The "Myth" of Soviet Space Superiority
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- Опубликовано: 3 авг 2024
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RussianSpaceWeb
Encyclopedia Astronautica
NASA
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Novosti-Kosmonavtiki
OKB-MEI
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NPR
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Rockets and People, Volume 4: The Moon Race, by Boris Chertok
National Library of Medicine
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I am well aware of my incorrect use of the word "oblast". Among my circle of friends we now know it as "the oblast incident".
Thank you.
For anyone wondering, the site of Gagarin's fatal crash was in a rural village in Vladimir Oblast, about 100km east of Moscow
Also, for most inquisitive ones - oblast means district, vladimirskaya oblast is a territory around city Vladimir, directly surrounding it. Vladimir is like a capital of it's oblast
You're a salty gringo aint You?
@@p00bixthe saddest aspect of the Russian program was Korolev was ENTIRELY the cause of the big successes they made, who was underfunded compared to Von Braun and the dude was sick from the decade he spent in the goddamn gulag. Since they just saw it as a propaganda tool he didn't have nearly as much support. Once he died they just didn't have the great mind helping.
But yeah, you see a lot of warped historical stuff here just like you see it with Wehraboos fudging data to lionize German tanks ignoring their many many many faults haha
One thing you forgot to mention, the Buran program directly copied NASA's open source documents on the space shuttle, but the program failed because NASA deliberately falsified a few important measurements knowing full well the Soviets would copy them.
I love how the Soviet retrieval plan was just
“Land somewhere in Russia, find someone and call us”
Well, I think that was the best solution at the time.
@@true_xander There's plenty of spots where there's nothing hundreds of kilometers out, not a living soul. Besides, no telling what would happen, might shoot the guy first ask questions later, deeming him a foreign spy, it's cold war after all. Hardly a flawless plan.
It would have been the only solution at the time you are right, but like what if you didn't rush it and gave yourself the opportunity to develop a more robust one?
Literal summary of the Soviet space program
To be fair you’d think something made out shiny metal falling from the sky would be pretty noticeable in the Cold War twitchy era. It being something of national and historic worth would motivate people to go looking for it to go down in history as well. Not the dumbest idea but in hindsight shows just how little people understood at the time.
Especially wild considering the extensive planning for the US landings, despite it being a far more densely populated and developed country. You'd think that would be a solution they'd do, if either of them.
A joke I just thought of:
What was the toughest hurdle that both the Americans and Soviets had to get through when starting their space programs?
Learning German.
Shiet... That is a good one. Cudos to you.
Tsiolkovsky.
Fun fact, the first american astronauts fly into space on german V-3 rockets. :D
More true for Americans tho, von Braun was essential for NASA.
@@stlawstlaw7585 the soviets started by studying the V2, Korolev was part of the team that did so. They had a couple German scientists in that team, too.
“I am a Soviet citizen like you, who has descended from space, and I must find a telephone to call Moscow.” That’s really funny to me for some reason. Gives me huge “I come in peace. Take me to your leader.” vibes.
I think this was what those people heard :) but what should Gagarin say then? "Arrgh, my sputnik broke on a road, i need new nuclear engine to go my way! Btw you have very nice bear with balalaika, lets drink some vodka and greet our meeting"
@@pavelhedge4947"Ah dont worry I am no bandit, this is new model Lada 2500😂
When the aliens arrive and they're just from a different part of the USSR
@@pavelhedge4947BTW, do you know where I can get 1.2 jigawatts of energy around here?
Perhaps the farmer assumed that all aliens speak Russian.
Don't forget the unique British achievement. Only nation to achieve space then abandon it's space programme 🤦
remember the Black Arrow/Blue Streak program
Wrong way round. The Brits cut their space programme, then proved it would have worked with a successful launch.
@@harbl99 Speaking as a Brit, there's something very British about that.
@willbxtn take over most of the known world and then go. Well, the fun shits over the rest of this are gonna be hard... I'm going to bed. See you ruskies and yanks later on tv.
had to cut something to fund that random e on the end of program
One thing about Gagarin's death: the USSR actually tried to preserve his life by clipping his wings, he wasn't allowed to fly anymore. But he insisted on it, and was later allowed to fly again (by that point, and i don't remember if it was him or the people around but, there was something about how out of shape he was for a fighter jet pilot). He died doing what he loved, a sad but totally fitting end.
Michael Collins noted that Apollo 11 would be the last time in space for him, Armstrong and Aldrin because the US could not risk losing them on a mission.
They were testing a new aircraft and apparently had selected someone else to fly it. Knowing that the thing was a dud, Gagarin, who at this time had descended into alcoholism after being paraded around as an example of Soviet technical excellence and terribly depressed by the experience, offered to step in for the other pilot (whose name escapes me).
At least, this is the story I heard years ago living in an ex-Soviet country.
@@Jablicek I think this was about the first Soyuz flight.
@@jaapaap123 Indeed. Komarov went up knowing there were problems with this politically-rushed flight. Both Komarov and Gagarin tried to postpone it, and Komarov was protecting Gagarin by insisting on flying the mission. The other fatal mission, Soyuz 11, not only established the universal rule that pressure suits be worn on ascent and re-entry, but also showed that swapping out a well trained prime crew for a less well trained backup crew shortly before launch was a bad idea. The prime crew was captained by Leonov, who knew all about the faulty valve and operated it manually so it could not be jarred open. Despite his advising the backup crew about it, they left it in auto mode, with tragic results. The crew swap was made for the usual reason, exposure of a crew member to infectious disease. The Americans had already switched to swapping out individual crew members in such cases.
read somewhere that gagarin had a public meltdown in front of Brezhnev and that crash was no accident.
One addition, Sputnik didn't just beep. It encoded information about it's internal temperature and pressure in the beeps.
@@mitchellcouchman6589oh no, a dead country lost the space race, cry
@mitchellcouchman6589 It's pragmatic to focus more on Soviet failures because they really tried hard not to admit they occured.
Also, if you really think it focused focused too much on Soviet failures, I really think you're a vatnik who didn't actually watch the video.
@@mitchellcouchman6589as if we haven’t all heard about the usa’s failure ad infinitum. The point of this video is to go over the mythology of the Soviet Union just being superior in the early stages of the race, when in actuality a lot of what they did was just doing things a lot quicker and dirtier while the USA was trying to master the technology
@@LittleBill5463 You're the oddly defensive one here
@@mitchellcouchman6589cope harder tankie scum. May McCarthy smite you.
Another benefit about Sputnik being first in orbit is that it settled the question of whether orbital overflights of sovereign territory would be legal under international law or not. Ike wanted the Soviets to agree to allow reconnaissance overflights for treaty verification purposes, but the Soviets wouldn't hear of it. But after Sputnik flew over the US over and over and over again, it was pretty hard to deny anyone else orbital navigation rights.
There are a few low level conspiracy theories that the American programs were sabotaged for reasons like that, and that Vanguard was selected precisely because it wasn't ready.
Russians knew that in early 1950's when USA launched first spy satellite. (My opinion). Google "first pictures of earth from space" - 1946 US Army. So next 11 yrs, Army just stopped, no need to take pictures from a spy satellite, really? Why 50's satellite files still confidential and why USSR made Sputnik spy technology public? Also Why did Eisenhower react so cavalier, not caring about Sputnik? Sorry, I believe USA had 10 spy satellites by 1957.
@RCAvhstape Indeed, United States was developing photo reconnaissance satellite before Sputnik 1 was launched. When Soviets opened the skies by flying first over countries, United States gladly used the opportunity, and still today do.
There has been many recce satellites that are near twins of Hubble since late 70s. They do not look to sky, but what Moscow/Peking is doing. They do not need film bucket returns, instead they can beam intelligence in real time to western allies, in 10cm resolution.
Gagarin's flight sparked a new joke in Poland that quickly became popular.
- Dad! Daaaaad! The Russians flew into space!
- All of them?
- No, just one.
- Why are you bothering me then!
Those who can’t achieve something usually end up coping with jokes, just like poor people about rich people. Makes being poor or not going to space less damaging to the ego.
@@poloska9471say what you will, but Poland is still a nation. How's the USSR doing? I'm kidding, you guys know you failed. It was a mean thing to say. I'm sorry
@@poloska9471 Tell me you don't know history without saying you don't know history. Or you know the soviet version or it.
@@poloska9471 man get a sense of humor.
In my experince its usually the bitter people that try to belittle others by dismissing anything they do just to protect their own ego. If anything, you not finding it funny, tells me that you are a very serious man. A man that doesn't make a lot of jokes. One might say a bitter man. But in reality it's probably because you achieved so much in your life. Tell me some of those acheviements. I'm really curious. @@poloska9471
In fact we have an idea what caused the accident of Gagarin, several officials talked about it decades later. Apparently a SU-15 violated rules and flew too low because instruments problems and the turbulence affected Gagarin's MiG. Alexei Leonov got obsessed with it and proceeded his own investigation for decades and found a lot of inconsistencies, and talked about it on his book The Two Sides of the Moon.
Alexei leonov was a real character
@@thesmirkingwolf If he wasn't, he would have died in orbit.
honestly sounds about right, jet wake is no joke, can make smaller planes literally fall out of the sky. Helicopter wakes are even worse
I had to read Two Sides of the Moon for a history elective. It was a really good read imo
Goddamn I love Leonov. His passing a few years ago hit me pretty hard.
For those who might be confused by the homophones, the "crude space flights" are in fact "crewed space flights" (flights with a human crew).
Crewed oil.
@@lastfirst5863 this. this is THE most slept on comment in RUclips history
Man I thought it was "crude" as in it was going into space and immediately coming down, not doing complete orbits. Thanks for this
One thing that doesn’t get mentioned but was crucial to the US’ success was the invention of the transistor. It allowed instruments and space shuttles to efficiently do complex calculations, significantly reducing errors. It also laid the ground work for what would become America’s dominant computing lead in the 80s and 90s
The Apollo led so many foundations for the modern computing industry. It's insane.
For example, the first commercial database, IBM IMS was made to keep track of the inventory for the bill of materials.
And resulting in the internet.
No, the USSR also had transistors; in fact, the p-n junction was discovered before WW2, but the transistors themselves were only produced in the 60s. The USSR also had its own supercomputers, which were on par with the American ones. There was simply no technological superiority on either side, but the political stability of the USSR and its gerontocracy made not only space dead, but also the state itself.
@@Erik-pt2yw Not really. Never on par. Soviets were always behind. Not far and no big deal technologically and in every day life... and cheaper. :-) Soviet computers were overwhelmingly knockoffs of the US versions. From mini-computers (PDPs, microVAXes, HPs) to mainframes (GDR-produced knockoffs of IBM's), etc. Not sure about the soviet "Minsk" series in early 70ies... but those were unusable for anything real as they did not even have an assembler.
@@youknowwho5900 you better bring some sources and proof for that shit. Looking at ukraine war with ukraine loosing despite the combined tech and support of usa and whole nat (and japan and south korea)
The Cosmonaut killed in the oxygen fire, during training, was Valentin Bondarenko.
"Those who fail to learn history are doomed to repeat it. Those who fail to learn history correctly are simply doomed."
than humanity doomed
"And those who learn history correctly are doomed to watch everyone else repeat it."
Those who expect to find the answers for the future from history alone will be inevitably gravitationally locked to the misconceptions and failures of those faulty narratives have effectively secured their place in the historybooks.
As a total Venus fanboy, I'll always be thankful to the Soviets for their Venutian landers. And, like most of us im sure, I have a helluva soft spot for Buran.
But, comrade, the buran is ugly af
Venus is very much an underrated planet! Mars is the one that receives all the news about rovers on it and potential manned missions and Venus is almost forgotten about. Then again Venus is a hellish nightmare of a world where Mars is not the best but manageable.
@@therealspeedwagon1451 i often find myself wondering just how much gravity humans need to be able to reproduce and maintain healthy bodies. There is a chance that the .3G of Mars is insufficient for some or even all of the functions we may need to actually live there. There are workarounds to that, from spinning cities to genetic manipulation, but those are far enough off at any real scale that it could set back real colonization of Mars some time.
If that ends up being the case, I think that considering chilling Venus with q solar shade and processing out a lot of the CO2 some way or the other might actually be of a commensurate timescale, and if it is then we may in the end find ourselves living on Venus before we live on Mars.
Purely hypothetical daydreaming on my part.
No freakn' way can Venus be colonized, or even landed on, by humans. There's really no point going there, unless someone needs to burn up a spaceship, and loads of cash.
Be better going to, and 50% failing on Mars, than 100% being cremated on Venus.
Actually, the Sun can be landed on, but you'd have to go at night. Like...DUH!
The RUclips algorithm just proposed this video to me, and I am amazed by the comment section. Almost ridiculously detailed knowledge being dropped by the audience. I didn't even know this community existed. Love it
It's extremely nice to find good content with a non toxic comment section
I find it ironic that by hiding their failures the Soviets actually ended up belittling their achievements.
yeah... really! So sad, so true! That is the reason behind Kennedy's demand to do it (all US space activities) all in the open, before the eyes of the public (and the American tax payer...)
Sovietism 101. They also buried the achievement of tons of soldiers if those men later did something to piss off the party. Of the scientists who helped run the Soviet space program actually died from that kind of political BS: guy was thrown in a gulag and tortured before he lead the space program and those injuries later caused his premature death.
Nah man, to put their achievements ahead of their far more costly failures is pure schizophrenic copium.
Imagine talking about "failures" of USSR when USA tried (and succeeded) in convincing idiots around the world that it "won" the "space race". Yeah, in the only competition that USSR did not participate. Talk about participation prize, lol.
@@Birdhatter you should tell it to the video's author then.
There's a lot of very good research here, but also some odd statements.
Korolev did not insist on the Soyuz 1 being launched, he was dead by then. As you yourself pointed out he died in 1966. It was his replacement Mishin that made that decision. Mishin was not up to the task and by some accounts dealt with the stress by being a hard drinker. (Mishin was also responsible for the poor handling of the N1 program). While there were certainly a lot of "space cowboy" stunts while Korolev was in charge, he did institute a policy of having several successful testflights before risking a human crew. Soyuz 1 ran into so many problems exactly because this policy was sidestepped in favor of trying to make up for lost time.
The story about Komarov's cries of rage is an urban legend. There is zero evidence to support it. There are a few snippets of audio where he sounds quite agitated, but he's simply commenting on the mission status, not cursing at anyone.
As far as Gagarin's death is concerned, shortly before his death Leonov confirmed the widely accepted account that Gagarin's Mig-15 went into an uncontrollable spin after winding up in the jet wash of another fighter aircraft that wasn't meant to be there. Leonov implied that he knew the identity of the pilot responsible for the accident, but refused to reveal his name, saying that he did not want to subject him to the court of public opinion.
I don't know where you got the idea that the later Venera probes were designed to operate for 23 minutes. Or that they were crushed. In reality we will never know how long they operated because the transmission stopped when the orbiter (which was acting as a relay) went out of range.
Buran (pronounced Bu-Run, not Bu-Ran) was certainly a response to the shuttle, but it wasn't the fear of stolen satellites that pushed it along. The Soviets had concluded that the Shuttle program would never be as cheap or efficient as advertised, and concluded that the only reason the US was pouring so many resources into it is because it had hidden military applications. One such whimsical idea was that the Shuttle could function as a nuclear bomber. And it was that fear that made Buran happen, even though that program had many detractors.
There is also something that should be mentioned here that I always found highly ironic about the Soviet space program: There was no unified soviet space agency in the way that NASA operated. Instead you had competing design bureaus, ran by highly competitive (and often combative) personalities, competing for limited resources. It was Korolev's insistence that the N1 use Kerosene that resulted in the 30 engine design. This individualistic, "auteur" sort of situation is something you'd likely expect in the west. Meanwhile NASA functioned as a real government ran space agency. Go figure.
Not to mention that Buran is now generally considered to be a much better design.
@@kitko33by whom? How could that possibly be evaluated since the specs as built are still state secrets. Secondly, Buran had exactly 1 flight of 25 minutes and was uncrewed. There is no way to determine fully crewed and loaded flight characteristics with no crew, their supplies, and no payload. It went up and came down. That's it.
@@kitko33 It had features that made it 'less' of a Space shuttle, which you could consider to be positive or see as extra complexity making the system even more of a 'why bother' for the sovjets. It is sad we lost it for historical purposes, but while the Space Shuttle ran on money, the Buran didn't run at all.
This should be pinned
@@xavariusquest4603 Why would that be hard to believe though? The soviets started their project significantly later, so they could learn from NASAs mistakes. For example they did not like the thermal tile layout on the Shuttle, and came up with something different for Buran. Those tiles were definitely one of the Shuttle's weakest links.
The approach to the system was also obviously completely different. Glushko's NPO Energia could not care less about Buran. To them it was just payload. They put their resources into making a heavy lift rocket, and succeeded. The work put into it wasn't a total waste either, since the Energia engines were later reworked into the RD-180 which had a very successful run powering the Atlas 5...
Thanks to not having to cary engines Buran could be flown with more cargo. And it's interesting that you take a feature the Shuttle didn't even have (automated flight) and try to make that into a negative... It was a very impressive bit of engineering, no matter how you look at it.
I have lived through every day of this video since 1945, I remember sitting in my dad's car listening to the news of Sputnik, then Lakia, then Gagarin.
Most I knew about, learning in later years, but there was much I was unaware of.
A huge thank you, this documentary was excellent.
Such an amazing time to have lived through. You witnessed some of the greatest moments in human history
The largest and most powerful rocket ever built will fly in the next couple days. It's twice as powerful as the Saturn V. You probably already know about SpaceX's Starship, but if not check it out. I also lived through most but not all of what you did. :)
I think the early Soviet space achievements are actually understated because the Soviets started out without the V2 plans and scientists we got with operation paperclip. While we sat on our initial lead, the Soviets practically built rockets with axes and hammers in siberia. That’s what it must have felt like, anyway. As for the tankies and kids defending communism, it is so tragic. The Soviet citizens were prisoners in their own country and sadly they had to give their children to be indoctrinated by the communists and after suffering through ww1 and ww2 they lost everything including hope. Their glorious victory in WWII gave them a lot of momentum but the lack of rewards and awful central planning eventually caught up with them and ate into productivity. Their military spending shot up to 25% of GDP and by the 1980s they were teetering on economic collapse. We were incredibly lucky to end the Cold War peacefully and we should have stopped expanding NATO. Russia and NATO should be negotiating a ceasefire every single day. Diplomacy doesn’t cost anything but a nuclear miscalculation could end us.
@@Greg-yu4ijRussia never stopped being a belligerent power, hence why there is still a NATO.
@@Greg-yu4ij There would be no need for nato if Russia/China weren't trying to upend the civilised world with every breath. Expansion is when you're baiting countries into your own sphere of influence.
Everyone is trying to just mind their business, but there will always be those who think themselves better than everyone else, even though they are well below par. Perhaps that is where their inherent need comes from but I digress. Nato expansion?
If I remember correctly Sweden and Finland were actually against joining, but then Russia happened. It's so pedestrian to see an actor thinking themselves better yet fail so miserably at what they are trying to achieve. Russia causing the exact opposite of their intention is just so over the top, you couldn't make this stuff up.
My 98 year old Dad worked on the Atlas missile project. He said this:
- when Sputnik was launched, one dad's colleagues (who had been a WW2 artillery officer) calculated what the power of the booster would have to be. Given that had knowledge of warhead weight, he calculated the flight time of a USSR ICBM. Then given the known time from detection by USAF, my dad said there was not enough time ro prepare an Atlas missile for launch before the USSR ICBM hit the USAF launcher. Many years latter when the Sputnik booster photos were released, it turned out that had multiple engines strapped together to lift the satellite and the USSR ICBMs did not.
- the USAF statement was that the USSR had 100 ICBMs ready to launch so we needed more than twice that number. It turned out the CIA knew the USSR had 0 ICBMs ready and were preparing about 10 for launchers. The 100 number was used to get more money for the ATLAS project.
It was a pattern we called "10 foot Ivan" that the USSR military was made out to be much more capable than it was and we would have to spend more to keep equal. The result was that we built superior weapon systems and companies like the ones that my dad worked for made lots of money. It kept Southern California aerospace humming.
"10 foot ivan" is hilarious. Thank you. Can't find anything about it online
Man id love to just hear stories from a man who is 98, let alone worked on something so fascinating in a bygone era
Former Air Force Cold War vet here. I have come to the opinion that the Russian nuclear arsenal is mostly defunct, and has been so for a long time. My rough guess is that 90% would fail on launch. That may turn out to be a conservative number.
You need to record some of his stories before that stuff is lost. My grandfather was CIA and he would tell me these weird ass stories when I was young,I seriously regret not paying better attention.
those are treasures that we need to cherish@@drumraider . in many respects the Sputnik crisis was the basis of western strategy to make the enemy bigger than they were to make sure RUSSIA replaced Nazi GERMANY as enemy number one.
To be even more precise, the first life in space would likely have been some bacteria or maybe even bugs on the first V2 the Germans sent past the Carmen Line.
The fruit flies were the first to be observed and studied.
According to Mark Felton the Nazi sended a small monkey with one of the V2 , you can search for older videos on his RUclips channel(Mark Felton production) ,search on the playlist named space.
Fruit Flies are 'Animals' while single celled organisms are 'Protists' and not plant or animal, so no your nitpick fails and the video is correct on the first 'animal in space'.
Germs barely count but yeah germs on the V2
You have a minor error at 53:30. One of the Pioneer Venus Multiprobe probes did infact land and continue to operate for 45 minutes after doing so, even though it was not intended.
Well that's lucky
When your "failures" work better than a lot of people's "successes"...
Didn’t win the ussr the race tho
Task failed successfully
@@Marcus001 I love your channel pic
The greatest example of this is the apocryphal pencil story. Smug tankies love it, pointing out that capitalism wasted resources developing a pen while the Soviets used a pencil.
Turns out, you don't want highly conductive graphite dust floating around in a spacecraft. That's why you invent a pen.
Yeah.. and now think about how many pencils you need to use up there in order for it to have an effect)
@@AntonAnderssen85 not many. Have you seen the inside of an early space capsule? It's a very small space.
During the first NASA missions the astronauts used pencils. For Project Gemini, for example, NASA ordered mechanical pencils in 1965 from Tycam Engineering Manufacturing, Inc., in Houston. The fixed price contract purchased 34 units at a total cost of $4,382.50, or $128.89 per unit. That created something of a controversy at the time, as many people believed it was a frivolous expense. NASA backtracked immediately and equipped the astronauts with less costly items.
During this time period, Paul C. Fisher of the Fisher Pen Co. designed a ballpoint pen that would operate better in the unique environment of space. His new pen, with a pressurized ink cartridge, functioned in a weightless environment, underwater, in other liquids, and in temperature extremes ranging from -50 F to +400 F.
Fisher developed his space pen with no NASA funding. The company reportedly invested about $1 million of its own funds in the effort then patented its product and cornered the market as a result.
Fisher offered the pens to NASA in 1965, but, because of the earlier controversy, the agency was hesitant in its approach. In 1967, after rigorous tests, NASA managers agreed to equip the Apollo astronauts with these pens. Media reports indicate that approximately 400 pens were purchased from Fisher at $6 per unit for Project Apollo.
The Soviet Union also purchased 100 of the Fisher pens, and 1,000 ink cartridges, in February 1969, for use on its Soyuz space flights. Previously, its cosmonauts had been using grease pencils to write in orbit.
Actually, that's why you buy a pen from a commercial supplier. Fisher renamed their line of pens "Space pens" after their adoption.
Even funnier is that said pen would be used by BOTH countries.
The Buran test vehicle with the jet engines actually still survived to this day, it's located in the technology museum in Speyer, Germany. You can walk up on top of it and look inside the cockpit and cargo bay. A very impressive craft to see in person, that thing is huge, way bigger than it looks in most fotos or videos.
Actually the Buran 2 backup vessel seen in photos in this video itself was not destroyed in the collapse. Only the original vessel. Notable youtuber Benjamin Rich was at the Kahakstan facility illegally in 2022.
The Buranhad no life support system.
The Buran vehicle that went to space was destroyed by hangar collapsing on it.
And as you say, the Buran landing test vehicle, that has two jet engines attached to it, exist and have survived.
And it is odd that so few really know about Buran, considering it was fully autonomous unmanned space flight. And on landing it missed the exact landing spot on runway by few meters, and before that it performed really impressive automatic self-correction landing procedure that was impossible for NASA space shuttles.
@@paristo minor correction, it has four jet engines, not two
That museum _sucks!_ the staff are incredibly rude when you try and drive the vehicles no matter how badass it would be.
“The world’s first artificial satellite was just a steel ball that beeped”
You know what I am okay with that I like it, simple and humble.
You missed that Sputnik's beeping rate was related to temperature. It _did_ have a sensor onboard but not one many realise existed
The story of Laika hurt.
A small price to pay for scientific advancement.
I mean, being a martyr for scientific development is better than dying in some siberian back alley
27:26 A note on this. I had the pleasure of having a tutor for a while who is from Russia. She told me, among other space-related things, that Yuri Gagarin’s death is, for most people in Russia, something they attribute to the USSR trying to cover up the issues of Soyuz-1 since he threatened to go public with how scuffed the initial spacecraft was.
The early bird gets the worm, but the second mouse gets the cheese.
12:25 check your facts mate, to build a redstone missile you obviously need slime blocks and they weren't yet available in the patch 19.54
True what a big error
You said Gemini 4's spacewalk went "much more smoothly"? But Ed White's suit also ballooned, causing significant problems getting him back into the capsule. And he also got very close to heat stroke while trying. The first two versions of Gemini spacewalking suits had horribly inadequate forced-air cooling, just like the Soviet suits.
Then Gemini 4's hatch wouldn't latch, requiring the astronauts to partially disassemble it from inside.
The two missions always seemed pretty similar to me. It's always tickled me that the best scientists and engineers in both countries ran into the same two design faults in their first real space suits. I wonder if neither calculated how much heat an astronaut exercising inside a thermos bottle gives off, or if they perhaps relied on the same wrong figures from some old textbook? :)
My guess is that they knew how much they gave off. They just didn't expect their suits to be as effective at retaining this heat as they ended up being.
Careful study of the door hinges showed an unusual anomaly, ... micro welding had occurred causing the door to become locked open as well ! A phenomenon of space travel that occurs to many moving parts on spacecraft. Also the over heating of the astros during space walks as Gene Cernan became extremely overheated and exhausted to the point of near collapse as he could barely get back into the capsule. His visor totally fogged over so loss of visual was a major problem. He lost as NASA claimed, ... 9 pounds of water in his suit from sweating,.... this was the main source of the visor fogging !
Whatever you say, comrade
Maybe they were studying each other’s homework one could say..
@@watonemillionOh f'chrissakes, grow up.
The Soviet Union also gave us the first human born to both parents who had flown into space (and thus had been exposed to cosmic radiation). The child reportedly was normal in all respects and not a super powered mutant…but could you imagine?
Why wouldn’t it turn out normal?
@@ultrasuperkiller it goes against every comic book, 1950s sci fi movie and pulp space novel! My expectations are dashed!
@@russellharrell2747 Or so you thought! His superpower was being able to fool people into thinking he was normal!
There was an anecdote in Soviet Union:
- Gagarin hist whole life didn't drink, smoke and trained extremely hard just to spend 108 minutes not in Soviet Union
He was literally an alcoholic after his flight.
@@DKiSAerospaceHistory Yea, he just spent his whole life to spend 108 minutes not there and then had to return, duh, I'd like to see you reacting any better
@@domaxltv interestingly he had traveled a lot all around the world after that, and had to drink much on all those celebrations.
@@ksotar If I had to go back to the Soviet Union I'd drink heavily too.
54:33 Two of America’s Pioneer Venus atmospheric probes survived the impact with the surface.
They both sent back data for about 45 minutes after landing.
That's pretty metal.
Any time someone makes a video about Cold War era space programs, the site assumes it's an attempt to debunk the Moon landing and they add the "context" underneath with a wikipedia article about Apollo.
What I always think wether it was the soviets or the americans doing it, was how dangerous were those types of missions, specially back in the day. Apollo mission could've gone horribly wrong, yet they managed to land safely on the moon. Almost a miracle by today's standards
Could? They did... a lot :D but muricans only talk about the one...
Fun fact ... they didnt
@@sawney_bean yes, I Know. I mean.. even after their success it was pretty difficult
By percentage, I think its now just as safe as driving. In USA, 40,000 dead each yr, over 2 million in hospital....Driving is equal to a war.
“The US also heavily relied on an ICBM-derived launch vehicle, the Titan family”
The Atlas launch vehicle family: “Am I a joke to you?”
I'm a second generation Hungarian American.
My grandparents left in the 50's through austria.
Subscribed after your intro about tankies. I'm trying to not rant in multiple paragraphs, but I appreciate someone calling out the larpers. My family suffered. I heard the stories all the time before my grandparents passed away. The vast majority of eastern europe hated communism and the only people who want it back were either the very few who benefited from it or edgy larpers.
Wierd how i hear the complete opposite from slavs and East Euros and general surveys reveal otherwise 😂😂
And you sure your grandparents didn't happen to support a nice Mustachiod man who happened to fail art school?
@@Cotac_Rastic
German God will live a millennium in your small dome, rent free ☝️🤓
@@Home_Rich ? God isn't German, he has a sense of humor.
@@Cotac_Rastic
Now you're just yapping nonsense 🙄
Having only a mild interest in space exploration I always thought that the 'Space race' was more about political penis waving than about doing anything (coming at the height of the cold war). Notwithstanding this, it has enabled both sides, and the world, to advance in satellites and space exploration.
Thank you for your thoughtful and informative video - and allowing us a glimpse into your world of space geekery.
"Political Penis" is a great name for a punk band.
The Space Race really was a fantastic thing for mankind, as another space geek.
It's admittedly nationalistic motivating factors shouldn't take away from what was an undeniable achievement in scientific progress. The way pop culture has reduced it to a dick-measuring contest is a complete disservice to the men and women of NASA and RosCosmos, as our society owes so much to their accomplishments; with countless technologies being borne from it that we couldn't live without.
Frankly, this "competition" was probably the only good one of its kind to come out of the cold war: not a contest of creating the biggest nuke or winning the most proxy wars, but just of pushing humanity furthest.
Its funny how so mamy of the people who point to the successes of the Soviet space program, their greatest achievement and pure contribution to science is rarely mentioned.
The Venera program to this day blows my mind
An excellent balanced overview. Fortunately, in the 1990's and 2000's many of the surviving Soviet space people published books, and also the previously secret archives were for a while opened up, so we know a LOT more now than we knew in the '60s and '70s. However, it's worth noting that the collaboration in human spaceflight between the US and USSR/Russia began as early as 1971, when Tom Stafford was invited to be a pallbearer at the state funeral of the Soyuz 11 crew. He went on to command the Apollo part of Apollo-Soyuz, and gave a eulogy, in "Oklahoman" Russian, at Leonov's funeral in 2019.
I don't recall this video referring to the fact that the venerable Soyuz, launching mainly from the same pad as Sputnik 1 and Yuri Gagarin, was the only means for US and other astronauts to reach the ISS between 2011 and 2020. Russian cosmonauts now fly on the US Space X Crew Dragon, and US astronauts still fly on the Soyuz. Despite very serious political strife, this collaboration has continued. I also note that Elon Musk fully acknowledges the achievements of Sergei Korolev, and many of his innovations draw on them. Starship follows more in the spirit of the N-1 than of Saturn 5 and SLS, but with the 21st century goal of reusability. Musk's design and development philosophy is the same as Korolev's.
I absolutely agree with you, about the facts you mention -as a septagenearian having followed Space flight since I was 10... What always drove me mad is, that ultra secretiveness of all things SPACE in the USSR... now I know that it was simply because they did actually have no "civilian" program! It was all intertwined with military projects! (And they did never have a Space Agency like NASA! )But back to your first words: Indeed! This excellent report was really fair and balanced - a joy to watch! I did not know the fact about Tom Stafford and Soyuz 11... I' d really like to sit down over a beer and talk shop with you... With best regards, Mike, Radebeul (near Dresden), Germany... as a PS: Did you read Kamanins Diary?
Korolev was a Ukrainian who studied in the Kyiv Polytechnical University btw
No American nor European will ever ride aboard a Soyuz ever again. Relationships have soured and launch aboard the space x dragon is far less expensive and far more comfortable.
Let's see whether starship lives up to the spirit of the N1 in failing to reach orbit four times before getting cancelled
@@jmelande4937 seat prices on dragon and soyuz are comparable, but arguably in large part to having a duopoly in space flight at the moment.
Great video!
Greetings from Ukraine!
One thing I wanted to correct: at 27:40, when you say about Gagarin's crash, you say "Oblast region", which doesn't make sense, as "oblast" means "region". The actual place is [near] Novosyolovo, Vladimir Oblast.
Thank you for the correction 😁 Slava 🇺🇦
The Ukranian version of "chai tea? Bruh chai means tea" 😅😅
Fun fact Buran harnessed the power of being second, by fixing problems of the Nasa Shuttle. Being second is really good actually.
yeah it did really well
@@tsunchooit had one spotty flight. Where is this unfounded basis coming from 💀
@imlonelypleasehelp5443 yeah i've seen a few, like it flew once and rotted in a hangar lol
They harnessed the power of theft and did nothing with it.
It wasn't better. For example, the Shuttle could fly autonomously too - but that capacity was for emergencies only
there's also been supposition that Yuri's death may have been related to his (understandable- they were best friends, or at least extremely close, from what ive heard) severe depression after the Soyuz 1 nightmare- Komerov and his desperate attempts to save the other from the deathtrap of a craft read like something from a well-written bromantic tradgedy, but ive seen nothing concrete-
regardless of what happened in Yuri's case, they were both good men, and the world was lesser without them, in my opinion :(
I still hold the personal opinion that one of the major achievements of the Space program was the Apollo-Soyoz mission.
Not for any unique or new technological achievement, but for showing how space programs could be international ventures, especially considering the politics of the time.
And hey.. who can truly say that hearing Fanfare for the Common Man introducing James Burkes comment=ary wasn't almost on a p[ar with Thus Sprach Zarathustra introducing both him and Raymond Baxter covering Apollo?
I would say the turning of Space programs into an international venture damned human space progress by at least a quarter of a century. It was the competition between the USSR and the USA that fueled the heights we've already achieved. It's only becoming more intense now because the world is on the precipice of a second Cold War, and the US is trying to stay ahead of the game as the Chinese Space Program is getting off the ground.
Admittedly I'm only 5 minutes in but my first comment that comes to mind is qualifying the soviets accomplishments before N1 basically as parlor tricks for stated reasons is dead on accurate and absolutely true...
That's said, it simply worked and the fact of the matter is we failed at those parlor tricks for a while.
And let's not forget that stepping on the moon wasn't some endgoal established at the beginning of the space race, we(the US) simply moved the goal post and called the game won when we finally scored...
It is what it is, the whole "space race" was a propaganda machine that massively succeeded on BOTH sides!!!
I'm glad it worked for us and the soviets too! Both countries did AMAZING things using different approaches and ideologies and showed a level of advancement that hasn't been seen since.
Incredible work from both sides...
Parlor tricks would be things like the Vanguard and Juno I. The soviets were lucky that that R7 was such a succes, and one that they could keep upgrading. In the late 50's early 60's there is no doubt that soviet rockets where much more capable then US rockets. One just has to look at the mass difference of the early sattelites and capsules.
Sputnik 2 and 3 where also marvels, so where some of the Luna and Venera probes. Around 1965 the US started to take over, but the USSR still had some impressive stuff, like the Molniya sattelites, which where huge and much more capable then any US communication sattelite.
“Called the game won when we finally scored”
Gfy dude, putting boots on the moon was leaps and bounds above what the Soviet Union was capable of and nothing was stopping them from moving the goalposts themselves and making it about putting a base on the moon or boots on mars, but the simple fact of the matter was they were exceeded and couldn’t catch back up
@@slome815>much more capable communications satellites
What are you smoking?
@@banksuvladimir They were launching large fully controllable communication satellites, in the form of their moniya's by 1965. when the US was launching tiny spin stabilised communication satelites to low earth orbit.
And yes, there were exceeded by the US in launch capability, as well as many other things, This is why I said they were ahead in the late 50's and early 60's. Though the soviets still had some areas where they were ahead. Space stations are one area, with Salyut and later Mir, and planetary probes is another.
As for moving goalposts, that's just as much the case with the US. The USSR never gave much funding or attention to their manned lunar program, it was always an afterthought.
@@slome815 >ussr never gave much funding or attention to lunar
Get the fuck out with that copium, you really went with the Soviet sour grapes propaganda? They built massive rockets to go to the moon that exploded and destroyed their facilities and killed a bunch of people, then they covered it up. They didn’t “never give much attention or funding to lunar landing” you liar
Just an interesting aside, I was a teenager when the Apollo Soyuz mission occurred. Some of my friends had parents who were engineers on that program on the American side. One of the things I learned was that what America would do with electronics the Russians did mechanically. For example, alignment for docking was managed by the Americans with a photoelectric detector system that fed information via a computer into the maneuvering thrusters. The Russian system used a system of metal rods that reached out and when something would touch it would open and close switches to do the same thing. The problem with this system is that it is very difficult to get lubricants to operate under these conditions, and sometimes the Russian rods wouldn't move properly.
I think you missed that the first man-made object might’ve been a manhole during the 1957 Operation Plumbbob nuclear test
Legend has it, James Webb is still looking for it
1944 is before 1957.
Once when asked that question I also guessed the manhole but my friend reminded me it was zee Germans.
That manhole being launched (although most likely just burned up in the atmosphere) was allegedly the inspiration behind the Orion Drive, aka rocket jumping with nukes. Possible to build with today’s technology and would be the fastest method of space travel yet achieved, it’s just logistically and politically very difficult to pull off.
"I'm making this video because of tankies."
Based!
Halfway through and I have to say Kevin... This is your finest work ever IMO. Very well done... Thoroughly enjoying this... Well done sir! Now back to the video...👍
Could not agree more!
Agreed!
what you should have also, probably, mentioned, and i'm sure there are many comments talking about it, and i may be labeled a tankie for it, is that all these achievements were made by a country, that just 50 years ago was basically a feudal state with absolutely 0 industrial capacity, and just 20 years ago had lost an entire 1/8 of it's whole population and an uncountable amount of industrial power, as well as found itself in severe financial debt as a result of lend-lease, which russia just recently finished repaying. while usa was in its' roaring twenties, soviet union was scrambling by, trying to rebuild a country after a bloody civil war, several foreign invasions, including american and a massive brain-drain. stalin's purges didn't help with the brain situation, although to be fair to the man, he did massively and rapidly industrialize the country, barely in time for the second world war. so, all in all, it's a genuine miracle that ussr was even able to compete with the us in the space race, let alone beat it at any point in time
Fair point.
Tsarist Russia did have some industrial capacity.
tsarist russias industrial growth was laughable compared to soviet five year plans,not including the fact that it was entirely dependent on selling off the country to western coroporations. Tsarist russia,if victorious from civil war would have been wiped out by germans as they would either be a defacto colony of allied nations or keep being a agrarian shithole.@@pompom8315
tsarist russias industrial growth is overstated to undermine achievements of NEP and first 2 five year plans. Warsaw Pact wasnt a "unified soviet hegemony" as many propagandists love to say,those nations usually had very different agendas and pursued different relationships with other countries at large,best example is romanian and soviet relations. @windrose5988
@windrose5988not only that, but the guy mentioned "including american" in regards to dealing with foreign invasions. Also the soviet union's loss of it's Population Was it's on governments fault both pre and post war
Grand daddy worked as a field hand. When he saw Sputnik orbiting across the sky he said it gave him hope! Poor Laika survived the horrors of WW2 only to die in space
It is also important to point out that it isn't capitalism which developed us space program it was work of workers and engineers working on the program payed by us government and mostly not private investment. So those are public projects.
Holy crap dude, I've only just started the video, and you've got the perfect voice for narration
I have to say, seeing tankies on twitter with NO knowledge of space exploration history outside of twitter posts making these claims is both annoying and pitifully sad to witness, thank you for this video.
"... an unheard-of 30 engines ... "
Congratulations to SpaceX, all these years later, on having a many-engine first stage work flawlessly through stage separation (although it didn't make its even more ambitious goal of a boost-back burn, for its ultimate goal of rapid reuse).
Good video. I'm glad to see a balanced discussion of US and Soviet achievements in space.
I do not think that word means what you think it means.
@@ShortArmOfGod Did you misclick, and accidentally reply to my comment, instead of to one that does contain the word "inconceivable"? Maybe you don't find the video balanced, but I doubt that you really find it so unbalanced as to say that the word can't be applied with its normal meaning. Same thing if the word in question is "after", in my statement that the problems started after stage separation: maybe you've heard about some problem that allegedly happened before stage separation, but if so it wasn't so obvious as to have it be clear that "after" is the word you're pretending I've misunderstood.
Oops, I said it worked without problems "through stage separation", not that the problems started "after stage separation". So the word would be "through" rather than "after". But so what, same difference.
Honestly speaking, it is likely that the problems started during stage seperation, it did essentially stop functioning immediately afterwards.....
@@domaxltv Could be. Most commentators seem to think it started during the flip, but there could have been something wrong for a while before it had any obvious effect.
I find it crazy that the Soviets were able to land in Venus. Its such a mystical and exotic planet and the fact they got wind and video of such a strange world is amazing
13:59
Tbf, Sputnik 2 did also carry (alongside a certain dog) scientific instrumentation (two spectrophotometers in the actual satellite plus a cosmic ray detector in the uppermost stage of the rocket). Additionally, the unsuccessful early Vanguard satellites were just as much attempts at being first (also radio transmitters inside steel spheres) as Sputnik was.
Sure - because Eisenhower was too chicken to give the go ahead to the REAL rocket team, and *WASTED TIME* with the Vanguard option for a while.
Explorer I was extensively instrumented and led to the discovery of the Van Allen Belt.
BTW, the Jupiter C and Explorer satellite were ready for launching in July 1956 but ordered into mothballs by Eisenhower.
@@manifold1476 Yes - pretty much exactly what happened with the USSR and Object D, the difference being that the USSR got away with it in terms of successful launches.
@@harrysteiman Yes to the first. However, I can find no information supporting the latter claim, and also if they were ready for launch by then why would Eisenhower have ordered them mothballed instead of launching them? Would be interested in seeing your sources. From what I've seen (and I quote:) 'Before work was completed, the Soviet Union launched a second satellite, Sputnik 2.'
The "Space Race", like the Vietnam War, was JFK's work..
Eisenhower was notoriously miserly and was not interested in "space research" . He however was very interested in ICBMs and spy satellites and did not want any "civilian" projects to drain money or talent from his military space objectives. He wanted to establish freedom of space so that he would be able to overfly the USSR legally. The JPL had prepared a satellite for launching on an ABMA Jupiter-C booster in 1956 but Eisenhower cancelled the launch and ordered the Rocket and satellite into mothballs knowing that the Russians were preparing to launch a satellite within the next year. With the failures of Vanguard and the USSR establishing the precedent of uncontested freedom of space with Sputnik, he finally gave the go ahead to the ABMA to launch, a mere 84 days later, the JPL Orbiter relabelled Explorer I on a Jupiter C (relabelled Juno) rocket.
Sources are all over the internet, especially unclassified CIA and Whitehouse documents.
This was so well done, Kevin. You really are the go to guy for space on RUclips. As an aside, I find the whole Venus exploration by the soviets to be endlessly fascinating. So much more interesting than Mars.
I think Venus is a much more interesting place than Mars. It had liquid water for a billion years, enougth time to develop multicelluar life.
My Stepfather worked on the Space Shuttle program and we often talked about space missions. I learned that there was some truth to the fable about the US spending millions to make a pen work in space but Russia used pencils. While that story is not true their engineering tended into that way of thinking. NASA would make multiple redundant systems that make spacecraft heavy, expensive, and complex and such complexity also comes with some increased risks. Russia on the other hand makes one simple but brutally reliable system that may not be elegant, or even heavy for its purpose, but overall just another way to engineer sufficient safety margin while also being relatively cheap and made with somewhat crude manufacturing techniques compared to their western counterparts. There was a lot to admired about the Russian approach to spaceflight. You cannot say they lacked ingenuity because they came up some simple yet very elegant solutions to many problems. Space-X appears to operate along similar lines where they strive to make a simple, easy to fabricate, yet robust and reliable spacecraft where clever engineering will make the cost of access to space much more affordable.
During the first NASA missions the astronauts used pencils. For Project Gemini, for example, NASA ordered mechanical pencils in 1965 from Tycam Engineering Manufacturing, Inc., in Houston. The fixed price contract purchased 34 units at a total cost of $4,382.50, or $128.89 per unit. That created something of a controversy at the time, as many people believed it was a frivolous expense. NASA backtracked immediately and equipped the astronauts with less costly items.
During this time period, Paul C. Fisher of the Fisher Pen Co. designed a ballpoint pen that would operate better in the unique environment of space. His new pen, with a pressurized ink cartridge, functioned in a weightless environment, underwater, in other liquids, and in temperature extremes ranging from -50 F to +400 F.
Fisher developed his space pen with no NASA funding. Fisher offered the pens to NASA in 1965, but, because of the earlier controversy, the agency was hesitant in its approach. In 1967, after rigorous tests, NASA managers agreed to equip the Apollo astronauts with these pens. Media reports indicate that approximately 400 pens were purchased from Fisher at $6 per unit for Project Apollo.
The Soviet Union also purchased 100 of the Fisher pens, and 1,000 ink cartridges, in February 1969, for use on its Soyuz space flights. Previously, its cosmonauts had been using grease pencils to write in orbit.
This kind of reminds me of T-34 Tanks vs Tiger tanks. Putting regimes and even ww2 aside I do wonder how a German vs US vs British vs Russian space program would have developed based on Engineering mentality differences of each culture and the innovations that would have occurred
It's a bit like an extension of industrial revolution and getting to grips with vast expanses via rail.
I know rockets were dual icbm research but the x-15 strategy of rocket propelled planes does make me wonder if that route could have been explored further and adapted into more "mainstream" space flight for oack of s better word in the way concord made commercial flight out of sound barrier breaking military jet technology
I remember watching Garand Thumb’s video on the KS-23 shotgun where he pointed out similar things you did about the construction of that gun. It’s a shotgun made from rejected anti-aircraft barrels that were repurposed into making shotguns with a massive bore (equivalent to 4 gauge). Crude, kind of haphazardly slapped together, but still very functional.
@@gameragodzilla Compare a Kalashnikov (AK-47 or 74) to the Colt/Armalite rifles of our military and you see it there too. The rifle of my USMC service era was M-16A1 and A2 and we would often talk amongst ourselves about which was better (AK or M-16). While the M-16 was certainly more accurate (in particular once ranges get over around 100m) it has very tight tolerances and will jam with the slightest amount of dirt or mud in it's mechanism, vs an AK that is very crude and low tolerances so you can bury it in the sand, let the surf wash over it, pick it up, and it will probably fire just fine. Thus the argument usually ends with "depends on where the fight is and distance to the enemy" as to which is better.
@@larrybremer4930 Yeah. You even see it in the ergonomics. The M16 is generally more ergonomic and you can do certain actions like reloading faster and more comfortably, the AK is less likely to screw up if you’re untrained (for example, one common amateur mistake with the M16 I’ve seen is people inserting the mag on a closed bolt but not all the way and causes the mag to drop out under fire, the rock and lock magazine is easier for an untrained soldier to understand when it’s fully seated). So one is suited for highly trained soldiers who can spend more time on the weapon, the other is suited for less well trained troops that you need to get into adequate performance quickly.
If you look at the timeline, the US was only a few months behind the first satellite and less than 25 days behind the first human. Once Sheppard happened, the US has been in the lead since.
Been looking forward to this video. So far, half way through and I am NOT disappointed. For me you have a documentary narration voice and your audio is crystal clear.
I am so glad you did this because I know a bunch of flat Earthers that needed to see this. I always respected the USSR guts when it came to this ONE area. They may not have had all the tech but they refused to be second place - even if it killed them.
Flat earthers wouldn't believe this video even if they watched it.
Most conspiracy theorists actually double down on their beliefs when presented with evidence to the contrary, because they integrate the evidence into the theory as proof that there is a cover up.
@@stephenh5944 in time maybe some will. Like those in a cult, all you can do is present information that they will remember and then when the time is right they can put it together.
@@John-qv5ux Not all. After years seeing flat earthers, I have seen it go both ways. Needing the info is more important for them to figure it out. It is never about making them believe or this will do it. It is about giving them that info that need till they get to that George Carlin moment with the cult. That moment when they say “hey you are full of 💩 “.
Space history and dunking on tankies? Have my sub.
Your opinion isn't important to anyone lol
@@deemwinchSomeone is salty lmao.
@@deemwinch Telling the uploader they got a new sub is an opinion?
Fascinating documentary. A few interesting comments for your consideration. My uncle launched Vanguard TV-3 (12:37), that failed. That satellite remains in the National Air and Space Museum today. He later launched all the Vanguards and Vanguard-1 remains the oldest man-made still in orbit today. I also understand that at the time of Vanguard (and this may be more rumor than fact), Pres. Eisenhower considered how a US satellite passing over the USSR might be perceived of as a threat to the Soviets (this was also just as Corona was being developed separately by the USA), so the decision was made to 'allow' Sputnik to fly over the USA first. That way the Soviets could not complain if we countered with a satellite of their own flying over their territory at a later point.
Eisenhower halted an American satellite launch in July 1956 so that the Russians would be first and establish "Freedom of Space." The US Army Jupiter C went into mothballs until after the initial Vanguard failures and in 1958 launched the US' first satellite --Explorer I.
Correction: The "Mercury 13" was never a NASA endeavor (unfortunately). It was a completely private program run by the doctor who had performed the physicals on the Mercury 7, but the women he tested were privately funded and were never part of NASA. In fact, the woman who largely bankrolled the program would later testify against allowing women into NASA astronaut ranks, even though the "Mercury 13" had outperformed their male counterparts in several significant ways.
What are those "significant ways"? Curious as they aren't talked about much.
@@nizm0man They didn't "outperform" their male counterparts in anything. One of the Mercury 13 members Wally Funk did become the oldest woman in space at 82 but even this was beaten by William Shatner who was 90 years old.
@@BumboLooks William Shatner is a man last I checked. Don't think he is in the running for oldest woman to visit space.
@@nizm0manIf I recall women generally handled G-forces better than men and I believe were faster to recover from space sickness but don't quote me on that
tankies disliking lmao
the truth is what they hate the most
Lies are what we hate the most.
Credit where it's due the soviets did get robots to the moon and mars first so for their flaws, to compete that closely was still impressive. (While also not down playing it is incredibly more difficult to successfully launch fragile meatballs into space instead of robots)
This is such a great work. I don’t think I’ve ever seen this information all in one place. I like how you provide solid debunking of new-age myths while also maintaining a focus on the humanity of the efforts.
That's so funny that some make the argument that it wasn't a race for USSR because a race is the only context in which the Soviets could be said to have actually been a leader in space.
Komarov did NOT swear anything. he was reporting about everything happening with spacecraft till his death. he is a hero.
Love it or hate it beeping soviet space orb was definitely one of the satellites ever.
IT HAS ARRIVED AT LAST
This video feels awesome. Not only does it have interesting information, but it is produced very well. The vibe is sometimes vintage and sometimes grim, but in the best way possible.
Not only did Laika die in space, she likely suffered terribly, essentially dying due to both lack of oxygen and heat.
yeah that was pretty harrowing
I have a picture that I shot at Bourget 1991’s air show of буран on top of Мрія, I was 20 and ecstatic to witness that !
Long are gone dreams of such a fierce struggle to fly us to the moon and beyond, nowadays are just commercial plans for suborbital flights for the richest…
I remember and old joke, by the late British-American comedian actor Bob Hope, when somebody asked him why the Soviets launched first, instead of Americans, a satelite, The Sputnik. He answered with his classical witty humor: "Because probably their German scientists are better than our German scientists".
I believe an aide of Churchill also said something similar about WW2. Consider Theoretical Physics was not considered prestigious so German Jews gravitated towards it out of a lack of options elsewhere due to prejudice. They were later instrumental in the Manhattan Project. America did indeed have better German Scientists than the Germans did.
They had nearly double the amount, and that's only the quantity admitted to
The sovet advantage in the space races was pretty short and clear: they were willing to have their researchers, workers and astronauts die for the programs, as with all industrial, agricultural, scientific and political programs.
well, actually many more American astronauts have died in space than Soviet cosmonauts, so...
@@arismaiden6457 disclosed deaths are indeed way higher 😉
@@Neat_profile nice strawman
That's not true at all lol. Below is the entire list of spaceflight disasters that resulted in Human casualties and you'll find a couple Soviet at the top but as you scroll through the list most accidents that resulted in crew deaths are from NASA. So cope.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_spaceflight-related_accidents_and_incidents
@@Neat_profile and like i said, the official numbers show them higher. Stick to wikipedia you'll have half a truth
A thing to remember when comparing USSR and US space archievements that Apollo program's budget was times the budget of the whole soviet space industry.
The Soviet space program wasn't cheap either..
@@timbermicka , yes, it sthill was one of the most expensive tech projects in history, but USSR was much less rich country in comparison with the US and their european allies. And it had to be self-sufficient wherein.
The desire to save costs was also why the RBMK reactor at Chernobyl was designed the way it was.
Most expensibe moon teatre
4:49 It’s funny that both women and dogs are held on the same level by tankies.
I've been looking forward to seeing this! Thanks for all the hard work and long hours, DKiS - you rock!
Off to get my popcorn 🍿 😋 and enjoy the show!
Well, the beeps of Sputnik also encoded internal parameters (temperature and pressure)
Another fact to mention about the Buran is that the basis of its design was copied from the U.S Space Shuttle design via espionage of thousands of documents from a NASA database. The contents of those documents included airframe designs (including the computer programs on design analysis), materials, flight computer systems, and propulsion systems. With it the Soviets were able to shave a few years off their program.
We watched the orbiting Sputnik wirh our backyard telescope! Actually, when it caught light just right, we could see it without the telescope.
I've always been amazed about unexpected inflation of the space suit in the space walk on Voskhod 2. A test for this is trivial as all that is needed is to inflate the suit with the same delta P that it would experience in space. From the brief bit of checking I just did the suit pressure was between 4 and 6 psi. So to test the suit for mobility under pressure (and leaks for that matter) it would just need to be inflated 4 to 6 psi above local atmospheric pressure. No testing in a vacuum chamber needed. This would be a simple test that should be done with a person inside and could be done quite safely. This should never have happened.
That's always puzzled me as well.
@@JohnWilliamNowak "space deniers" love to complain about testing space suits in a vacuum chamber. I'm sure that this was done but it is really simple to just do the differential pressure test I described. Also much safer. Then just wait a while to see if there are leaks by looking for a pressure drop. Of course you could do a simple soap bubble test if you like or get fancy and get a helium leak detector. The differential pressure test would work really well to understand mobility issues.
The incessant nitpicking on both sides is nonsense. The U.S. and the U.S.S.R. had different strategic goals -- legitimate or not -- for their space programs. Each country achieved those goals at the time. However, if you are talking about strategic goals, the winner is the country that won the Cold War and emerged with a healthy economy. I don't need to say more here.
What is often overlooked is that spying and espionage played significant roles in advancing both the US and Soviet space program
Mostly the Soviet Union relied and benefitted from espionage.
@@SHVRWKthe US did outright tactically relocate some stuff
@@SHVRWK of course which is why they were... first. oh wait, but at least we can say they used german technology, oh wait they didnt really use that much, and the americans used far more, and used nazi scientists like the wholesome boys they were and they still came second to most things. oh
@@SHVRWK the US also a lot be the 60s the CIA was given all intelligent the could get to NASA analyzing every part of what they where doing and also making sure that no program rivaling Apollo was underway they even stole a whole Satellite which greatly boosted the Program in that time both power where similar in Technology development but be the end of the space race the collapse of the Soviet Economy make sure that no project will be financed enough to keep there edge a lot of Nato tech are based on stolen soviet blueprint why do you think the US had almost anything that could counter soviet tech because they stole them and knew what to produce
@@SHVRWK Yeah. Reminds me of that one time Soviets got the U-2 spy plane to spy on US military installations. Or that one time when Soviets created project Horizon in 1959 and considered placing the nukes in space. Oh wait no, that was the US.
It's depressing that the current Russian space programme is just a shadow of what it was during Soviet Union era. Nowadays they can't even land probes on the Moon succesfully, and won't take long before China and India surpasses Russian space exploration efforts.
Anyway, this was an excellent video.
I like your username. First album I ever bought was Americana.
Something worth pointing out that I don't think you covered:
Luna-9 in 1966 was indeed the first soft(ish) landing on the Moon, but it was more of a controlled crash using airbags (as with NASA's Mars Exploration Rovers many years later) and what landed wasn't even the whole probe but a smaller ejectable capsule.
Of course that's a fine method for landing a small probe without the problems of precision landing, but it's useless for a crewed landing. The American Surveyor 1 landed later the same year, but it used its rockets to come to a precise controlled stop 3 metres above the surface before freefalling onto a set of landing legs. It also landed with over 3 times the mass of Luna 1. This is basically the same landing method used by the NASA Lunar Module so it was Surveyor which made the crewed Lunar landings possible.
The Soviets didn't achieve such a fully controlled landing on any body until Luna-16 in 1970, and that delay killed any chance of a Soviet Moon landing in the 1960s just as much as the N1 launch failures or Soyuz 1 disaster did.
Luna-9 vs Surveyor 1 emphasizes the difference in approach between the Soviet and American space programs during the 1960s. The Soviets were very focused on "firsts" some which were individually worthy achievements while others were just stunts, but the Americans were focused on developing technology and skills for crewed Moon landings and travelling in space in general. They certainly achieved some firsts too, and pulled some stunts, and they were certainly aware of the political (and funding) value of "firsts", but American priorities leaned more toward development rather than the Soviet obsession with achievements. Most American "firsts" were things that were actually useful instead of showy.
In my opinion, it was the Gemini program which won the Americans the space race. So much of what made the Moon landings possible was done during Gemini while the Voskhod program pulled a couple of mostly useless stunts and then just ended.
Bragging about cooking a stray dog in what is basically a exo-atmopheric pressure cooker is a weird flex from the pinkos, especially when it wasn't an accident.
A small price to pay for scientific advancement. Also a massive flex indeed for the time.
The soviet scientist letting the dog stay with him for a night.. that was very heart warming
I love how older air forces sent their pilots out with almost no training, even after serving, Gagarin only having just over 100 hours and being considered a Soviet air force pilot is just insane. Today 100 hours wouldn’t even qualify you as a student pilot.
40-75 to satisfy hourly requirements for a private pilot's license.14 CFR part 61.
Bruh, that was better than like 99% of the "documentaries" on mainstream TV these days. :o
I have been waiting for this video for decades.
My father, a USAF pilot for 25 years, fed my voracious appetite for all things space as a kid. His perception of Soviet "achievements" were precisely this video; he knew the story of the crew that burned up on re-entry, and also told me about how the "first spacewalk" was basically done at verbal gunpoint.
But then Call of Duty Black Ops came out. And zombies taught a generation of disaffected youth that their boring and familiar history had actually been done first, _and_ _cooler_ by the Soviets.
And here we are.
Seems disaffection should be a concern for everyone. Maybe a dometic focused Nasa-like agency could be formed to directly combat disaffection. We know exactly what the domestic problems are, just like we had an objective (aka a problem to be solved) to reach the moon.
It's mind boggling that many American youth see cool value in the Soviets. I've used some Soviet tech, such are cars, radios, cameras and so on. They were all miserable. Comically miserable, with mostly outdated designs even back in the day, and ridiculously low quality of workmanship. Also I remember Soviet tourists who came to my country as groups, in their silly looking buses, shepherded by the KGB. Nothing "cool" about them, especially as their clothing looked like they were 20-30 years behind in fashion sense.
I could not agree more. Kids just think it's "cool" because it's different than what they know. They believe that because the USSR was held in such contempt by the USA that "they must have been on to something", not realizing just how unrecognizable their own lives would be under communist rule.@@Kivikesku
@@Kivikesku I very much don't agree with the idea that all Soviet commercial goods were universally awful quality. I am a hobbyist watchmaker. My stock and trade is Soviet watches, both due to my family's history and personal interest. All of them, regardless of price when new, had at least a decent number of jewels and an actual glydocur balance wheel. Both things that were not guaranteed with Western equivalents. Some designs were what would be considered outdated (such as the everyman's watch ZiM 2602), but none were poor quality. Those are two entirely seperate concepts, as something more modern isn't necessarily better. I've also handled Soviet cameras and don't agree with your analysis there, specifically a 1959 Kiev 4 rangefinder and a 1979 Zenit-E SLR. The Zenit-E is so reliable and simple that it is in fact my regular camera to this day. I can give plenty of other examples if you like, from radios and microscopes to silverware and shaving razors, but I believe you get the point. The quality of Soviet consumer goods depended upon the percieved importance of what was being produced.
@@Soniti1324 The USSR was indeed onto something as the world's first worker's state. Little wonder the US, THE largest capitalist hegemon in the world, expended an astronomical amount of resources to weaken it. That plan obviously worked. That the USSR lasted the 69 years that it did when it was constantly assailed by foreign powers (directly or otherwise) is in itself an accomplishment.
Ironically, the reason for Soviet space success was internal competition between the different design bureaus whereas NASA was one monolithic entity.
An excellent and very interesting video. A major problem for the Soviet Union is that they didn't spend time for testing just to beat America.
My uncle represented the Glenair Company in Germany. Glenair provided the "golden umbilical" for the first US space walk.
Not that I have ANY clue what he did for them, he lived 400 kms away, we met him only on holidays and family meetings. But the company still has its german residence where he lived.
So this is not to provide a lot of information, just to show how small the world is.
i think the Soviets were more advanced and ambitious, but its silly to say it wasn't politically motivated. N1 was ambitious, and perhaps hasty, but i certainly think it was just as improbable as all other rockets. if continued, it would have meant a lot more progress, and perhaps more importantly, spur the US to continue space funding.
Anyone who wants a general idea of what Komarov looked like after the crash, I’m currently staring at the full picture trying to figure out which end is his head
I think I can make out a hand and a forearm. That's about it.
I’m not going to look up the picture, but I have seen the bodies of deer that were hit by semi trucks.
Even though the Soviet union wasn't the superior in space exploration they still managed some very impressive feats
In my opinion the best one was reaching the surface of Venus and actually getting pictures of it back to Earth, and this is when Venus is known for its runaway greenhouse effect, constant storms of acid, and intense heat in hundreds of degrees Celsius
And it's a feat that has never been replicated