thats great. now even the united states is buying rusted equipment from russia via disgruntled upper middle rank russian government officials. The pinaccle of civilization.
I don't really see a point to the space station. Its too large, too expensive and totaly useless. The only practical use for the ISS is for zero gravity experiments. In the original plan, it was also supposed to be a "launch platform" for inter-planetary travel, but lets face it by the time inter-planetary travel is a feasible option, the ISS will have crashed in the south pacific just like MIR. If my memory serves correctly, the ISS proposition came around about the time NASA was about to get a major budget cut and a huge global cooperation would be a reason to keep their budget and possibly have it expanded.