Upvote:7
The Apollo-Soyuz Test Project was the first spaceflight to include two participating nations working together with their own national spacecraft. The Americans sent up an Apollo command module, while the Russians launched a Soyuz spacecraft.
The Soyuz and Apollo spacecraft docked on July 17, 1975, in a demonstration of how well the rendezvous and docking systems of each spacecraft would work with each other. The combined crew of five people — three Americans, two Soviets — spent about two days in orbit working on experiments and conducting joint press conferences.
ASTP was a signal that the Space Race was over. The two nations, now fighting different foes other than themselves and facing budgetary restrictions for spaceflight, openly spoke of working together in future initiatives.