International Space Station, Russian's next Conquest.
Basically we have given up rights to this space station as we can't even get their on our own anymore and Russia has the only way for us to get too it.
Interesting blog I found doing some digging on this..
"It took a special brand of stupid to not continue our own space development beyond the Shuttle, and to retire the Shuttle (although it desperately needed it, given its age technologically) without developing anything to replace it.
It took an even more-special brand of stupid to put together a "consortium" to build an international space station with the belief that none of the parties would ever become hostile to one another, and therefore we never had to worry about the possibility of destruction of our investment.
Well, we were that stupid.
And now it appears we may well pay for it.
Russia has put ISS continuation beyond 2020 on the table as a possible price for our refusal to let them do whatever they want in Ukraine -- and, it can be safely presumed, anywhere else.
Never mind that we were also dumb enough to single-source their rocket engines for some of our satellite launches.
Yes, we were that dumb.
Thank the last several Presidents and Congresses -- they're all responsible for this."
by Karl Denninger