Soviet space program
The Soviet space program[1] (Russian: Космическая программа СССР, romanized: Kosmicheskaya programma SSSR) was the national space program of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR), active from 1955 until the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991.[2]
Formed
1955–1991
- Sergei Korolev (1951–66)
- Vasily Mishin (1966–74)
- Valentin Glushko (1974–89)
Sputnik 1
(4 October 1957)
Vostok 1
(12 April 1961)
25 December 1991
Soyuz TM-13
(2 October 1991)
Soviet investigations in rocketry began with the formation of a research laboratory in 1921, but these efforts were hampered by the devastating war with Germany. Competing in the Space Race with the United States and later with the European Union and China, the Soviet program was notable in setting many records in space exploration, including the first intercontinental missile (R-7 Semyorka) that launched the first satellite (Sputnik 1) and sent the first animal (Laika) into Earth orbit in 1957, and placed the first human in space in 1961, Yuri Gagarin. In addition, the Soviet program also saw the first woman in space, Valentina Tereshkova, in 1963 and the first spacewalk in 1965. Other milestones included computerized robotic missions exploring the Moon starting in 1959: being the first to reach the surface of the Moon, recording the first image of the far side of the Moon, and achieving the first soft landing on the Moon. The Soviet program also achieved the first space rover deployment with the Lunokhod programme in 1966, and sent the first robotic probe that automatically extracted a sample of lunar soil and brought it to Earth in 1970, Luna 16.[3][4] The Soviet program was also responsible for leading the first interplanetary probes to Venus and Mars and made successful soft landings on these planets in the 1960s and 1970s.[5] It put the first space station, Salyut 1, into low Earth orbit in 1971, and the first modular space station, Mir, in 1986.[6] Its Interkosmos program was also notable for sending the first citizen of a country other than the United States or Soviet Union into space.[7][8]
After WWII, the Soviet and US space programs both utilised German technology in their early efforts. Eventually, the program was managed under Sergei Korolev, who led the program based on unique ideas derived by Konstantin Tsiolkovsky, sometimes known as the father of theoretical astronautics.[9] Contrary to its American, European, and Chinese competitors, who had their programs run under a single coordinating agency, the Soviet space program was divided and split among several internally competing design bureaus led by Korolev, Kerimov, Keldysh, Yangel, Glushko, Chelomey, Makeyev, Chertok and Reshetnev.[10]
The Soviet space program served as an important marker of Soviet claims to its global superpower status.[11]: 1
Internal competition[edit]
Unlike the American space program, which had NASA as a single coordinating structure directed by its administrator, James Webb through most of the 1960s, the USSR's program was split between several competing design groups. Despite the remarkable successes of the Sputnik Program between 1957 and 1961 and Vostok Program between 1961 and 1964, after 1958 Korolev's OKB-1 design bureau faced increasing competition from his rival chief designers, Mikhail Yangel, Valentin Glushko, and Vladimir Chelomei. Korolev planned to move forward with the Soyuz craft and N-1 heavy booster that would be the basis of a permanent crewed space station and crewed exploration of the Moon. However, Dmitry Ustinov directed him to focus on near-Earth missions using the Voskhod spacecraft, a modified Vostok, as well as on uncrewed missions to nearby planets Venus and Mars.
Yangel had been Korolev's assistant but with the support of the military, he was given his own design bureau in 1954 to work primarily on the military space program. This had the stronger rocket engine design team including the use of hypergolic fuels but following the Nedelin catastrophe in 1960 Yangel was directed to concentrate on ICBM development. He also continued to develop his own heavy booster designs similar to Korolev's N-1 both for military applications and for cargo flights into space to build future space stations.
Glushko was the chief rocket engine designer but he had a personal friction with Korolev and refused to develop the large single chamber cryogenic engines that Korolev needed to build heavy boosters.
Chelomey benefited from the patronage of Khrushchev[58]: 418 and in 1960 was given the plum job of developing a rocket to send a crewed vehicle around the Moon and a crewed military space station. With limited space experience, his development was slow.
The progress of the Apollo program alarmed the chief designers, who each advocated for his own program as the response. Multiple, overlapping designs received approval, and new proposals threatened already approved projects. Due to Korolev's "singular persistence", in August 1964—more than three years after the United States declared its intentions—the Soviet Union finally decided to compete for the Moon. It set the goal of a lunar landing in 1967—the 50th anniversary of the October Revolution—or 1968.[58]: 406–408, 420 At one stage in the early 1960s the Soviet space program was actively developing multiple launchers and spacecraft. With the fall of Krushchev in 1964, Korolev was given complete control of the crewed program.[62][63]
In 1961, Valentin Bondarenko, a cosmonaut training for a crewed Vostok mission, was killed in an endurance experiment after the chamber he was in caught on fire. The Soviet Union chose to cover up his death and continue on with the space program.[64]