WASHINGTON, September 7. /TASS/. Former US astronaut, the head of NASA in the Obama administration (2009-2017), United States Marine Corps Major General Charles Bolden hopes for cooperation in space between the United States, Russia and China, which would facilitate integrated flights and the international use of national orbital stations, he said in an interview with TASS.

"My hope is that we'll continue <…> to exchange crews and have cosmonauts fly with us on American vehicles, and we'll continue to fly on Soyuz getting to whatever platforms we happen to be going to. I think that's essential," Bolden said when asked about the possible extension of the integrated crews program between NASA and Roscosmos, which is scheduled throughout 2025. He added that he hopes for international collaboration in this initiative.

"I'm one of these guys, it's kind of odd, my hope is that at some point we'll reach out and bring the Chinese into the collaboration, the partners in space flight," the former chief of the US space agency said.

Space enables nations to come together

Bolden is convinced that "space is this incredible environment that allows people to come together for a common purpose." "The reason, I think that Roscosmos and NASA get along so well is that we have common goals and ambitions. We understand what teamwork means and what gaining trust in each other means, something that our governments don't exactly seem to get just yet, but I think we're working toward getting there," he believes.

According to Bolden, there is much more tension in international relations than it was in the late 20th century, when he flew with Russian cosmonaut Sergey Krikalev on the US-Russian joint mission STS-60, which was the first of the Shuttle-Mir Program. "We were a partnership kind of on the rise, if you will," he emphasized.

"Today, because of all the diplomatic tension between the US and Russia and China and Iran and everybody else, we've got the governments kind of at each other. And these two space agencies (NASA and Roscosmos - TASS) are trying to carry on this partnership that they know is good for the world," the former NASA chief said.

Prospects for international use of orbital stations

Bolden pointed out that "the International Space Station is coming to its end," while the main US hopes for having astronauts in outer space after 2030 are currently centered on space stations being developed by private companies. "I was kind of hoping that we'd be able to retire the International Space Station if not next year, 2025, at least by 2028. But to do that we need to have an alternative platform ready to receive the crews," he said.

Therefore, Bolden said, "it would be nice to be able to use Tiangong, which is the Chinese Space Station, as a platform." "It's relatively new, and could be an international platform, much the same as we have the International Space Station today," the former chief of the US space agency said. He admitted, "But we've got to be able to come together and sit at the table and talk to each other the way that we finally did with the Soviets and the Russians, getting to where we are today."

When asked what his thoughts were about the future of the Russian project of an orbital station, Bolden said that he did not "know a lot about it." "My hope is that whatever Roscosmos produces will be something that they'll put into the mix of available international vehicles that anybody can use," he said.