From a launch site on European soil, a German startup called Isar Aerospace has crossed a threshold that no private European company had crossed before — reaching orbit and delivering payloads on just its second flight. The achievement arrives at a moment when the commercial space industry is quietly searching for alternatives to the concentrated power of a single dominant provider, and it suggests that the long arc of European strategic autonomy in space may finally be bending toward independence. What was once the exclusive domain of government programs and American partnerships now has a ne