If Russian academia and engineering had been supported likes ours over the last 5 decades, we would have some very serious competition. In many fields. I don't believe this was a failure of talent but a failure of support and resources. Just an opinion.
I agree that Russian science and rocket manufacture is not second class.
But, while funding levels are always important constraints, there is also the goal-setting actions of the political parts of the system that affect what projects get whatever funding is available.
The U.S. reached the Moon with humans first, and that was the goal achieved, so the U.S. went to low Earth orbit continuous occupancy as the next goal. I guess the idea was to make a robust system before going to the Moon in a more continuous manner, but that tended to eat-up all of the available funding. Apollo got cannibalized by the Space Shuttle, which is now providing parts for SLS. The continuous Earth orbit occupancy needed a flexible, reliable and cost-effective launch system, and the Space Shuttle just wasn't it. It looks like SpaceX has finally delivered reusability with an entirely different approach than the Russian or American governments worked on.
At least some funding was provided for non-human payloads, such as Mars and beyond probes, plys Webb. But, that too was long delayed.
If China had not stated its goal of going to the Moon, I don't think Artemis would be getting scheduled for this decade. China has the scientists, R&D capabilities and manufacturing infrastructure to succeed, and maybe pretty quickly, because they have the political control and desire for putting Chinese on the Moon.
I just hope neither the Chinese nor the Americans push their schedules too hard and end up with fatal blunders. That is the type of outcome that tends to damage the political will to get the project done.
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