Sorry, comrades: Capitalism won! If you need proof, check out the upcoming auction for all this junk from the space race-era Soviet cosmonaut program, including one adjustable-size "brown lace-up full body suit with breathing apparatus." You know, for dogs.

Props to Animal New York for flagging this: Designed for "Sputnik 5" and complete with a "tube for oxygen supply," this outfit (starting bid: 4,000 euros) "was one of the first space suits for dogs to test the effects of low gravity and high-speed launches on living organisms," Auctionata reports. "This dog space suit was used in the training of the dogs Belka and Strelka," who amazingly survived four orbits of the earth in 1960 and paved the way for human space flight.

The suit and hundreds of other Russkie space items are being put up for sale by Andora, an East German-born pop artist who apparently painted a rocket for the Russian space program that was actually launched into the cosmos, supposedly went through some cosmonaut training, and subsequently came into all this bizarre gear. Even if you don't speak decent Russian or German, this video explanation is a hoot:

Other goodies in the collection include an empty bottle of cognac signed (and allegedly drunk) by Yuri Gagarin, the first man in space; a mess of spacesuit gear, boots, and helmets; a very uncomfortable-looking handheld "space toilet" system; pop art; and also a whatever this is, but hey, it's designed by Andora and Philippe Starcke:

Is it legit? Is it an art project? Is it a ploy by an aging marginally relevant art-industry huckster to cash in on old notoriety? Who cares? Dog spacesuit, dude.

[h/t Animal New York]