&quot;The Kremlin leadership saw the space shuttle primarily as a carrier of space weapons and discounted its advertised scientific and commercial applications as an elaborate smokescreen&quot;<p>Which, to be fair, somewhat reflects the involvement of the DoD and NRO in the US shuttle design process. After all, the USAF built Vandenberg for a reason, and all the SDI people wanted x-ray killsats, kinetic bombardment satellites, etc.