Instead of racing each other to space or to the Moon as they did back in the bad old days, Cold War rivals now hope to go hand-in-hand in returning to the Moon. Through its spokesperson, the Russian Federal Space Agency (more commonly known as Roskosmos) voiced its hopes of joining NASA in its back-to-the-Moon program through technology and know-how.

Hey, it's not a bad deal, and not just because they were the first satellite, animal, and human into space. When the USSR became the CIS, one of the signs that things had indeed changed was cooperation between Russian and American space agencies. They've had longer experiences with keeping men in space for long periods of time, (critical for long-duration lunar missions) right up to the Mir space station and now continuing with the International Space Station. Their workhorses, Soyuz and Progress, complement the American Space Shuttle in supplying the ISS.

Given NASA estimates of US$ 104 billion in mission price tag and investments to get a four-man crew back to the Moon - not including keeping them there for quite a bit of time - there's a lot of room for potential partners like Roskosmos to contribute, although their contribution will be through tech-transfers and not cash. Roskosmos spokesman Igor Panarin also notes that "space research is a vast field with plenty of room for every nation".

But yeah, hitching along for the ride's also a good way to bootstrap or at least achieve the potential of the Russian space program.