<story><title>The last Soviet citizen: The cosmonaut who was left behind in space</title><url>https://www.rbth.com/history/330415-last-soviet-citizen-cosmonaut</url></story><parent_chain></parent_chain><comment><author>meredydd</author><text>If you like this, you should definitely read &amp;quot;Dragonfly: NASA and the crisis aboard Mir&amp;quot; by Bryan Burrough. It&amp;#x27;s an amazing portrait of the disintegrating immediately-ex-Soviet space program, and the disintegrating space station they were trying to keep flying.&lt;p&gt;This article mentions other countries buying seats on Mir. The book explains how this was a deliberate international effort to keep the Russian space program alive with infusions of hard cash. This was to avoid huge numbers of scientists with, effectively, high-level missile experience dispersing across the world in desperate need of money (rockets==missiles; that was the point of the whole original space race).&lt;p&gt;It&amp;#x27;s an eye-opening look at an astonishing time, and it culminates in heart-stopping descriptions of the various in-flight accidents, including the mid-space collision with a supply craft that knocked a hole in the station and nearly killed everyone aboard.&lt;p&gt;If you prefer video, the author gave an extended interview about it when it was released:
&lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.c-span.org&amp;#x2F;video&amp;#x2F;?115419-1&amp;#x2F;dragonfly-nasa-crisis-aboard-mir&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.c-span.org&amp;#x2F;video&amp;#x2F;?115419-1&amp;#x2F;dragonfly-nasa-crisis...&lt;/a&gt;</text></comment>
<story><title>The last Soviet citizen: The cosmonaut who was left behind in space</title><url>https://www.rbth.com/history/330415-last-soviet-citizen-cosmonaut</url></story><parent_chain></parent_chain><comment><author>avmich</author><text>Krikalev has a good article on Wikipedia on him: &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;Sergei_Krikalev&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;Sergei_Krikalev&lt;/a&gt;</text></comment>