Russian Space Chief: Mars Mission Is Realistic

It would be sad if Russia beat the United States to Mars, but on the flip side if they could do it by 2013 that would be amazing:

Russian Space Chief Says Mars Mission Is Realistic

“Russia’s new space agency chief said Monday that a manned mission to Mars in the near future is realistic provided funding is adequate, and appeared to express support for an ambitious plan to visit the planet within a decade, the Interfax news agency reported. “The project is very interesting and I am not turning it down,” Interfax quoted space agency chief Anatoly Perminov as saying in Berlin, apparently referring to a plan announced last month to send a six-man crew to Mars. “Any project is flatly rejected by some and fully supported by others at first. We hold a fairly progressive, professional, neutral stance. We support it, and it should be further developed,” he said.

Georgy Uspensky, a researcher at the Central Research Institute for Machine-Building, Russia’s premier authority on space equipment design, said in April that it would carry out the project with funding promised by Aerospace Systems, a little-known private Russian company that says it draws no resources from the state budget. Uspensky said the small US$3-5 billion budget for the mission reflected plans to use already developed spacecraft, and predicted it would happen around 2011-2013.”