Ford helped the USSR set up a few assembly lines in the late '20's and '30's, with state department approval. According to a book called "National Suicide" in 1936 FMC shipped complete truck assembly lines to Gorky Avtomobilny Zavod and Pavlovo Avtomobilny Zavod. That's back when they were the enemies of capitalists like the USA and friends of the National Socialists. Of course lots more equipment was delivered to the Soviets after they shunned the NAZIs and became our allies around 22JUN41.
I was out in the desert of California's Imperial Valley on a bombing detachment in the mid eighties when I met an Army mechanic whose unit was camoflaged beyond our barracks for some event. It turned out that his unit was made up of opposing force vehicles. I asked him how it was to work on all that metric stuff and I was suprized when he told me that the equipment was all flathead Ford and pretty easy to maintain. Then I remembered what I'd read in high school about GAZ and PAZ.
Many major American companies have been prominent in building up the Soviet truck industry. The Ford Motor Company, the A. J. Brandt Company, the Austin Company, General Electric, Swindell-Dressier, and others supplied the technical assistance, design work, and equipment of the original giant plants.
His Russian trucks may just have been American trucks on the five year plan. Tell him that though and he may have a story to tell about buying or selling rope.
Zoyd, AT1 USN ret.