You may use Единый tariff from MegaFon Moscow to call the States, it's about $0.11/min, isn't it so expensive? I guess it's cheap enough. Calling the States using other tariffs and operators is usually much more expensive. The alternative is a calling card, it's $0.03-$0.12/min to the States via a local landline access number.
The things you saying about the Госсвязьнадзор's permissions and so on sound very strange to me. I have never heard a foreigner had any problems with bringing her or his cellular phone into Russia for last 4-5 years and carrying it back home. Some people from this forum or their friends did successfully visit Russia having their cellular phone with them and had no problems. I guess you are talking about the very outdated law: before February 2000 Russians had to register their cellular phones for Госсвязьнадзор too, and any border crossing was a problem both for Russians and foreigners because border guards could have asked for a Госсвязьнадзор permission. The permissions, as I wrote, was cancelled in 2000. Where did you get the info you told me? Do the US State Department update their data on foreign countries sometimes? :blink: By the way, have a look here -
http://travel.state.gov/travel/cis_p.../cis_1006.html . You may read the following: "
Visitors may bring in regular cellular telephones to Russia without restriction. Satellite telephones require advance approval from the Russian authorities. ". And, yes, there's a restriction put on GPS, but it's not your problem unless you have a mixed GPS/GSM device. Still have doubts?
By the way, what phone would you be able to bring with you to Russia? Which bands does it have? It's quite important if it has 900 MHz, 1800 MHz or both because different operators use such the bands more or less or even just the only band. And, yes, the phone should be unlocked to accept a Russian SIM card. It's theoretically possible to unlock phone in Russia, and it's quite cheap, but you can't do it without fluent Russian and knowing the local reality well (unlocking is a sort of hidden business here, you get what I mean, right?). However, it's all about your American GSM phone, which is probably locked for now. Keep in mind, all phones sold in Russia are unlocked. You just go to a dealer shop and buy a phone (separately to a SIM, i.e. you may just buy a GSM phone without a SIM as if it was a DECT cordless phone or something like that), and this phone is always unlocked. So, it's not a problem at all. Do not buy a phone at the operator's offices, you'd better buy them in popular dealer shops such as Связной or Евросеть (these are spread both in St.Petersburg and Moscow, AFAIK), which you may find almost at every metro station here. A phone you might buy here would probably be 900/1800 MHz only (good for Europe but useless for the States) or 900/1800/1900 MHz (good for Europe and fine for the States in places with 1900 MHz GSM coverage).