Did Kennedy hamper space travel with his Go to the Moon Speach?
- Thread starter valkyrie013
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Not exactly a cancellation of Apollo. Rather, he proposed that the United States and the Soviet Union jointly develop a moon program. Khrushchev dismissed the idea, then had second thoughts, but by then it was too late.
There really wasn't a race to the Moon, per se. The Russians began developing a Moon program when they realized that, "Oh, shit, the Americans are really planning on going to the Moon" around 1966, but they were so far behind at that point that, even if they'd gotten all the kinks in the N-1 worked out, it would've been about 1973 before they could have had anyone on the Moon. Whether they would have gotten anyone back from the moon, on the other hand...
2 billion people tuned into the agonized last moments of a purposefully sacrificed man would have been the permanent end of any space program.
That scenario made it into book form as well.
https://www.amazon.com/Red-Moon-David-S-Michaels/dp/0979692946
Great read, by the way.
Well, the US version was land and resupply (dismissEd pretry sharply by NASA and shown rather tongue-in-cheek in From the Earth to the Moon).
Some of the rival Soviet design bureaus might have suggested it, spinning it as "Great personal sacrifice for the wider interests of the state".
Oh, read that years ago now I look.
SpaceX is about bringing space to the masses. Apollo was about leading masses to space--employment..interest.
Some lament the Saturns of Apollo 18-20 being entombed within Butler buildings and surrounded by snot-nosed kids--but I take a different view. Their true mission is to lie in repose--as a buddha, the echoing voices of CAPCOM--their shamen. They are there to inspire---to have the young look up...and dream.
Star-hopper? That was a flying clubhouse
Some lament the Saturns of Apollo 18-20 being entombed within Butler buildings and surrounded by snot-nosed kids--but I take a different view. Their true mission is to lie in repose--as a buddha, the echoing voices of CAPCOM--their shamen. They are there to inspire---to have the young look up...and dream.
Star-hopper? That was a flying clubhouse
I think as a burgeoning species we've started to learn a few things, some of which could have been learned faster. Simple is better than complicated. Re-use when its economically viable. Don't give up the high frontier. It's harder to start over again.SpaceX is about bringing space to the masses. Apollo was about leading masses to space--employment..interest.
Some lament the Saturns of Apollo 18-20 being entombed within Butler buildings and surrounded by snot-nosed kids--but I take a different view. Their true mission is to lie in repose--as a buddha, the echoing voices of CAPCOM--their shamen. They are there to inspire---to have the young look up...and dream.
Star-hopper? That was a flying clubhouse
One thing we haven't learned to deal with is loss. There haven't been many people to die going to or from space, and there should have been a lot more by now. At some point, it must become a tragedy we dislike and do our best within reason to prevent, but accept in small doses.
An interesting article
https://www.americaspace.com/2019/09/17/artemis-updates-2019-09-17/
https://www.americaspace.com/2019/09/17/artemis-updates-2019-09-17/
The moon is probably mankind's greatest achievement.
The only thing that was wrong was the USA and Russia giving up once the USA got there. The Apollo program should of continued with more cooperation with the soyuz and gone for a joint US and Russia moon base.
The mistake was NASA and the US goverment obsession with public intrest and giving up on moon landing when the public lost intrest.
The secound biggest mistake was the shuttle. Decades and billions where wasted on that Overenginnered, over complicated death trap and is a prime example of why politics should not dictate the design of a spacecraft.
The dream of what the shuttle was supposed to be was not a bad idea, rapid turnaround, reusability, but the way it was done was wrong, and perhaps the goals were too soon. It was certainly more complicated than it needed to be.
But for all that, the shuttle saved America's crewed space program. It was the only thing Nixon would sign off on.It continued to reuse the old launch and processing architecture, and those buildings and launch pads are now in use by SpaceX and Artemis. The standing army that was required to keep STS going did lead to a large experienced workforce many of whom are still working in the private sector.
Losing heavy lift required multiple launches and multiple EVAs to build the ISS. Maybe we know more about building in orbit than we might have otherwise. I am looking for very thin silver linings. I think it's a damn shame we gave up the moon, but it's still beckoning, and its still the best place to learn to operate and live long-term on another world.
Agreed.
Speaking of Nixon...
https://gizmodo.com/deepfake-art-project-reimagines-nixon-s-speech-had-apol-1840049001
Speaking of Nixon...
https://gizmodo.com/deepfake-art-project-reimagines-nixon-s-speech-had-apol-1840049001
No, Kennedy did not hamper space travel with his Go to the Moon Speach [sic].
As a proof of concept, the Apollo program will be forever invaluable.
As a proof of concept, the Apollo program will be forever invaluable.
In short, no. t think Kennedy's speech did the exact opposite, it gave the US a great reason to get it's act together, come together and accomplish something. I think that the real reason we got to the moon was because it was war - it was political, the USA was trying to beat Russia. So it got the funding and personnel it needed. Neil deGrasse Tyson talks about this subject here:
Basically, large projects get funded for three reasons - war/defense, praise for a deity (or royalty pre 1900), promise of economic return. No one wants to fund an expensive project like going to the moon - it has a great risk of failure and risk of death, is not done for some god, and it doesn't make any money, at least not any concrete, clear in the here and now. However the cold war provided the incentive. After that died down, so did the space program, which became very heavy and bloated. It is only now that private companies are having success, partially because they are more streamlined and have more clear cut financial goals.
The GAO's report on NASA's Moon missions of the future:
https://www.gao.gov/assets/710/703432.pdf
https://www.gao.gov/assets/710/703432.pdf
Degrasse is correct.
Space flight especially personnel flight, is too expensive, and not really anything that most people care about.
How ever the American government has committed to at least going to the moon. But I don't think it is a long term goal, or going to Mars sometime after, it is too much money.
As for private companies they need to make a profit to eventually keep continuing.
Space flight especially personnel flight, is too expensive, and not really anything that most people care about.
How ever the American government has committed to at least going to the moon. But I don't think it is a long term goal, or going to Mars sometime after, it is too much money.
As for private companies they need to make a profit to eventually keep continuing.
The problem wasn't Kennedy, it was the Soviets. Everything the US was doing was in tandem with the Soviets; to upstage them if need be. The Soviets didn't show up for prom. Their N1 went down a different route; I believe it could had been forced to achieving a landing (but little else), but the way they engineered the thing, it couldn't work. I think Korolev was going for a more simple design but he died; and his opponent/successor was deadset on a particular set of fuels and stages so we got the four dead N1s. I'll have to reread the books on Korolev and the Soviet programme but I think that's the gist.
So the Americans go to the Moon, the Soviets WANT to go to the Moon and even beyond but can't get a super-heavy ready enough to do that, so they continue with their space station programs, the US follows - we get Saylut, Almaz, Skylab and MIR. Skylab is abandoned, the shuttle basically functions as a 'ad-hoc' station whenever the lab was shoved into the cargo bay, it peeters out.
If the Soviets even launched a man on one of their proposed Venus flybys or even a Mars landing, the US would had followed, just to up them. But they didn't. So the US felt no real need, saw no danger, in going beyond LEO, because that's where the Soviet guys are. Everything else was probes, flybys, landers, rovers; the Americans could do that no sweat.
If the Soviets stood around a bit or reformed, kept the Buran, pushed for their own set of missions, the Americans again would had followed. In a way we're still seeing this today - a lot of investment and development going into the Space Vehicle industry because we're stuck with Soyuz and Ares didn't take off, and so we got the SLS and SpaceX and Boeing stepping up to the plate. And the Soviets have been replaced with the Chinese who have a lot to show off from doing big, frivolous things, such as landing on the Moon - and so again the Americans will follow/upstage them. If neither of those things were around today, space would be a much more hoo-hum and quiet field.
So the Americans go to the Moon, the Soviets WANT to go to the Moon and even beyond but can't get a super-heavy ready enough to do that, so they continue with their space station programs, the US follows - we get Saylut, Almaz, Skylab and MIR. Skylab is abandoned, the shuttle basically functions as a 'ad-hoc' station whenever the lab was shoved into the cargo bay, it peeters out.
If the Soviets even launched a man on one of their proposed Venus flybys or even a Mars landing, the US would had followed, just to up them. But they didn't. So the US felt no real need, saw no danger, in going beyond LEO, because that's where the Soviet guys are. Everything else was probes, flybys, landers, rovers; the Americans could do that no sweat.
If the Soviets stood around a bit or reformed, kept the Buran, pushed for their own set of missions, the Americans again would had followed. In a way we're still seeing this today - a lot of investment and development going into the Space Vehicle industry because we're stuck with Soyuz and Ares didn't take off, and so we got the SLS and SpaceX and Boeing stepping up to the plate. And the Soviets have been replaced with the Chinese who have a lot to show off from doing big, frivolous things, such as landing on the Moon - and so again the Americans will follow/upstage them. If neither of those things were around today, space would be a much more hoo-hum and quiet field.
The problem with the N1 (I have a model on my window shelf) was that it used old technology: 20 engines in the first stage.
The mark two version, with fewer more powerful engines, would probadly have worked, but that was in 74, by which time the propaganda argument said "Scrap it, pretend it never existed".
FWIW, Korolev was succeeded by his deputy, but when the N1 failed he was replaced by one of Korolev's rivals, who then cancelled all the succession projects in favour of his own proposals.
The mark two version, with fewer more powerful engines, would probadly have worked, but that was in 74, by which time the propaganda argument said "Scrap it, pretend it never existed".
FWIW, Korolev was succeeded by his deputy, but when the N1 failed he was replaced by one of Korolev's rivals, who then cancelled all the succession projects in favour of his own proposals.
To play Devil's Advocate: maybe if Kennedy said 'within twenty years', gave Apollo more breathing room and gave the Russians time to kink out their problems, and thus have more of a horse in the race, overall, we might have had a longer Space Race with longer results.
Kennedy's speech proved, without a doubt, that if we want to, we can do great things. But this is the nation that went across a continent within fifty odd years, and produced enough materiel to keep the allies afloat in two world wars...maybe a 'decade' sounds better, but there were already reports from Von Braun and the BIS and other 'learned' agencies that affirmed it could had been done anyway.
So from that angle I can concede that the Kennedy speech did have a bad effect in that regard: we beat the Soviets, Soviets were both in a rush and didn't really care, Soviets went home - leaving America alone in the ballpit, so America went home.
Kennedy's speech proved, without a doubt, that if we want to, we can do great things. But this is the nation that went across a continent within fifty odd years, and produced enough materiel to keep the allies afloat in two world wars...maybe a 'decade' sounds better, but there were already reports from Von Braun and the BIS and other 'learned' agencies that affirmed it could had been done anyway.
So from that angle I can concede that the Kennedy speech did have a bad effect in that regard: we beat the Soviets, Soviets were both in a rush and didn't really care, Soviets went home - leaving America alone in the ballpit, so America went home.
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