Terms are listed alphabetically 


ABM: Antiballistic missile defense

ASAT: Anti-satellite weapon

ASU PP: Automated control system of preparation and launch

CPSU: Communist Party of the Soviet Union (KPSS if transliterated from Russian) the official name of the ruling party in the USSR.

ELINT: Electronic intelligence

EVA: Extra Vehicular Activity (spacewalk)

Geostationary transfer of orbit (GTO): Elliptical orbit with the apogee (the highest point at the altitude of 36,000 kilometers.

Geostationary orbit (GSO): The circular orbit over the Equator (0 degrees inclination) at the altitude of 36,000 kilometers. The spacecraft in such orbit needs 24 hours to make one revolution around the planet, which makes it look "hanging" over the same point of the Earth surface.

GULAG: Glavnoe Upravlenie Lagerey: in Russian Chief Directorate of Camps -- A system of prison camps in Stalinist Russia.

ICBM: Intercontinental ballistic missile

ISS: International Space Station

IRBM: Intermediate range ballistic missile

KSISO: Complex of means of measurement, collection and processing of information

LEO: Low Earth Orbit (between 90 and 200 kilometers)

MIRV: Multiple reentry vehicle

MIT: Moscow Institute of Teplotechniki

MOM: Ministry of General Machine Building, the government body (ministry) which between 1966 and 1991 oversaw rocket and space industry in the USSR.

NIIP-5: 5th Scientific and Research Range of the Ministry of Defense: The official name of the test range near Tyuratam (Baikonur)

NT: Nitrogen Tetroxide (oxidizer)

RORSAT: Radar satellite

SVAG: Soviet Military Administration in Germany (after World War II)

Synchronous orbit: The orbit with the altitude of 36,000 kilometers, where spacecraft needs 24 hours to complete one revolution around Earth.

TASS: Telegraph Agency of the Soviet Union; In the post-Soviet period renamed ITAR-TASS (Information Telegraph Agency of Russia)

UDMH: Unsymmetrical Dimethyl Hydrazine (rocket fuel)