Interkosmos was established at the height of theCold War "Space Race" between the Soviet Union and theUnited States, which competed to achieve superiorspaceflight capability. The respective successes were exploited by both sides for propaganda purposes, with Interkosmos aimed at demonstrating solidarity and unity between the Soviets and aligned or sympathetic countries.[4]
All members of Interkosmos from the USSR were awardedHero of the Soviet Union or theOrder of Lenin. The program included members of theWarsaw Pact andCoMEcon, as well as other socialist states likeAfghanistan, Cuba,Mongolia, and Vietnam.Non-aligned nations such as India and Syria participated,[5][6] as did capitalist states such as the United Kingdom, France and Austria.[7][8] Most crewed missions consisted of non-Soviet cosmonauts being placed on routine flights with experienced Soviet cosmonauts.[9]
Interkosmos was responsible for many inaugural achievements in the history of spaceflight, including the first citizen of a country other than the U.S. or USSR (Vladimír Remek ofCzechoslovakia), the first black and Hispanic person (Arnaldo Tamayo Méndez of Cuba), and the first Asian person (Phạm Tuân of Vietnam).
Beginning in April 1967 with unpiloted researchsatellite missions, the first crewed Interkosmos mission occurred in February 1978.[8] Joint crewed spaceflights enabled 14 non-Sovietcosmonauts to participate inSoyuz space flights between 1978 and 1988. The program was responsible for sending into space the first citizen of a country other than the US or USSR:Vladimír Remek ofCzechoslovakia.[7] Interkosmos also resulted in the first black and Hispanic person in space,Arnaldo Tamayo Méndez of Cuba, and the first Asian person in space,Phạm Tuân of Vietnam. Of the countries involved, onlyBulgaria sent two cosmonauts to space, although the second one did not fly under the Interkosmos program, and the FrenchspationautJean-Loup Chrétien flew on two flights.[10]
The Soviet Union also offered commercial joint human spaceflight missions to the United Kingdom and Japan, resulting in the first British and Japanese cosmonauts. In the early 1980s, an offer was made to Finland, with test pilotJyrki Laukkanen mentioned a potential candidate. The pilots of the Test Flight (Koelentue) refused on the grounds that participation would not benefit the flight or test pilot activity in any way; no further offers were made to Finland.[11][12]
1979 September 26 — Vertikal-8 Solar Ultraviolet/Solar X-ray mission.
1979 November 1 — Interkosmos 20. (Czechoslovak Socialist Republic, the German Democratic Republic, the Hungarian People's Republic, and the Socialist Republic of Romania).
1981 — Re-entry Vehicle Test mission.
1981 February 6 — Interkosmos 21 - (Czechoslovak Socialist Republic, the German Democratic Republic, the Hungarian People's Republic, and the Socialist Republic of Romania)
1981 August 7 —Interkosmos 22 "Bulgaria-1300" (People's Republic of Bulgaria).
1981 August 28 — Vertikal-9 Solar Ultraviolet/Solar X-ray mission.
1981 September 21 — Oreol 3 - Developed by Soviet and French specialists under the joint Soviet-French project 'Arkad-3'.
1985 April 26 — Interkosmos 23 - Developed by scientists and specialists of the USSR and the Czechoslovak Socialist Republic.
1986 December 18 — Kosmos 1809
1989 September 28 — Magion 2 - Part of the scientific programme of Interkosmos 24 (project Aktivnyj) Execution of the scientific programme of the 'Aktivny' project in conjunction with Interkosmos-24, permitting simultaneous spatially separating investigations of plasma processes in circumterrestrial space.
1989 September 28 — Interkosmos 24 - U.S. participation, in cooperation with Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, the German Democratic Republic, Hungary, Poland, and Romania (the international scientific project entitled 'Aktivny'). Carrying the Czechoslovak Magion-2 satellite.
1991 December 18 — Interkosmos 25 - Experiments fromGermany, Romania, Bulgaria, Poland, Hungary. Comprehensive study of the effects of artificial impact of modulated electron flows and plasma beams on the ionosphere and magnetosphere of the Earth (forming part of the Apex international scientific project, conducted jointly with Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, Germany, Hungary, Poland, and Romania.)
1994 March 2 — Interkosmos 26 - Conduct of comprehensive investigations of the sun under the Coronas-I international project developed byRussian andUkrainian experiments in cooperation with specialists from Poland, theCzech Republic, theSlovak Republic, Bulgaria, France, and the United Kingdom.
Following theApollo–Soyuz mission, there were talks betweenNASA and Interkosmos in the 1970s about a "Shuttle–Salyut" program to flySpace Shuttle missions to a Salyut space station, with later talks in the 1980s even considering flights of the futureBuran-class orbiter to a future US space station.[16] Whilst the Shuttle–Salyut program never materialized during the existence of the Soviet Interkosmos program, after thedissolution of the Soviet Union theShuttle–Mir program would follow in these footsteps in the mid-1990s and eventually pave the way to theInternational Space Station.
In general, most of the films associated with programs are short TV documentaries from that era.[citation needed] The two exceptions include (largely fictionalised)Interkosmos from 2006, and cooperation document from 2009 (in Polish) titledLotnicy Kosmonauci ("Aviators-Cosmonauts").[17]
Bion satellites, a series of biology research satellites from 1966 to 1996 – participation of theUnited States from 1975 to 1996.
Vega 1 andVega 2, two Solar System probes, in the jointVega program between the Soviet Union,Austria, Bulgaria, Hungary, Poland, Czechoslovakia, France, the German Democratic Republic ("East Germany"), and theFederal Republic of Germany ("West Germany") in December 1984.
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