Conway Twitty sang ‘Hello Darlin’ in Russian. On July 19, 1975, the recording was played by the American astronauts on board the Apollo module to Russian cosmonauts flying in Soyuz 19. It was meant to be seen as a gesture of peace and goodwill toward the Russians.
Russia
Russian military used foot wrapping…
Russian military used foot wrapping instead of socks. Technique of wrapping feet in cloth was used since 17th century up until 2013 when they allowed the use of socks and announced the abolishment of centuries old practice.
In 1991 a youth group in Denmark…
In 1991 a youth group in Denmark wrote to Gorbachev of Russia to ask for a free submarine. He said yes, and 3 years later they received a massive 76 meter (250 ft) submarine.
In 1996, Russia launched a Mars Rover…
In 1996, Russia launched a Mars Rover called “Mars96”. It crashed back to earth after 2 days, containing plutonium-238 fuel which would have survived the impact. Nobody ever bothered to look for it, and it’s believed to just be lying around the Andes mountains.
The battleship Imperator Aleksandr…
The battleship Imperator Aleksandr III was built by Imperial Russia, taken by Provisional Russia, given to Germany, given to Britain, given to White Russians, and then sold for scrap by the French. The ship guns were then sold to the Finns, stolen by Nazis, and returned to Russia after WW2.
At a 1976 Amsterdam chess tournament….
At a 1976 Amsterdam chess tournament, Soviet grandmaster Viktor Korchnoi politely asked an English competitor how to spell the words “political asylum.” He then went straight to a police station and announced that he wished to defect.
When Maxim Gorky arrived in the US in 1906…
When Maxim Gorky arrived in the US in 1906, he initially received a warm welcome. President Roosevelt, Mark Twain planned to meet him. But when it was reported that Gorky was accompanied not by his wife, but by his mistress, his hotel threw him out and he got cancelled. Gorky on a goodwill and fundraising mission for the Bolsheviks. But in 1906 this didn’t mean much to Americans.
It turned out the woman accompanying Gorky was not, in fact, Mrs. Gorky. She was Maria Andreyeva, a star of the Moscow Art Theatre. Sure, she was another ardent Bolshevik, but apparently that wasn’t the problem. She and Gorky weren’t legally married. That was the problem, considered by the media to be a moral blemish worse than anarchism. American morality, was made of different stuff.
The mayor of a Russian town persuaded…
The mayor of a Russian town persuaded the cleaner of the local administration building to run as his rival, in order to fulfil the minimum requirement of two cаndіdates. The residents of the town were fed up with the mаyor, and the cleaner was elеcted, receiving almost 62% of the vоtes.
In 1944, three American B-29 bombers…
In 1944, three American B-29 bombers on missions over Japan were forced to land in the Soviet Union. The Soviets, who did not have a similar strategic bomber, decided to copy the B-29. Within three years, they had developed the Tu-4, a nearly-perfect copy.
To train new operatives during the…
To train new operatives during the Cold War, the Soviets built fully functional replicas of American towns. Their residents consisted of retired deep cover operatives who taught the trainees everything they needed to know about blending into American life.