Signed during Richard Nixon's Moscow summit, the agreement committed NASA and the Soviet space program to design compatible docking systems, enabling American and Soviet spacecraft to link up in orbit. Three years later, an Apollo capsule and a Soyuz craft docked 140 miles above Earth, and astronauts and cosmonauts shook hands through the open hatch — a symbolic thaw amid ongoing Cold War rivalry.
Signed during Richard Nixon's Moscow summit, the agreement committed NASA and the Soviet space program to design compatible docking systems, enabling American and Soviet spacecraft to link up in orbit. Three years later, an Apollo capsule and a Soyuz craft docked 140 miles above Earth, and astronauts and cosmonauts shook hands through the open hatch — a symbolic thaw amid ongoing Cold War rivalry.
Key people: Richard Nixon, Alexei Kosygin