Larry's comments are spot on (as usual). Success Machine's comment about the Mercury Capsule is a bit silly. The Russian aerospace engineers were first rate. It's regretable that so many of them are no longer practicing (although I'm very pleased they're no longer designing ICBMs that are pointed at us).

The Russians have a long list of notable achievements. The Energia launch system was an extremely exciting design (too bad it got scrapped). The Soviet Venus landers represented some top notch engineering that has yet to be reached by anyone else. Also their Lunar rover was a nice piece of work. Their Mars Landers though unsuccessful represented some excellent bang/buck engineering. The Russians can take pride in what their Space Program acheived.

Gary