Soyuz yes in modern times. But also back in the 70s. Apollo-Soyuz seems like such a distant memory, like something you see on "Today I Learned" on reddit followed by 5,000 upvotes from amazed gen-zers.
The height of the cold war when we had thousands of nukes pointed at each others cities, multiple proxy wars including Vietnam, a conservative Republican president and conservative Communist premier, yet somehow a civilian international space program was still considered worth it.
The whole "for profit" thing just seems like such a sham. It's only "for profit" because the government is paying the bills, while avoiding liability and scrutiny if something goes wrong. Every space accident will now be like the Virgin Galactic fatalities, a bunch of secretive corporate NDAs instead of an open inquiry like Challenger.
> somehow a civilian international space program was still considered worth it.
I think a major reason was that, for all its failings, USSR was a superpower, powerful, influential, with an internationally attractive ideology. Russia today is a sunsetting power kicking around itself.
It was probably worth it, it's not very likely it would have been continuously crewed for as long as it was without them. Also, put less wear on the US space suits, since they were made in the 1970s.
The USA operates on the theory that mutual exposure will modify their hearts & minds more than it modifies our hearts & minds.
This applies to cultural contacts in general too. Every time the US decided to "punish" the Soviets by cutting back cultural contacts... breathtakingly stupid (IMO).
Also, what better way to say "let's not nuke the shit out of each other" than to cooperate on civilian space programs?