Since Mir survived the dissolution of USSR, and continued flying for 10 more years, adding modules, crews, modifying programs, it really showed how many unforeseen changes can be incorporated into a flexible program. Among those changes was a whole program, Shuttle-Mir, of Shuttle flights to Mir and joint expeditions on the station with crew from two main adversaries of the Cold War. Technologically this required matching the interfaces of the two different space programs - including, for example, orbit inclination. Politically and diplomatically the space program didn't have such a level of cooperation since 1975 Apollo-Soyuz joint flight. To have American astronauts on Soyuz spaceships and Russian cosmonauts on Space Shuttles was something just a few years prior hard to believe.
Shuttle-Mir program was a large step towards cooperation in space which resulted in International Space Station project, flying to this day in 2026. We can look into the Mir program in 1990s as an example of establishing cooperation between very different sides.
Mir, over its 15-year long flight, had a very serious accident when the Progress M-34 spaceship lost control, struck Spektr module, punctured it, and the crew had to operate very fast, cutting cables, sealing the hatch and restoring the normal working of the station - with one module permanently unavailable. This story teaches us the importance of graceful degradation and that safe design of systems and processes in general is critical.