independence after the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991.
There was once a Soviet intercontinental ballistic missile base known as Svobodny 18, a few miles from the Vostochny complex. That base shut down in 1993.
Since the Soviet Union, the Kremlin had used its space programme as a tool to demonstrate its technological and industrial prowess. During the cold war, it at times led the space race with the launch of Sputnik, the first human-made satellite in 1957; Yuri Gagarin’s first manned spaceflight in 1961 and the launch of some of the first space stations, interplanetary probes and space rovers.
Those successes provided material for Kremlin propaganda and the communist system. Shortly after his first spaceflight, Gagarin was attributed the apocryphal phrase: “I went up to space but I didn’t encounter God.” Whether he actually said that remains a matter of dispute.
Meeting Kim – who was cast by Donald Trump as the “rocket man” in 2017 – at Vostochny puts a spotlight on western concerns about the development of North Korea’s missile capabilities.
Kim also wants to launch spy satellites. When he was asked whether Russia would help to do that, Putin was quoted by the country’s state media as saying: “That’s why we have come here. The DPRK leader shows keen interest in rocket technology. They are trying to develop space, too.”
North Korea’s latest Hwasong-18 intercontinental ballistic missile – its first to use solid rocket fuel – has reignited debate over possible Russian links to the nuclear-armed state’s dramatic missile development.
Vostochny cost billions of dollars to build, giving a boost to the local economy, but construction was mired by repeated delays and several corruption scandals.
The first launch there was in 2016, when a Soyuz-2 rocket blasted off. The most recent launch was a Soyuz rocket carrying the ill-fated Luna-25 spacecraft, which crashed into the moon.
Putin, who claimed to have helped choose the site of the cosmodrome, was present at the first launch. “I want to congratulate you,” he said at the time. “We can be proud. It is a serious and important contribution to the development of the Russian space industry.”
