The reason the earlier pentacarbonyl plants disappeared was not because of a project quality roll but because Mal got Voz'ed and Voz cut the project because deleading would be too expensive. Once that stopped being true the pentacarbonyl plants returned in the form of the above project.
The expense was due to a poor roll wasn't it?
I had missed that pentacarbonyl came back later though!
So the developing brains of the Soviet Union are better off than I had thought. And our car hell much less.
One French reference (though discussions of cost are extremely rare in this period)
put the escalation of real investment per kW at 50% or 4.4%/year during 1974–1984
(as reported by Crowley and Kaminski, 1985). Yet these trends did not cause alarm,
as other countries were suffering even worse escalation—as in Germany and
especially the US, with 10–15% real cost escalation per year.
But as it turned out later, the expectations
of significant economies of scale proved unfounded: any cost reductions from larger
components were more than offset by more complex construction sites, longer
construction times, and the need to fix the inevitable technical problems arising from
significant design changes
Embracing new technology and finding unanticipated complexities is a tale as old as time. And it is worth noting, the French were building larger and more complex power plants as well, not iterating on a single design or class of designs. And dealing with higher pressures and higher temperatures of water gets... super fun. (Though I expect that there's a significant chance that the quest USSR will also be pushing the envelope in the same way - it is an obvious way to go with a nuclear reactor, though the OTL USSR did somewhat avoid it with the RMBK design, so we might adopt a similar KISS approach to our PWR designs, we'll have to see what happens when it happens.)
If you look at the actual numbers in the paper: the French program had significantly lower cost appreciation than the US program. By the end of the program France had installed 65.9 GWgross of generation capacity at a total cost of 330 billion 2008 US$ - about 5 billion 2008 $/GW. Or (from the same paper) about 2100-2600 US$2008/kW. Pretty good for that level of capacity, especially once you factor in the costs of the pollution from coal and oil fired power plants. And the cost projections over the course of the program were generally on point. Or in other words, I don't read that paper as a discussion of a failed program, to me it reads as a discussion of why a generally successful program did not meet all of the hopes people had for it.
Now, to be fair, if we look
here, we can see that in the US in 2021, natural gas cost 920 2021$/Kw, which is 726.8 2008$/Kw. Call it 1/3rd the cost of French nuclear. Now remember, we're comparing the cost of the entire French civilian nuclear roll-out to ordering an off-the-shelf gas power plant from a year when gas is a mature technology. Of course, if we did have the numbers for all the costs that have gone into gas power plants as a technology over the decades, they'd
still be cheaper than France's nuclear capacity, just not AS cheap.
So expecting nuclear power to replace gas turbine power plants is definitely setting ourselves up for failure. I think we can realistically replace our coal and oil power plants with gas and nuclear though.
The regular Soviet citizen doesn't care about this not wanting to bad as Europe or daming with faint praise stuff, they what there roads to be not made out of dirt and to actually have a car to drive on the roads, like if they had the ability to influence the yearly plans there would be no surprises on what they would get into in, also frankly I'm sick of hell of the dooming about project Earth moving not doing anything useful to making an anti nuclear movement that could actually be influential because yet again the Soviet citizen gets no say in what actually happens and will very much likely continue to be.
Note: the quest Soviet Union is significantly more democratic, as members of the Supreme Soviet wield alot more power than they did in OTL. It could be better still, but even now, a big enough problem can cause issues for us politically.
And if you think I am being alarmist, well tough. Because so far as I know, there are reasons for alarm. And causing a massive public health crisis would cause real problems for our trying to fulfill the plan.
If you'd like to disprove my concerns, honestly I'd be glad of it, because that enhanced earthmoving is something that will seriously help improve our transport grid.
To make a more broad argument about our decisions: I don't think we should make our decisions based on increasing the survival for the Voz. With the current parliament, I think his time in power is played out. Kosygin has several alternatives, none of which involve having to share a government with a now chronically paranoid bureaucrat who is deeply tied to prior large-scale corruption and over-centralizations. Calculating the factions, Kosygin simply needs 285 seats to form a coalition, which is best served by the inclusion of a larger faction than the technocrats. Voz has been outflanked by reformist wings, with his faction being now on the conservative end of the spectrum. And this problem is only going to get worse in future elections, with the reformers gaining more support due to the fresh blood moving up. If I'm going to be frank here, I don't think there is a high chance for Voz to even secure the junior partner rule in the next election. Voz lost his base in the political system due to increased decentralization, and he won't suddenly get a new one.
I think we should enjoy our last few rounds filled with constant use of "cybernetics", and prepare for a new minister once this plan ends. Let Voz live out the end of his ministerial period by making sensible decisions on foreign policy and then say our goodbyes.
I personally trend towards backing Kosygin's policy. Good relations with China are incredibly valuable, arguably more valuable than Indonesia. Pivoting to making an anti-china coalition seems rather questionable to me, since I really want to avoid moving towards the Sino-Soviet split. Waiting and seeing is also a decent strategy, as we have currently no idea if the new government will actually last. There might very well be a countercoup or civil war in the cards. Let's not tie ourselves to a potential loss out of haste.
[]Back Kosygin
I entirely agree. Indeed, I am not even sure we want Voz to hang on too long. I am concerned that his blind spots are storing up trouble.
And getting pulled into internal Indonesian politics seems a bad bet. Sukharno made mistakes and there's been a backlash. These are problems that we are more likely to make worse by intervening. Kosygin's path avoids us getting dragged into a quagmire.
I mean, half the reason the situation in Indonesia has reached the point is because Chinese attempts to increase their influence in Indonesia, often it seems at the expense of our influence.
There's clearly tension in the Sino-Soviet relationship already, and I'm not sure being so passive in Indonesia is going to meaningfully shore it up. Even if we assume that the Chinese read this as a deliberate gesture of good faith, it's still leaving a bunch of Soviet figures increasingly pissed off at a time when Kos' foreign policy is under fire. We gain lifts from backing Kos out of the hope for a rapprochement with China if all it leads to is the next wave of Soviet leaders pissed off at China.
Of course there will be Sino-Soviet tension. The Soviet Union and China have legitimate national interests that are not aligned, and that's fine. Occasional disagreements don't mean we can't have a productive Sino-Soviet relationship and maintain our economic and military cooperation.
It is interesting that the Chinese-aligned wing of the KPI is specifically referred to as
Maoist as China itself in this timeline is not particularly Maoist (though I can't remember if Mao died during the Chinese Civil War, or if he was simply out-competed by more pro-Soviet members of the CCP). It does raise the question of how strongly the broader Chinese party supports this play going on in Indonesia?
Either way, I don't particularly mind if China throws minor problems at our diplomats, especially when the larger issue in Indonesia is the bad choices by Sukharno. The Chinese-influenced KPI members are minor issue, if they are an issue at all.
I also don't think we should take a hardline here, as that would push the junta into the arms of the Americans, would encourage violence in Indonesia, as well as undermining Kosygin (whose work as Gen.Sec. I am quite happy with). But if China manages to win a strong relationship with Indonesia through its own efforts, I don't think that is automatically bad for us.
Formalized Moon Program: Now that a sufficient number of base components have been developed for rocket launch operations, a formal and expansive program to put a cosmonaut on the moon can be started. Theoretical developments with landers will be involved and require both deep throttle ability and re-ignition potential at a nearly nonexistent mass budget. Beyond the universal technical challenges, a general approach toward the mission must be selected if it is to be attempted. Something cheaper like a simple manned orbit and weekly stay may be conducted at a lower degree of technical risk, but it will inherently be severely politically challenging. (3) (Subvote)
Boldly and decisively designing a new far heavier vehicle for the moon program has been judged as questionable by several detractors, but necessary for ensuring the safe delivery of the astronauts. Instead of attempting to conduct a rendezvous above the moon, a safer system can be launched as a combination of two stages, with a heavy hydrogen transfer stage launched by the RLA-5 carrying a direct ascent lander. The lander itself will necessarily have to be hypergolic due to limitations in easy re-ignition engines, but by landing the entire return stack onto the moon a large degree of redundancy can be eliminated. The costs of developing an entirely new design for the FGB stack will be significant, but nothing that the Union cannot overcome.
[]Push Forward: Glushko wants his massive rocket and it can theoretically be made to fit into the budget with several rationalizations. Providing the funding now will ensure that a functional and low-risk upper lunar stack can be constructed. This will require the division of several teams, but pursuing the plan should keep the project on the politically required timetable. (Project Cost 40 RpT)
[]Revise the Project: Glushko has many ideas, some of which are good, but he has no ability to determine the economic viability of anything. Rather than enabling him to dictate the exact design specifications of the program, he can be made to properly utilize FGB systems for the habitable bus. Limitations in the design can be compensated for with engineering and common components will ensure an economic program. (Project Cost 30 RpT)
[]Accept Yangel's Rationalized Mission: Rather than risking funding on a frankly dangerous trip to the moon, admitting financial incompatibility and the significant inherent risk of the program. A refocus of the general space program can be made to a heavy orbital mission as a prelude and to build experience with manned operations outside of LEO. An effectively month-long scientific tour of the moon from orbit along with significant instrumentation can be flown on current hardware without much risk or issue. The American capsule program in theory may be able to achieve it first, but a same-year launch will be politically sufficient. (Project Cost 10 RpT) (Surrenders Moon Race)
[]Organize Alternative Proposals: Glushko has convinced himself that any problem can be solved with a sufficient application of funding while Yangel is a defeatist on the topic of Soviet engineering. Koralev has been busy with his health, but can still be compelled to bring in a more viable proposal and Chelomei is still functional. Glushko himself will not be happy with a committee on designing the moon mission being formed or that his idealized hardware may not fly, but his ego comes second to soviet progress. (Canceled Project, New Design by Consensus available)
Well, this is... Not as bad as I feared it would be.
Personally, I like Yangel's proposal best.
We just haven't been getting good rolls on the key programs for the moon mission, and I am at this point quite pessimistic that we can manage any moon landing worth the name inside the time limit.
We are no-where near having a workable moon suit, or even a suit suitable for EVA work (a much easier challenge, since an EVA suit doesn't need to have joints in the legs, nor does it need to deal with Lunar dust), debugging the RLA-5 will be a close run thing (we can probably do it, but we have no wriggle room if we have more poor rolls) and current designs are wedded to a weedy LK-type lander with shit for safety margins and little scientific utility.
The expanded Luna program, which is looking quite promising, sending men around the moon and the promise to the SupSov that we can do a safe moon landing in the first half of the 1970s, and even do a short-stay Lunar base if they want, should keep the political fallout from being too onerous.
And conceding doesn't automatically make the Americans win. They'd need to spend money like water to get a win, most likely, and without Kennedy being martyred, with them beating us to first man-made satellite and with the cooler cold war, their space program will have less political capital overall.
"Organize Alternative Proposals" may be a decent second best though. I am quite displeased with Glushko's performance overall, and now that he's delivered the RLA, it may be to our advantage to let his competitors suggest options. It may give us a useable moon mission architecture that doesn't make me want to throw up, and even better, it may let us replace Glushko with a designer more able to take the space program to the next level.
Regards,
fasquardon
