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"If we don’t go, we won’t know!"
The first American
to orbit Earth, John Glen, January 16.01.98, at NASA press conference announcing his
return to space, thus making him the oldest human to go (at the beginning of 1998, John
Glen was 76 years old).
Planeteer Resurrection is a web site focusing mainly on science fiction and it must be made clear that the following is not science fiction. However, science fiction has played a rather surprising role in the development of space exploration, in particular in the early parts of this century. Science fiction authors, such as Jules Vernes in the 19th Century, have been precognitive, even visionary e.g. the concept of communications satellites first ‘invented’ by Arthur C. Clarke in 1945. These first chapters will concentrate on the early ideas of space exploration.
The American civilian space agency, National Aeronautics and Space
Administration (NASA), is celebrating its 40th birthday this year. Last year was the 40th
anniversary of Sputnik I and II which initiated man’s exploration of space. These
past decades have witnessed momentous developments i
n technological, mental, exploration and medical terms and many of them find
their origin in space exploration, space research and space science. It is the belief of
this writer that the next 40 years will see a comparable development and expansion in
space activities, not the least now that the commercial sector has overtaken the military
and civilian use of space (1996). This expansion into space may well begin with the
International Space Station project which, it is hoped, will be launched this year.
However, NASA, and
other space agencies, such as the European Space Agency (ESA), the Russians, Canadians,
and even the Japanese (all of whom are participating in the International Space Station)
have all experienced more or less drastic budgetary cuts during their existence. As space
agencies are simply a part of central administrations they are subject to the processes of
decision and policy making. Therefore it is important to remember that for space
exploration, manned as well as unmanned, to succeed it is necessary for the space program
in question to generate a political and public support strong enough not only to initiate
the program, but also to maintain the support during the years to come.
The glory
era’s of the Apollo Program, the transition between Apollo and the space shuttle, the
Space Shuttle Program, and the International Space Station will be dealt with in later
chapters.
Michael Bjorklund is a Danish student of History at the University of Copenhagen. He is working on his final dissertation on the International Space Station, 1981-88. The opportunity to publish these texts at Planeteer Resurrection lets him utilise some of the material he wasn’t able to use in his dissertation, simply for limitation purposes.
The purpose of this text and the texts to follow is:
There always has been vehement discourse between adherents of manned space exploration, and the groups preferring an automated approach (in particular the space science communities). Many people have asked themselves precisely why we should waste so much money in space exploration whilst so many problems exist on Earth. Therefore I should state that while I am very positive towards space exploration, both manned and unmanned, and feel that both should be expanded drastically in vision, budget and scope, I have attempted to keep the following texts as objective, in scientific terms, as possible. If I have failed it is not the fault of the materials I have used, but is, in fact, my responsibility.
Most of my source material was assembled during a stay at NASA Historical Reference Collection, NASA HQ, and at George Washington University, in May 1997. Additionally, used as secondary sources (i.e. material not of an original source, but something utilising original materials e.g. this article), found mainly in Denmark where the libraries, unfortunately, have a rather limited range of literature on space history and space policy. Finally NASA has published an awesome quantity of material through the NASA Historical Reference Collection (accessible through NASA’s homepage).
In presenting this article I would like to thank:
Dr. Roger Launius and the other staff at NASA Historical Reference Collection, NASA HQ, Washington D.C.;
Dr John Logsdon and the staff at George Washington University; Gil Ousley, BDM;
John LaBrecque, Jet Propulsion Laboratory,
Peter Hoffmeyer, Terma Elektronik Space Division;
Ian Pryke, ESA, Washington D.C. office;
Carsten Due-Nielsen, my dissertation tutor at the University of Copenhagen.
A great many more who have helped me in one way or the other, be that people who have been interviewed, or corrected my spelling, or simply been there, should be mentioned here. To all of you: thanks! Finally a thank you to Planeteer Resurrection for giving me a chance to write about a subject I really care about!
Please write to me if you find any inconsistencies, have suggestions, find faults, want me to perhaps have a look at a certain part of the History of Space, have questions or want to hire me.
Michael Bjorklund
(please use subject: "Q:Planet")
© Michael Bjorklund, Denmark, September, 1998
Until only a few
centuries ago, man had very limited observational possibilities when attempting to explain
Earth’s place in the Universe, yet many attempted to. The Ptolemaic view on the
Universe placed Earth in the centre of a system where the sun, the planets and the stars,
placed on spheres around Earth, moving in a well ordered system (a geocentric belief).
This view, placing man exactly in the centre, went well hand in hand
with Medieval Christianity, and was thus assimilated into the
Christian
explanation of the Universe. It did not begin to change until it was shattered by people
like Nicholas Copernicus (1473-1543), Galileo Gallilei (1564-1642), Johannes Kepler (ca.
1571-1630) and Isaac Newton (1642-1727). With Galileo Galilei came the use of the first
telescopes, and thus the first glimpses of moons around Jupiter, thereby proving that
other bodies in the skies moved around something other than the Sun, thus shattering the
Heliocentric worldview. (1)
With the new understanding of the Sun-system, the Universe, and the position of Earth, literature appeared, in which man travelled to the Moon, and further out. Kepler with Somnium (published after his death in 1634), and Cyrano de Bergerac with Voyage de la Lune (1649) are two early examples. In the latter, the hero actually accidentally uses firecrackers attached to his ‘space ship’ and becomes the first flyer in fiction to reach the Moon using a rocket propelled craft!
Later writers includes Edward Everett Hale with The Brick Moon (1869), which places a manmade satellite in orbit around Earth. (2) As it is manned by a group of people, Hale actually describes an early permanently manned space station. They communicated by jumping up and down on the surface in a Morse code like way ….. !
The Italian astronomer Giovanni Shiaparelli saw certain features on Mars in 1877 that were interpreted, both by him, and by others, to be artificially made canals. Percival Lowell, a scientist, built the Lowell Observatory, near Flaggstaff, Arizona .Lowell published Mars and It’s Canals in 1906, in which he argued that Mars had once been inhabited by intelligent beings.
Jules Verne wrote De
la Terre á la Lune in 1865 and later Autour de la Lune, while H.G. Wells published War of
the Worlds (1897) and shortly after The First Men in the Moon. Both were scientifically
more sound than either Shiaparelli or Lowell. Another early science fiction writer, with
positive contacts between humans and aliens, was C. S. Lewis with Out of the Silent Planet
(1938), Perelandria (1943) and That Hideous Strength (1945).
The first science fiction film appeared already in the 6th year after the first film was made in 1895, namely in 1902: Le Voyage dans la Lune by George Méliés.
The thought of space penetrated deep into popular culture, e.g. in the Superman Comics, and other popular magazines. When H.G Wells’ War of the Worlds was performed on the radio people all over the USA panicked. From 1940 onwards UFO’s (Unidentified Flying Object) became synonymous with visiting intelligent aliens. (3)
So space has been a part of fiction for a long time before the first humans actually left Earth.
New and old myths about the unexplored, ancient and changing as religious beliefs changed, like the maps of the unknown seas up to only a few centuries ago had depicted gigantic sea snakes in the far west, explanations of the unknown has always been sought by man.
With the newer tools of observation and the accompanying scientific explanation came an interest in trying to reach the stars, though even this also has its roots in the antique world ... in Greek mythology Icarus glued feathers to his arms and flew too high so the sun melted the glue and he fell to his death.
In the USA science fiction writers and those interested in science fiction formed the early rocket societies, though one of the three recognised fathers of space-flight, Robert H. Goddard (1882-1945; an engineer, and not a science fiction writer), operated independently from the societies. In Europe and Russia, young engineers, students and other technically interested, formed the core of the European rocket societies. (4)
One of the most successful was the German ‘Verein für Raumschiffarth’ (created July 5, 1927) which counted among its members such names as Hermann Oberth (1894-1989), another of the three recognised fathers of space-flight, and Wernher von Braun, who played an all-important role in the development of the German V2 rocket bombs used to attack England during World War II, and which formed the fundament for the US rocket program after the war. The last of the three fathers of space-flight was the Russian Konstantin Tsiolkowsky (1857-1967) whose contribution to the Russian space program cannot be underestimated.(5)
In Germany, Wernher von Braun was the first of the rocket pioneers from the ‘Verein für Raumschiffarth’ (VfR) to be hired by the German Army. This happened around October or November 1932 and as the development of rockets was not covered by the Versailles Peace Treaty arms limitations from June 1919 led to the Germans having a very highly developed rocket program, which was continued by the allies after the end of WW II. (6)
When the Peenemünde facility was established in 1937 several more from the VfR were included in this secret German weapons program, which led to the development of the feared V-2 rocket bomb. Thus were the skills and energy of von Braun and his compatriots turned away from the conquest of Space, into the development of weapons. During the war years, it was dangerous for von Braun and his associates to talk about their dreams of sending men to the Moon. Hitler wanted weapons, not fantasies!
Nonetheless, paradoxically perhaps, it was the Second World War that changed the future and development of the rocket and created the environment which brought the fulfilment of mankind’s ancient dream, to travel to and amongst the stars, closer.
In the U.S.A. the Jet
Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) was established in 1943. It became one of the most significant
contributors to the development of the U.S. rocket program (7), while back in 1915, the
National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA), another major factor in U.S.
aerodynamics and rocketry, had been created. (8) The latter developed from being purely an
advisory organ, through being a serious and competent aeronautical and aerodynamics
research organisation, to become a key player in American aviation. During World War I and
in the years that followed, the main focus was on research in aerodynamics. Later on, the
development and testing of supersonic aircraft took over and on October 14, 1947 the X-1,
piloted by Chuck Yeager (then a test pilot for the Air Force and NACA), broke the sound
barrier for the first time. (9)
During the final stages of the war Soviet and American soldiers were hunting for the brain pool of the dying NAZI Empire. Both the USA and the USSR were fully aware of the potential of these scientists. They were considered essential war booty and, with the Cold War was looming in the not too distant future, both superpowers were in a hurry to capture as many of the coveted prizes as possible before the other.
The border separating the Soviet controlled parts of Germany from the Allied sectors put the Peenemünde facility in communist controlled territory and the scientists were split in two groups. Wernher von Braun and some 100-150 of the leading scientists and engineers fled to the U.S. controlled zones, while most of the rest were rounded up by the Soviet forces because they lived in the Soviet zone. Finally the Americans managed to ‘steal’ about 100 V-2 rockets and blueprints from a facility at Kohnstein Mountain, later was surrendered to Soviet control, which caused a series of strong but futile protests from the Soviet government.
What came as a total chock for the Americans was that the Germans had been up to 25 years ahead technologically of anything that the Americans could produce – due to the personalities of those engaged in the programs and differences in state support where the Germans had utilised the lack of limitations imposed by the Versailles Treaty on rocketry. The Versailles Treaty did not include rocketry for the simple reason that rocketry was not developed well enough for it to be any threat against anybody in 1919 ... artillery was more efficient. (10)
With the capture of Wernher von Braun and the other rocket scientists, USA rocket technology could take a quantum leap into the Space Era. This was catalysed by the competition against the communist Soviet Union and would probably have been unthinkable without the Cold War. As General H. H. Arnold, commander of the U.S. Army Air Forces, concluded, the warning time before an attack hit home would leave no time for mobilisation, rearming, training, because of nuclear weapons and jet aircraft. (11) The United States could not again afford an intelligence failure like the one at Pearl Harbour … thus ".. continuos knowledge of potential enemies" including their "political, social, industrial, scientific and military life" would be necessary "to provide warning of impending danger." (12) So, despite protests against the Germans made by some Americans, the decision was made to keep them in the country. One major reason was to prevent them from falling into Soviet hands. And in March 1947 President Truman spoke to a joint session of Congress, guaranteeing U.S. intervention against Communist aggression - armed, political, or propaganda - anywhere in the world; the birth of the Truman Doctrine. (13)
General H. H. Arnold was also the man behind Project RAND, which, as an independent consultant group, was to perform operations research and to provide advice. (14) Changes of the military structure in the U.S. Armed Forces, resulted in the concentration of the study of the use of military satellites to RAND, Santa Monica, California. In 1948 it reformed into The Rand Corporation, a non-profit advisory group. The Rand Corporation attracted a host of intelligent scientists and other able individuals, and was a very important factor in the formation of the early U.S. space policy, and in development of the first U.S. satellite programs, in particular defining them as observation platforms.(15)
Wernher von Braun and the other German rocket scientists came to White Sands Proving Grounds, New Mexico, the place where the V-2 program would continue under U.S. auspices. The plan was to fire a rocket every second month, with the aim of gaining experience in handling and firing huge missiles, obtaining information for the design of longer-range, and more sophisticated missiles, gain ballistics data for building ground equipment to track trajectories and to research the upper atmosphere. (16)
In October 1946 all through Eastern Germany, the Soviet occupation forces executed Operation Osvakim - a carefully orchestrated operation to kidnap some 20,000 Germans, technicians, scientists, and other able individuals, and their families. These were to be brought to the Soviet Union, to contribute with their knowledge and skills. Amongst these 20,000 were hundreds of missile experts, who were given the option to aid in the development of the Soviet rocket program or a bullet in the head. The choice was easy! (17)
While the armed services in Pentagon vied for the control of the development and deployment of guided missiles during 1946 and 1947, the Soviet leadership had clear aims. The German scientists doing missile research, and testing (on captured V-2’s) had much better conditions for their work. As such they achieved impressive results and were able to modify and improve the V-2 to a much greater extent than either von Braun’s team (working under U.S. Army auspices) or the competing U.S. Navy/Air Force programs, something which only slowly was recognised by the American leadership.
Wernher von Braun warned against the danger of a Soviet triumph in the space race and that the Peenemünde team had the capability to build missiles much larger and more powerful than the V-2.
When the Soviets
detonated their first nuclear bomb in 1949, and intelligence rumours reported gigantic
improvements in missile development, the firing range at Cape Canaveral was established,
thus increasing the test firing range from 120 miles to 5000 miles. Furthermore the
Germans, now aspiring to U.S. citizenship, were transferred to Huntsville, northern
Alabama (April 1, 1950). On June 25, 1950, North Korean Communist troops, armed with
Soviet built tanks and weapons, attacked South Korea, leading to the direct involvement of
U.S. troops in the American battle - against the Communist aggression, and thus
reinforcing the fears of the American administration. The Cold War became warmer. (18)
Lack of trust, direct fear of aggression, the Soviets detonating an atomic bomb in 1949, the Korean surprise conflict (beginning June 1950), and the development of the thermonuclear devices (1952-4) made it clear to the leadership of the nation, both government, civilian and military, that the key to future warfare was information.
At the Huntsville facility, research was concentrated on developing missiles to launch large bombs. Despite this, Wernher von Braun still had harboured visions about manned space flights, visions that led him to criticise efforts made by the administration. (19) He argued that the development of a satellite vehicle was unthinkable as a by-product of the present development programs in the fields of guided missiles and that a co-ordinated space program was urgently necessary.
In the media von Braun was one of the authors of a series of articles, appearing in Colliers between 1952 and 1954, that exposed the American public to the details of space exploration and pushed for further an expansion of the space program in light of the threat from the Soviet Union. (20) Amongst other things, von Braun wrote: "…it is an urgent warning that the U.S. must immediately embark on a long-range development program to secure for the West "space superiority". If we do not, somebody else will. That somebody else very probably would be the Soviet Union". (21) And : "Because of the telescopic eyes and the cameras of the space station, it will be almost impossible for any nation to hide warlike preparations for any length of time." This latter commentary foresaw where the emphasis would lie in the Eisenhower years in the development of the first American satellite. (22)
The Air Force was assigned responsibility for long-range strategic missiles including ICBMs (21/3-1950). A few weeks later the Research and Development Board vested jurisdiction for military satellites to the Air Force as well, which led the USAF to direct RAND to complete studies of a military Earth satellite. In April 1951 the RAND report "encouraged Air Force Leaders to believe that directed periodic observation of the Soviet Union might soon be conducted from extremely high altitudes." (23) This led to the formation of the Beacon Hill (BH) study group (early 1952) with its final report being delivered in June 1952. The report gave recommendations for specific improvements in orientation, emphasis and assigned priorities to strategic intelligence. It also recommended solutions for collection of such and its use and finally suggested a refinement of sensors where improved sensors were to be flown near to Soviet territory in various vehicles not including space satellites. All such vehicles would require political approval at the highest level. The report only mentions space satellites fleetingly, mainly for being vehicles for the future, but they however were identified as having to over-fly Soviet territory. (24)
At the same time, various companies under contract to RAND, were designing and examining specific satellite equipment. Collectively known as Project Feed Back (March 1954) it confirmed that automated satellites could be built without undue delay and at an affordable cost. The legal ramifications concerning flight in outer space were discussed and, in September 1953, RAND officials advised that a satellite be built. (25)
When Eisenhower took over the presidency in 1953, the fear mirrored by von Braun (as previously mentioned), came to dominate his policies concerning disarmament and relations with the Soviet Union for the next 8 years. (26) The immediate problem was far too little information and the very limited possibilities of intelligence gathering. The only way to avoid the cost of another Pearl Harbour was aerial reconnaissance as Eisenhower knew from his experiences in World War II. Therefore the USA began intelligence gathering missions by plane over the border regions in the early 1950s (under auspices of the Strategic Air Command). (27). But using flights over border regions provided only limited intelligence results as they were limited to gathering information on border defence installations and near border manoeuvres so new means of data acquisition were sought. Balloons, never very controllable (28), were used only between January 1956 and February 1956. The over-flying of Soviet territory by these balloons, which violated recognised Soviet national sovereignty, had very limited intelligence results (the cameras based in the balloons could not discern between a peaceful forest and a tank factory) and, as a result, were terminated by the president. (29) Five months later Eisenhower approved the first U-2 flight over the USSR though these were a violation of the recognised Soviet border. In the spring of 1955 the administration determined that a policy of keeping outer space open to all, where the space craft of any state should be able to over-fly any and all states, should be pursued – so a "freedom of space" policy (later known as the "Open Skies" doctrine) was approved. This favoured operations of a peaceful scientific character, like the projects proposed by civilian scientists as contribution to the International Geophysical Year (IGY), July 1957 - December 1958. (30) As a result of this, the White House, July 1955, revealed plans for launching a "..small unmanned Earth circling satellites as part of the U.S. participation in the IGY". (31) The Soviets also announced their intention to launch a satellite as part of the IGY making the launches into a very real race between two opposing systems, where the first to place a man-made satellite in orbit, being the one showing that theirs was the most technologically advanced nation in the world - a media coup of political and psychologically vast importance. (32)
A few months after the appearance of the RAND Feed Back Report, the Air Force had acted on the recommendations in the report. Studies of a military satellite were begun November 1954, and the construction of military observation satellites was approved in March 1955 by USAF. (33) In April 1955 the Naval Research Laboratory submitted to the Defence Department a ‘Scientific Satellite Program’ for the IGY, eventually known as Vanguard. Meanwhile the Army’s Redstone rocket team led by Major General John B. Medaris and Wener von Braun had for some months (since September 1954) urged a small inert Earth satellite launched with the Jupiter IRBM (34), called Project Orbiter (later named Explorer). (35) For various reasons it was decided to launch the all-American Vanguard, although von Braun predicted that it would go down in American history as a fateful wrong decision, that would ensure that the Soviets would be the first to reach space. (36) And in July 1957 the Defence Department issued sharp spending limits for the Jupiter project, effectively reducing it to the "study level." (37)
Vanguard was still not
operational, when the Soviets launched their Sputnik I. This had a devastating and
demoralising effect on the American public to an extent that surprised Eisenhower and his
staff. Not only had the Soviet Union, ideologically opposed to the free world, and thus
supposed to be an inferior political system, beaten the Americans to be the first to
launch a satellite - thus shattering the American certainty that the nation was always
number one in technology. But ominous military implications lay in the fact, that the
first Vanguard, still not launched, weighed 3 pounds while Sputnik I weighed 183 pounds
(83.6 kg). (38) When Sputnik II was launched, less than a month after the launch of
Sputnik I (and about one month before the launching of the first American satellite) it
caused even more grave concern, as it not only weighed some 1100 pounds (still compared to
the Vanguard satellite’s 3 pounds!), but also carried the first living being from
Earth to reach outer space, namely the dog Laika. This concern was confirmed on December
6, when the much expected, both by media and the public, first launching of an American
satellite ended in a fireball after only 3 feet. What was supposed to be the redemption of
the superiority of American technology had become a devastating failure, and a media
catastrophe. (39) After this disaster, Project Orbiter, now known as Explorer I, was
launched successfully on January 1958, as the first American satellite.
The ‘Pearl Harbour’ effect of Sputnik I and II on the
American public made it necessary to include the issues of national pride and
international prestige in space affairs. So far Eisenhower’s administration had
underestimated the dramatic psychological value of satellites, which was one of the
reasons, why the space program had been given low priority. (40) So the importance of the space program
changed, and the administration now moved quickly to restore confidence at home and
prestige abroad. The Defence Department authorised the Army, with Project Orbiter, to
launch a scientific satellite as a backup to the National Foundation-Navy Vanguard
Project. More funds were made available to the military space program, and in early 1958
the administration approved launching these satellites sooner with Thor IRBM boosters,
just as space vehicles was to "provide a closer look at the moon". (41)
The undeniable public concern with Soviet leadership in outer space exploration, caused Eisenhower to declare, on April 2nd 1958, that a unified national space agency must be established. (42) These plans, drafted in January-February 1958, led to the National Aeronautics and Space Act of 1958 (October 1st 1958) which created the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). (43) Built on the foundations of NACA, most of the other rocket research organisations (including military) and combining a series of research and development centres around the United States NASA inherited their on-going projects like the scientific satellite and planetary exploration. (44)
The National Aeronautics and Space Act of 1958 was "To provide for research into problems of flight within and outside the earth’s atmosphere, and for other purposes." (45) The part of the Act which is the ‘Declaration of Policy and Purpose’ states, that ".. it is the policy of the United States that activities in space should be devoted to peaceful purposes for the benefit of all mankind." (46) Furthermore "… provision be made for aeronautical and space activities ….. such activities shall be the responsibility of, and shall be directed by a civilian agency exercising control over aeronautical and space activities sponsored by the United States … " except for strictly military projects, which should be under auspices of the Department of Defence. (47)
The aims of these activities included several objectives (48):
While most of the first two years were filled with an intense planning, organisation and build up for the challenges which would lie in the near future the Mercury project was established a week or so after the formation of NASA, under the responsibility of The Space Task Group created for this purpose. (49)
The first 7 astronauts
for the Mercury Project were chosen in 1960 with first launch May 5th 1961 (Allan Shepard,
in a 15 minute ballistic shot), the second February 20 1962 (the first American is
launched: John Glenn) followed by further 3 manned launches and ending with Gordon Cooper,
May 15-16, 1963.). These 7, The First Seven, became part of American folklore and seen in
the film The Right Stuff. Besides NACA, NASA took over the Vanguard Project from the Navy,
lunar probes from the Army and Air Force, rocket engine programs from the Air Force, the
Jet Propulsion Lab, the Huntsville facilities and people (in 1960), including Wernher von
Braun, and the other Germans.
John F. Kennedy was elected president in the 1960-election with the vice-president being Lyndon B. Johnson, one of the foremost spokesmen in favour of the space program. (50) During the election campaign, Kennedy accused the Eisenhower administration of doing nothing to solve a plethora of different problems, amongst other things the ‘missile gap’, which was claimed to exist between the U.S. and the Soviet Union where the Soviets allegedly were ahead of the U.S.A. in ICBM technology. (51) Without being enthusiastic about the exploration of space per se Kennedy, a shrewd politician, nevertheless saw the political gains, and conversely the political losses, which could result from victories and defeats in the space race against the Soviet Union where national prestige could suffer and thus severely influence the position of the United States in the international arena. (52) So, while preparing to take office in late 1960, he appointed Jerome B. Wiesner of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology to head an ad hoc committee that should offer suggestions to possible directions the American space program could take. (53). The Wiesner Report stressed the national security aspects, through ICBMs and reconnaissance satellites. (54) It examined the current state of the American space program and NASA in the light of Soviet accomplishments and the realisation that Soviet rocket capacity and booster capability would make it highly unlikely, that USA would be the first to put a man in space. Wiesner even warned that ".. a crash program aimed at placing a man into an orbit at the earliest possible time cannot be justified solely on scientific or technical grounds. Indeed, it may hinder the development of our scientific and technical program even the … future manned space program by diverting manpower, vehicles and funds." (55) At the same time Wiesner began the report with the words "First, there is the factor of national prestige. Space exploration and exploits have captured the imagination of the peoples of the world. During the next few years the prestige of the United States will in part be determined by the leadership we demonstrate in space activities." (56). The report recommended that "[a] thorough and impartial appraisal of the MERCURY program should be urgently made. ……. If our present man-in-space program … appears unsound, we must be prepared to modify it drastically or even to cancel it.". (57) Instead Wiesner stressed the positive sides of scientific and communication satellites places where gains and results had already been achieved. (58)
When James E. Webb, NASA Administrator 1961-1968 (b.1906-d.1992), submitted a request to the president-elect in March 1961 greatly expanding the NASA budget for 1962 with the aim to permit a Moon landing before the end of the decade Kennedy’s "..essential unwillingness to commit to an aggressive space program …." is evidenced. (59) Instead a modest increase in the budget was approved.
Two important international events happened to change this. The first
was on April 12, 1961, when
Soviet cosmonaut
Yuri Gagarin became the first human to enter space, with a one-orbit mission in Vostok I.
The second was the disaster of the Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba between April 15 and April
19, 1961. (60) Furthermore when Alan Shepard became the first American in space some 3
weeks after Gagarin, on May 5 1961, a comparison between the space programs of the two
super powers fell out to the advantage of the Soviet union. Gagarin had completed one
orbit, and been weightless in 89 minutes, while Shepard only had been in the top of a
missile, conducting a ballistic curve, being weightless for only 5 minutes. The Vostok I
weighed more than 10,000 pounds, while the American Freedom 7 Mercury spacecraft weighed
only 2,100 pounds. (61)
These Soviet successes and the apparent booster and technological gap
to the Soviets, prompted Kennedy in a memorandum to vice President Johnson, April 20, to
ask "Do we have a chance of beating the Soviets by putting a laboratory in space, or
by a trip around the moon, or by a rocket to land on the moon, or by a rocket to go to the
moon and back with a man. Is there any other outer space program 
which promises
dramatic results in which we could win?" (62) Johnson concluded that
"…other nations .... will tend to align themselves with the country which they
believe will be the world leader – the winner in the long run. Dramatic
accomplishments in space are being increasingly identified as a major indicator of world
leadership." (63) Furthermore Johnson advised that ".... the United States could
conceivably be first in those two accomplishments [in circumnavigation of the moon and in
a manned trip to the moon, the latter by 1967 or 1968]"(64) Johnson also stressed the
need for increased funding if the work was to be speeded up. (65) This resulted in the
up-scaling of the ambitions of the Apollo Program (already underway in
small scale as a
follow-up to the Mercury program, July 1960), which is unveiled in Kennedy’s speech
May 25, 1961, announcing the decision to go to the Moon. "If we are to win the battle
that is going on around the world between freedom and tyranny, if we are to win the battle
for men’s minds, the dramatic achievements in space which occurred in recent weeks
should make clear to us all, as did the Sputnik in 1957, the impact of this adventure on
the minds of men everywhere who are attempting to make a determination of which road they
should take …. We go into space because whatever mankind must undertake, free men
must fully share….. I believe this Nation should commit itself to achieving the goal,
before this decade is out, of landing a man on the moon and returning him safely to earth.
No single space project in this period will be more impressive to mankind, or more
important for the long-range exploration of space; and none will be so difficult or
expensive to accomplish." (66)
Thus the Space Race was initiated.
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