A Space & astronomy forum. SpaceBanter.com

Go Back   Home » SpaceBanter.com forum » Space Science » History
Site Map Home Authors List Search Today's Posts Mark Forums Read Web Partners

How the CIA took America to the Moon



 
 
Thread Tools Display Modes
  #1  
Old April 19th 10, 01:44 AM posted to sci.space.history
F/32 Eurydice
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 40
Default How the CIA took America to the Moon


Several years ago, PBS had a documentary whose name I can't remember,
but I think that is was simply an American history of the year 1968.
According to that documentary, NASA sent Apollo 8 to the moon, because
the CIA told them the Soviets were about to beat us to that goal.
Their original plan was just to continue doing docking rehearsals in
Earth orbit with the LEM.

I've always wondered if the CIA gave the alarm because they had
reconnaissance photos of the N1 on the pad, before the big explosion.
It turns out that, although it wasn't the famous mega-explosion, the
N1 did have it's first launch failure on 2/21/69, which was just two
months after the Apollo 8 Christmas flight, in1968.

I'm going to continue assuming that my theory is correct, and that the
CIA's photos were of the N1 being prepared on the pad for its first
test flight. They had good data, but as usual they didn't know how to
interpret it, because espionage is mostly guesswork and assuming the
worst. The Soviets were about to try to launch, but they were nowhere
near beating us into space.
  #2  
Old April 19th 10, 05:01 AM posted to sci.space.history
Damon Hill[_3_]
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 162
Default How the CIA took America to the Moon

"F/32 Eurydice" wrote in news:d6364239-7789-458f-
:


Several years ago, PBS had a documentary whose name I can't remember,
but I think that is was simply an American history of the year 1968.
According to that documentary, NASA sent Apollo 8 to the moon, because
the CIA told them the Soviets were about to beat us to that goal.
Their original plan was just to continue doing docking rehearsals in
Earth orbit with the LEM.

I've always wondered if the CIA gave the alarm because they had
reconnaissance photos of the N1 on the pad, before the big explosion.
It turns out that, although it wasn't the famous mega-explosion, the
N1 did have it's first launch failure on 2/21/69, which was just two
months after the Apollo 8 Christmas flight, in1968.

I'm going to continue assuming that my theory is correct, and that the
CIA's photos were of the N1 being prepared on the pad for its first
test flight. They had good data, but as usual they didn't know how to
interpret it, because espionage is mostly guesswork and assuming the
worst. The Soviets were about to try to launch, but they were nowhere
near beating us into space.


They were, however, sending modified Soyuz spacecraft on circumlunar
trajectories via the Proton launcher. A propoganda coup probably seemed
imminent with a manned flight (though more than one of the Zond flights
would have killed a human crew).

Apollo 8 very effectively trumped that.

--Damon
  #3  
Old April 19th 10, 05:23 AM posted to sci.space.history
Brad Guth[_3_]
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 15,175
Default How the CIA took America to the Moon

On Apr 18, 5:44*pm, "F/32 Eurydice" wrote:
Several years ago, PBS had a documentary whose name I can't remember,
but I think that is was simply an American history of the year 1968.
According to that documentary, NASA sent Apollo 8 to the moon, because
the CIA told them the Soviets were about to beat us to that goal.
Their original plan was just to continue doing docking rehearsals in
Earth orbit with the LEM.

I've always wondered if the CIA gave the alarm because they had
reconnaissance photos of the N1 on the pad, before the big explosion.
It turns out that, although it wasn't the famous mega-explosion, the
N1 did have it's first launch failure on 2/21/69, which was just two
months after the Apollo 8 Christmas flight, in1968.

I'm going to continue assuming that my theory is correct, and that the
CIA's photos were of the N1 being prepared on the pad for its first
test flight. *They had good data, but as usual they didn't know how to
interpret it, because espionage is mostly guesswork and assuming the
worst. *The Soviets were about to try to launch, but they were nowhere
near beating us into space.


At least our mutually perpetrated cold-war was certainly good for
government job security.

~ BG
  #5  
Old April 19th 10, 10:22 AM posted to sci.space.history
Pat Flannery
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 18,465
Default How the CIA took America to the Moon

On 4/18/2010 4:44 PM, F/32 Eurydice wrote:

Several years ago, PBS had a documentary whose name I can't remember,
but I think that is was simply an American history of the year 1968.
According to that documentary, NASA sent Apollo 8 to the moon, because
the CIA told them the Soviets were about to beat us to that goal.
Their original plan was just to continue doing docking rehearsals in
Earth orbit with the LEM.

I've always wondered if the CIA gave the alarm because they had
reconnaissance photos of the N1 on the pad, before the big explosion.
It turns out that, although it wasn't the famous mega-explosion, the
N1 did have it's first launch failure on 2/21/69, which was just two
months after the Apollo 8 Christmas flight, in1968.

I'm going to continue assuming that my theory is correct, and that the
CIA's photos were of the N1 being prepared on the pad for its first
test flight. They had good data, but as usual they didn't know how to
interpret it, because espionage is mostly guesswork and assuming the
worst. The Soviets were about to try to launch, but they were nowhere
near beating us into space.


It wasn't the N-1 they were worried about, it was the Proton/Zond, which
would have been able to send a single cosmonaut on a mission that would
loop around the Moon (without entering orbit) and return to Earth.
They had already done unmanned tests of that scenario, and the CIA
thought a manned flight could well be imminent, despite the fact that
the unmanned flights had not gone well:
http://www.astronautix.com/craft/soyz7kl1.htm
CIA had photos of both the Proton/Zond and N-1 boosters; here's a
detailed article about the N-1 photos:
http://www.globalsecurity.org/intell..._follow-on.htm

Pat

  #6  
Old April 19th 10, 10:35 AM posted to sci.space.history
Pat Flannery
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 18,465
Default How the CIA took America to the Moon

On 4/19/2010 1:22 AM, Pat Flannery wrote:

It wasn't the N-1 they were worried about, it was the Proton/Zond, which
would have been able to send a single cosmonaut on a mission that would
loop around the Moon (without entering orbit) and return to Earth.


Make that two cosmonauts.

Pat
  #7  
Old April 19th 10, 10:36 AM posted to sci.space.history
Pat Flannery
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 18,465
Default How the CIA took America to the Moon

On 4/18/2010 8:01 PM, Damon Hill wrote:

Apollo 8 very effectively trumped that.


Also, the Saturn V and CSM was ready to go, but the LM wasn't, so an
orbital test of the LM had to wait for Apollo 9.
Leonov is still ****ed off that they wouldn't let him try a Zond flight
to beat Apollo 8.

Pat
  #8  
Old April 19th 10, 05:39 PM posted to sci.space.history
Pat Flannery
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 18,465
Default How the CIA took America to the Moon

On 4/19/2010 12:17 AM, Damon Hill wrote:

Given the chaotic Soviet space program at the time, it's surprising
that the CIA could getany "intelligence" out of that mess.


Their still-classified "Gambit" satellite imagery let them get some
photos of the Proton that were good enough to count the number of stages
on it, and that let them figure out its mission - as there was an extra
stage besides those needed to get it into Earth orbit.
The fact that there was an escape tower on top of it showed it was
intended to be manned, so it didn't take too much guesswork to figure
out what its intended mission was.
N-1 was so big that its only two possible missions were either putting a
big space station into orbit or a manned Moon mission, and the long
white cylindrical thing atop the third stage looked like an inefficient
design for a space station. Besides, it also had a escape tower atop it,
and if you were going to send up a big space station, you could make it
even larger if you just orbited it unmanned and then sent up crew
ferries to it rather than sending it up with some sort of manned
spacecraft already attached to it. Ergo, this was the manned Moon
landing mission rocket.
Mark Wade has a good article about what the CIA knew about the Soviet
space program over the years he
http://www.astronautix.com/articles/whanowit.htm
....with pdfs of the now declassified documents linked to the article.
The Soviets also made a few slips in what they publicly released, like a
photo of two space-suited cosmonauts standing in front of a giant globe
of the Moon, a cosmonaut peering out of what would normally be the
back-up parachute stowage hatch on a Soyuz descent module that was now a
entry hatch (on the normal Soyuz you get in via a side hatch on the
orbital module, then climb down into the descent module), and in a major
oversight, basic drawings of the rotating launch tower design for a
giant rocket (the N-1) that showed up in a architectural magazine.
Particularly for a program as big as the N-1, it must have been almost
impossible to keep it all secret, as someone who was involved with it
was sure to blab about the new super rocket that was being built.
What really would have thrown American intelligence services a curveball
would have been any info they got their hands on regarding Chelomei's
parallel manned Moon program, as it would have made no sense to them to
have two manned Moon programs running at once, particularly with
different boosters.

Pat
  #9  
Old April 25th 10, 11:34 PM posted to sci.space.history
Brad Guth[_3_]
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 15,175
Default How the CIA took America to the Moon

On Apr 24, 8:20*pm, Dan Birchall
wrote:
(F/32 Eurydice) wrote:
*Several years ago, PBS had a documentary whose name I can't remember,
*but I think that is was simply an American history of the year 1968.
*According to that documentary, NASA sent Apollo 8 to the moon, because
*the CIA told them the Soviets were about to beat us to that goal.
*Their original plan was just to continue doing docking rehearsals in
*Earth orbit with the LEM.


The cold-war and propaganda bits went a bit further back than that,
like requirement 5 of the Project Horizon report (9 June 1959):

"To be second to the Soviet Union in establishing an outpost on the
*moon would be disastrous to our nation's prestige and in turn to
*our democratic philosophy. Although it is contrary to United States
*policy, the Soviet Union in establishing the first permanent base,
*may claim the moon or critical areas thereof for its own. Then a
*subsequent attempt to establish an outpost by the United States
*might be considered and propagandised as a hostile act. The Soviet
*Union in propaganda broadcasts has announced the 50th anniversary
*of the present government (1967) will be celebrated by Soviet
*citizens on the moon. The National Space policy intelligence
*estimate is that the Soviets could land on the moon by 1968."[1]

So if the CIA said that kind of thing in shortly before 1968, it was
just repeating things that had been said for over a decade.

[1]http://www.astronautix.com/articles/prorizon.htm

--
djb@ | Dan Birchall, Night Operation Assistant, Subaru Telescope/NAOJ.
naoj | Views I express are my own, obviously not those of my employer.
.org | Our atmospheric inversion layer keeps silly people below 3000m.


Is that what those Rothschild K12 approved years of education told you
to say?

Why are you sticking up for and/or brown-nosing on behalf of those
that clearly got us into this mess?

Are you going to suggest that no one private or public funded group or
agency was ever responsible for distorting or perpetrating anything?

The cold war started before the end of WW2, by those of both/multiple
sides desperately in need of a continued public-funded wartime economy
(false flagged, bogus or otherwise perpetrated made no matter). Faith-
based global domination is today as big as ever, and those puppet
strings attached to our private parts are seemingly tougher than ever
in spite of their child fondling, satanic rituals, corporate and
government debauchery and systematic failures to police their own
kind.

Mainstream religion is still the other half or corner stone of our
government that’s not taking care of business unless it improves and/
or protects their own quality of life. At times President BHO seems
to be on the side of doing what’s right for the greater good of
humanity and our environment, not that the demise of JFK for going too
far is ever misunderstood or underestimated.

~ BG
  #10  
Old April 27th 10, 11:33 PM posted to sci.space.history
Brad Guth[_3_]
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 15,175
Default How the CIA took America to the Moon

On Apr 27, 7:46*am, Dan Birchall
wrote:
(Brad Guth) wrote:
*On Apr 24, 8:20?pm, Dan Birchall
The cold-war and propaganda bits went a bit further back than that,
like requirement 5 of the Project Horizon report (9 June 1959):


"To be second to the Soviet Union in establishing an outpost on the
?moon would be disastrous to our nation's prestige and in turn to
?our democratic philosophy. Although it is contrary to United States
?policy, the Soviet Union in establishing the first permanent base,
?may claim the moon or critical areas thereof for its own. Then a
?subsequent attempt to establish an outpost by the United States
?might be considered and propagandised as a hostile act. The Soviet
?Union in propaganda broadcasts has announced the 50th anniversary
?of the present government (1967) will be celebrated by Soviet
?citizens on the moon. The National Space policy intelligence
?estimate is that the Soviets could land on the moon by 1968."[1]


So if the CIA said that kind of thing in shortly before 1968, it was
just repeating things that had been said for over a decade.


[1]http://www.astronautix.com/articles/prorizon.htm

*Are you going to suggest that no one private or public funded group or
*agency was ever responsible for distorting or perpetrating anything?


No, just pointing out that the stuff the CIA apparently said in 1968,
wasn't particularly new or original.

--
djb@ | Dan Birchall, Night Operation Assistant, Subaru Telescope/NAOJ.
naoj | Views I express are my own, certainly not those of my employer.
.org | Oh wicked, bad, naughty, _evil_ Dan! *He is a _naughty_ person.


Neither was anything Kissinger, Dick Cheney and their puppet warlord
GW Bush had to say, but it still created 9/11 and got us into yet
another spendy and lethal war that was as bogus/phony as Muslim WMD.

~ BG
 




Thread Tools
Display Modes

Posting Rules
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts

vB code is On
Smilies are On
[IMG] code is On
HTML code is Off
Forum Jump

Similar Threads
Thread Thread Starter Forum Replies Last Post
How Randolph Rae put America on the Moon? Pat Flannery History 2 November 12th 12 09:40 AM
The End of America? SuperCool Plasma Misc 0 September 5th 05 09:31 PM
The Saturn V Took America to the Moon. Now It's Bringing Us to the Museum. Jim Oberg History 7 January 13th 05 04:45 AM


All times are GMT +1. The time now is 01:00 PM.


Powered by vBulletin® Version 3.6.4
Copyright ©2000 - 2024, Jelsoft Enterprises Ltd.
Copyright ©2004-2024 SpaceBanter.com.
The comments are property of their posters.