Comment 26 by raytoman - The US had to work as part of a team to build "the" space station and relies on the Russians to visit it since they don't currently have a usable passenger vehicle.

They also rely on European ATV systems for resupply, and on their contract with Space X for resupply and eventual astronaut transport. That (along with the various multinational modules and astronauts) is what makes the venture "International".

This is SpaceX’s third category of NASA award, with the company also holding awards to carry cargo to the space station and to start to prepare the Falcon 9 rocket and Dragon spacecraft to carry astronauts. - http://www.spacex.com/updates.php/

DRAGON MAKES HISTORY - FIRST COMMERCIAL SPACECRAFT VISITS ISS - http://www.spacex.com/

..

Comment 26 by raytoman - Sending stuff to mars is just a way of pretending they are still in the space race. The Chinese will be launching their first manned mars mission from their own space station, when they have finished extending it.

The Chinese have a lot of catching up to do first. Their station is on a par with Skylab.