MOSCOW — A Russian booster rocket carrying two telecommunications satellites malfunctioned during a launching early Tuesday, failing to deliver the satellites into their proper orbit and rendering them useless and unsalvageable. The mishap was another blow to Russia’s space program, which has been plagued by malfunctions, crashes and failed launchings. The failure was particularly glaring because it came just hours after NASA’s successful landing of a research probe on Mars. Acknowledging the starkly different outcomes, Deputy Prime Minister Dmitri O. Rogozin, who oversees Russia’s military industry, suggested in a Twitter post that the national space agency, Roscosmos, was struggling because...
