Читать книгу The Cold War: History in an Hour - Rupert Colley - Страница 16

Space Wars: ‘Flopnik’

Supremacy in space, so the superpowers believed, equated to control of the Earth. On 5 October 1957, the Soviets launched the first satellite, or Sputnik, into space, followed a month later, on 3 November, the fortieth anniversary of the Russian Revolution, with a second, this time with an astronaut of sorts on board – Laika, a dog. Animal lovers throughout the world protested. The Americans were shocked by how far the Soviets had raced ahead, and more so when their own launch, on 6 December, resulted in a humiliating failure when their rocket exploded on take-off: ‘Flopnik’, teased the press. The US felt it was fast becoming a ‘second-rate power’ behind the Soviet Union. In response, it formed NASA (National Aeronautics and Space Administration) and did finally succeed in launching its own rocket in January 1958. However, the ultimate humiliation came on 12 April 1961, when the Soviet astronaut, Yuri Gagarin (pictured below), became the first man in space in a round-the-world flight lasting an hour and forty-eight minutes. Gagarin returned a hero and Khrushchev was delighted. The two men toured around Moscow in an open-top car. Stung into action, John F. Kennedy, elected US president in November 1960, promised that America would put the first man on the moon before the end of the decade.