Just a few weeks ago you disagreed with me when I said their space program is ahead of ours, but I am glad you changed your mind
You are confusing two different thoughts.
Being critical of Iranian space progress does not mean I think that NK is ahead of ours as much as you do.
North Korea is a mirage, look at everything they have unveiled (6+ ICBM, TBM, SLBM) modern battle tanks, SLV, nuclear submarine, HGV, air defense systems, etc etc.
Now ask how a country that needed to barter for gasoline and food a decade or so ago, that has a gdp of a paltry $50B can afford such programs all at once? Programs that even well developed nation states like Japan, South Korea, Turkey, Brazil, South Africa, etc don’t have?
It’s not possible. I’m sorry. Massive foreign assistance behind the scenes and a lot of mirages and smoke screens.
As for Russian assistance, NK had 2/3 successful orbital launches of Unha-3 (first one back in 2012 with a 100kg payload and second one in 2016 with a 200kg payload) while we still haven't been able to fix Simorgh.
Unha-2/3 are/were basically Taepodong 2-3 reconverted to SLV. Taepodong 2-3 I remember quite well from my younger days. It was NK attempt at an ICBM over a decade ago. The missile was a failure. Failed tests and delays.
North Korea was going no where fast while Iran was rapidly catching up in field of missile development from its Shahab-3 first production in 1998. You have to remember that NK has been playing around with missiles since before the Shah fell. If anything NK has gone nowhere for decades while Iran caught up. If it wasn’t for NK (and Libya), Iran would never have had BMs or learned how to develop them.
Then suddenly within 5 years this spurt of advancement has happened where they mastered large diameter liquid and solid fuel engines based on some of Russian’s most complicated engines, with zero prior tests. This also weirdly kicked off a massive advancement across nearly the entire military sector of NK. Various fields suddenly started unveiling what appears to be top of the line weapons.
It’s the worst kept secret in the world right now. Russia (and probably China) are following the Iran-proxy model and helping NK reach new heights as a deterrence to US in Asia. Hard to know what is real or how much of these systems NK unveils it can actually afford to produce. In Ukraine, Russian soldiers don’t like using NK artillery shells because the quality and control is so shoddy.
2012 (and 2016) should predate any such Russian assistance. In other words, they were already ahead of us, not just recently with Russian help, that just widened the gap even further
2012-2016 you can blame on Rouhani and JCPOA. Lots of political sensitivities that North Korea doesn’t have to deal with.
Supposed Russian assistance also doesn't impact pace of launches, they launched their new solid fuel 2.4m diameter SLV 3 times in 6 months ! Our last civilian orbital launch attempt was December 2021, almost 2 years ago !
That’s Russian assistance. This is a country where most of its population is starving. People routinely die from starvation and live in slum conditions. At night most of the country is lights out from space (outside of parts of the capital). Its economy is worth less than the net worth of some billionaires.
Now use logic and rational and you will reach the conclusion how such advancement is possible.
My point is whatever North Korea is doing is irrelevant, NK is a joke of a country. It’s entirely focused on military endeavors (with massive foreign assistance) while its entire population starves and dies. Reminds me of Saddam in the latter years. So who cares where NK is, that is not a successful route for Iran to emulate unless you want our population to go
From 90M to 50M.
Our last civilian orbital launch attempt was December 2021, almost 2 years ago !
Welcome to resisting the West. You guys are so rah rah Iran until the bill comes due. It has costs and it sacrifices development of critical areas of one’s economy and industry.
Iran spends billions (with a B) on food subsidies on its population. North Korea they eat grass when times get tough and die. Rocket man doesn’t care if his population is 20M or 2M, just like his father. Iran actually has a country to run. Corruption is also high. Inefficiencies run deep in the republic.
So yes there is no priority (or funds) for space right now. Even among IRGC, NK is already outpacing IRGC this year. You hear IRGC officials talk and besides the Solemani project they have zero vision for a future in space. No moon mission. Some joke of a propaganda for a “manned” mission. They unveiled some space suits from Amazon.com a while back. It’s a disaster.
Space is not a priority, simple as that. Hasn’t been for over 10 years. IRGC jumping in won’t change it much, Simorgh was an IRGC designed rocket. Should tell you all you need to know.
North Korea seems to care about space again and even talks of a NK space station. Iran doesn’t care about space too much. Next month a couple of private sector Iranian satellites will be launched by Russia on Iran’s behalf. Just goes to show you where we at and how much this government doesn’t care to change it.