Spaceflight and Cross-Cultural PsychologyThe initially daring and innovative enterprise of international missions has
expanded greatly over the years, although approximately 20 years would pass before
Americans and Russians again flew together. However, international crews appeared
early on. In 1976, the Soviet Union announced its Interkosmos or “guest cosmo-
naut” program. As James Oberg explains, the first, three-week flights in March,
June, and August 1978 included Czech Air Force Pilot Vladimir Remek, Polish
pilot Miroslaw Hewrmaszewski, and East German Air Force officer Sigmund Jahn.^5
Actual flying was done by Soviet cosmonauts, who had many more years of train-
ing than their guests. Oberg recounts a joke about Remek returning to Earth with
“red hands” disease. When flight surgeons asked how he had acquired this malady,
Remek explained, “Well, in space, whenever I reached for this or that switch, the
Russians cried ‘Don’t touch that!’ and slapped me on my hands.”^6 Other guest cos-
monauts were recruited from Cuba, Bulgaria, Mongolia, and Romania.
Although Oberg portrays Interkosmos as largely symbolic, he also predicted—
correctly—that this could give rise to true international missions with more active
participation on the part of the international partners. More recently, a NASA
report pointed out that Russia has flown cosmonauts from many countries, includ-
ing Germany, India, Italy, Japan, South Africa, Syria, the United Kingdom, the
United States, and Vietnam.^7 The first Western European to fly, Frenchman Jean-
Loup Chrétien, did so aboard Russian craft in 1982.
In the late 1970s, while the Interkosmos program flourished, the last Apollo
rocket had been launched, but the Space Shuttle had not yet completed the tran-
sition from drawing board to orbit. In 1969, NASA had invited Europeans to par-
ticipate in post-Apollo flights, and in the 1970s, while the Europeans were hard
at work designing Spacelab, Ulf Merbold from West Germany, Wubbo Oeckels
from Holland, and Claude Nicollier from Switzerland were training for the Shuttle.
Merbold, flying aboard Columbia, was the first to reach orbit and did so in November
- By 2003, the 25th anniversary of Remek’s historic flight, 30 European astro-
nauts had participated in 44 missions: 26 in collaboration with NASA and 18 - J. Oberg, “Russia’s ‘Guest Cosmonaut’ Program, A Commentary,” L-5 News 3, no. 11
(November 1978): 1–2. - Ibid., p. 2.
- “Astronaut,” World Book at NASA, http://www.nasa.gov/worldbook/astronaut_worldbook.
html (accessed 23 May 2010).