The last Soviet manned reconnaissance station burned up in the Earth's atmosphere on August 8, 1977. Missions were accomplished both on the next Salyut spacecraft and also on Mir. They initially intended to augment Spektr, that was rammed last year, with a reconnaissance apparatus. Chelomey thought that it was cheaper to launch automated reconnaissance spacecraft. Surveillance should be conducted 24 hours per day, regardless of whether or not the Earth was covered with clouds or if the spacecraft was located on the dark side.
Cosmonauts are helpless here.
But the radars that were developed for Almaz were able to do that. However, an order arrived from Moscow 10 days prior to the launch - terminate the Almaz Program as a result of work on Buran. Ustinov had decided to deal the finishing blow to Chelomey. They authorized him to prepare for launch the station that had collected dust for six years at a test range. To the designers' surprise, Almaz was in decent condition in contrast to the fairing that was being used as a toilet.