Soyuz

Soyuz is a transliteration of the Cyrillic text Союз (Russian and Ukrainian, 'Union'). It was often used as an internal abbreviation for the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (Сою́з Сове́тских Социалисти́ческих Респу́блик, Soyuz Sovetskikh Sotsialisticheskikh Respublik) during the period of that country's existence. The term was used officially by both the Soviet State (for example in various projects it commissioned during the Space Race) and the citizenry as a whole. As terminological shorthand it was often used interchangeably with each of the slightly longer terms Сове́тский Сою́з (Sovetskiy Soyuz, 'Soviet Union'), and the initialism ссср (SSSR, 'USSR' in English). This use was primarily confined to the Soviet Union itself, since elsewhere the name of the country was typically translated into the native language, and abbreviated accordingly. Internationally, it most commonly refers to elements of the Soviet/Russian space program.