Barring slippage, they're supposed to have three more launches before the end of June, which would put them on track for 24 this year. They seem to be well on their way to matching 173, based on their current record and high flight rate.

Hard to say, but maybe Rogozin means crewed spaceflights, not just any rocket launches. Soyuz had more than 140 flights... don't know where 173 came from, but no, SpaceX isn't going to launch 24 flights of manned Crew Dragon this year, not next year.

I don't agree with ideas of the article :) but Soyuz spacecraft did fly quite a lot of flights. More than Shuttle already, and counting.

> If SpaceX to launch 5 launches per year it would take 35 years to prove same kind of reliability.

I mean, sure, but they've done nine this year so far already, and have plans to launch upwards of 30 by the end.

Yes but the rocket between them is identical, which is historically the most dangerous part of space travel.

You can slice and dice the numbers in many different ways.

Russia is gonna put heavy emphasis on the long history of the Soyuz family. SpaceX is gonna point out things like https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soyuz_MS-09#Air_leak ("A 2 mm hole in the orbital module was discovered, later stated to have been 'hidden with a low-quality patch job.'") and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soyuz_MS-10 ("aborted shortly after launch on 11 October 2018 due to a failure of the Soyuz-FG launch vehicle boosters") as a counterpoint.

Ultimately, Russia can comfortably say "we're pretty good at doing rocket launches". SpaceX is getting there themselves.

They are planning for around 30 launches in 2020, and 50 in 2021

No they are not. Here the matter is crewed launches, and SpaceX isn't going to launch 30 manned Crew Dragons this year, or next year, or these two years together.

The rocket between them is identical, which is historically the most dangerous part of space travel.

Spain should've kept the South America - Cadiz route on sailing ships. They'd have million trips under their wooden belts already, beat that internal combustion engine!