The Space Race, Harrison Linsey

The U.S. and Soviet Space Race;
Friendly scientific competition, or fierce political battle?


The race to space, although commonly associated with the Cold War bout between the United States and the Soviet Union, can be traced back even farther into history. In 1919, France, Britain, Germany, and the United States signed the treaty of Versailles (Schefter 1999). This temporarily stopped the conflict, and effectively ended World War I, however the fighting officially stopped in 1918 (historylearningsite 2000-2010). France, Britain, and the United States all wanted Germany to be weakened, and disarmed; stopping Hitler from achieving his goal of world domination. Despite these intentions, a compromise had to be attained, and this involved Germany remaining the powerful country it was. This may be considered the event that sparked the Space Race, because it allowed Germany to remain armed. Germany’s research of rocket propulsion greatly contributed to the growing arms race to come (Caidin 1963).
Thus, World War I was ended. Despite this fact, Germany’s ever-potent power led into a second world war from 1939-1945. One condition of the Treaty of Versailles was the abolishment of the long-range cannon. These deadly weapons proved too dangerous for warfare, and were therefore prohibited. This sparked the need for new means of long-range artillery weapons, and as a result, Germany began investing much time and means into rocket research (Heppenheimer 1997).
As rocket technology quickly developed from necessity, it quickly spread to surrounding European countries, and later, worldwide. The world was changing rapidly and greatly, and advancements in arms and weaponry really played a role in power. Many countries were making huge leaps in military technology, however Russia and the United States were really the forefront of a global arms race (Heppenheimer 1997). Machine guns, tanks, planes, and artillery were being improved time after time, and Capitalism was juxtaposed with Communism regularly.
Along came the Cold War between the United States and the U.S.S.R. The two countries fought a series of proxy wars in other countries. Each intervened and supported one side of a country’s civil war. Disguised as supporting another country, the real purpose of these wars was for the U.S. and U.S.S.R. to fight each other with minimal casualties of their own. In similar conduct to the proxy wars, the space race became a heated competition between the United States and U.S.S.R. As the goals became more and more intensive, some viewed this as a friendly scientific competition. The question is, was the Space Race another pseudo-proxy war? Was the purpose of the competition to battle between Democracy and Communism? Or a proxy for the arms race between the U.S.S.R. and the U.S?
As part of this project, I interviewed two of my Russian cousins, who lived in Kiev, Ukraine, throughout the span of the Space Race (1957-1975). Both, now married, remarked about the, to my surprise, friendly feeling towards the United States that was present in the Soviet media at the time. These findings greatly surprised me, as the viewpoint in the United States was surely of a more competitive nature. In addition, they commented on how this sort of scientific competition was “healthy” and “for the greater good”. They also mentioned how Sputnik, the first vessel to reach space (Soviet’s) gave the U.S.S.R. a great sense of pride. Sputnik was the first vessel to orbit the earth, and the Soviets viewed this as a nationalistic victory (Brzezinski 2007).
The story is very different in the United States, I discovered as I interviewed my mother. She described the accuracy and trust in the news that the American people had. News reporters, such as Walter Cronkite, renowned in their time, were watched and listened to every day by the American people. Many sources of media were easily accessible, in stark contrast to the Soviet Union’s. The Space Race was also viewed as a healthy competition in America, however there was an element of fear and disgust of the Soviet’s communism. Political leaders of both countries began to get involved with the struggle as well.
John F. Kennedy, president of the United States, announced the goal of a man walking on the moon. After his sudden and shocking death, Lyndon B. Johnson, Kennedy’s vice president and, after his death, the new president, dedicated large sums of money to the funding of America’s space program (Siddiqi 1974). The struggle between these two nations was beneficial to the improvements in space travel and exploration as well as advancements in military weaponry and arms. In addition, this Race to Space bears an uncanny resemblance to the pervading Cold War at the time, and its conflicts involving the United States and the U.S.S.R.


Interviews:


Lev:

Q: Where were you living from 1957-1975?
A: I was living in Kiev, Ukraine. I was working very hard at a factory that produced household radios for most of those years. This was after I had graduated college, and was expected to have a job. My parents and most of the rest of my family was also living in Kiev at the time, or neighboring towns, but all of them were in Ukraine.
Q: What did you hear of the Space Race?
A: There was a lot of news about the race with the United States. What may surprise you is that we had only one source of information; the government. Sure, we could listen to the radio, read the paper, watch television (in the later years of the Space Race), however all of what we saw and heard came directly from the government.
Q: Did many people question the validity of this news?
A: No. Not very much. Everybody understood where their news was coming from, however everybody just accepted this as normal, and thought nothing of it. We never knew anything different than this, and so it was alright. Much different than here in America.
Q: What was the general attitude about the space race, and towards the U.S.?
A: There were no feelings of anger or hate, or anything like that, really. Most of the news we heard was of the competition, and purely that. We all knew that there was a competition going on, but we were more interested in the great things that were happening. I remember when Russia won the race. When we successfully delivered the first person to space. That was a good day, everybody was happy.
Q: What about the Cold War? Did this have any relation?
A: No. The Space Race was not political for us at all. We did hear about some government people trying to make the space competition into some sort of political dispute, but it really was not. Remember, the U.S.S.R. was made up of many, many countries. I cannot speak for all of the others, but I can speak for my personal experience.
Q: Have you heard of M.A.D.?
A: Yes. I believe very strongly in mutually assured destruction. Russia and the U.S. were just trying to over power each other. Both countries kept building more powerful weapons, and we were scared for out lives. But even the space race was only part of the arms race.

Alla:

Q: Where were you living from the years 1957-1975?
A: I, like Lev who you already spoke with, lived in Kiev, Ukraine. This was a busy time for me. During the earlier of this time, I was still in college, and I was married in 1968, and we had our first son in 1969. I graduated college in ’72 and as you can see I had a lot on my plate. School, a husband, and a child were a lot to handle. When I wasn’t in college, I was working most of the time.
Q: What about your family?
A: My family was very mobile, which was odd for most people. My dad was in the Soviet military, and therefore, we had to travel wherever he went (we being Alla and her mother). For the years when I was in school, I had a very hard time. As you already know, my family moved sometimes a few times a year. Very often. I was in school, and then would immediately have to transfer to another school in another country in the Soviet Union. As you can probably imagine, this was very hard on me, as there were so many countries that were part of the former Soviet Union, each with their own schooling systems. Some countries required English, and some didn’t. I had a very hard time keeping up in general. One time, my father was sent to the Far East, still in the U.S.S.R., but very far away. During this short timeframe, I felt very lonely and isolated.
Q: What did you hear of the Space Race?
A: Surprisingly, we didn’t hear very much. There was really only one way for my family to get the news. That was through the newspaper. We didn’t have a radio, or we did, and never used it. My family was very proud when the U.S.S.R. sent the first astronaut into outer space. We always thought we were the best. We didn’t hate the United States, though. We just had fun with the competition, where the real goal was advancing medical and scientific knowledge.

Janis Traven:

Q: Where were you living and working from 1957-1975?
A: I was mostly living in Cherry Hill, NJ. Most of my family lived there as well, and it was only until college that I left. Also, I spent some time living in Atlanta for work.
Q: What did you hear of the Space Race?
A: We were very proud when the U.S. made some advancement. We really got the play-by-play from the media, and our favorite news anchor to watch and listen to was definitely Walter Cronkite. My father was a doctor, and also very interested in science. He would always marvel to me and my two brothers about how America had changed during his time. He could not believe that a man was now walking on the moon. Even more than American changed during my father’s lifetime was my great uncle Abe. When he was a boy, there were still horses and buggies driving around New York City, and he got the opportunity to see a man walk on the moon. How amazing that would be.
Q: What was the general attitude about the Space Race and the U.S.S.R.?
A: Well you must realize that I had a large part of my family living in the U.S.S.R. at the time. Although some Americans really hated the Soviets, we couldn’t really let ourselves fall into that lull. There was very little contact with our Russian cousins, however we knew they were there, and couldn’t have very hard feelings against them.
Q: What else was notable during this time period in your childhood?
A: I remember that we would have nuclear bombing drills in my classes during school. These kept us in constant fear of the Communists, and what they were capable of. We were told to hide under our desks, as if that would have helped in the slightest. This gave the opinion of the conflict between the U.S. and the U.S.S.R. Also the conflict between capitalism and communism. Overall it was a very interesting time period in my, however my family did not feel any hatred whatsoever towards the U.S.S.R. The Space Race was more healthy and productive competition than an


Reflections:

1. Alla and Lev are my second cousins, once removed. They moved to the United States from Kiev a little bit more than ten years ago, and are fluent in English, as well as Russian. As they live in Seattle, I spend quite a bit of time around them, and that definitely contributed to my comfort during the interviews. Both are amazingly kind people, and generous with their time. They seemed overjoyed to talk to me about their lives, and I learned some very interesting information. One setback, during the interviews, was their accent. Both have very heavy Russian accents when they speak, and this made it somewhat hard to understand the names of people, and things. Other than this minor road bump, the interviews went very well. My mother, of course was extremely easy to talk to, and provide many stories with interesting historical context.
2. In these interviews, the thing that surprised me the most was the attitude the Soviet Union and the United States had towards each other. The Space Race is commonly depicted as an epic fight between the forces of good and evil, however this was not the case when talking to Alla, Lev, and Janis. I specifically picked members of my family from the U.S.S.R, and the U.S. to compare opinions. Despite my expectations they both said the Space Race was a healthy competition and there were no hard feelings.
3. As previously stated, what I took away from the interviews was drastically different from what I expected to hear. From all that I have read about the Space Race, it has been played up to be an ruthless battle between Democracy and Communism; good and evil. From what I understood through the interviewing process, this was not the case. The opinions from all three people that I interviewed were those of national pride, and desire for knowledge to better mankind.
4. If I were to expand this project, there would only be a few things that I would decide to change. As all three people I interviewed are part of the same family, they might have had some reservations of their true feelings. My mom remarked that she didn’t sense any hate towards the U.S.S.R. because she had family there. To remedy this problem, I would locate and interview people who lived in the Soviet Union at the time who were not related to me. Also, I could find someone that lived in the U.S., but had no ties to the U.S.S.R.
5. 4 and 5 combined into one answer
6. These interviews really shed light on the fact that most of my book and Internet sources are extremely biased. I have read works from each side (U.S. and the U.S.S.R.), and all show a sense of superiority over the other. The conflict also became somewhat demonized, as it was played up to be a very hostile matter. Overall, these interviews changed my opinions greatly, for example, Sputnik was thought of, in the U.S.S.R., as a victory. Many books written by Americans would disagree