The Doomed Soviet Moon Program ☭ 🚀 | 1955-1991 | Time Travels

In the mid-20th century, the Soviet Union was in the lead of the space race with the United States. However, their space program was a total disaster.
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We'll explore the motivations behind the Soviet Union's space program, the strategies they used, and the resulting failures. During this time, the Soviet Union attempted to launch a number of manned and unmanned space missions. However, most of these missions failed, often due to poor planning or technical glitches. As a result, the Soviet space program was largely unsuccessful and is now widely considered to be one of the biggest failures in history.
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[@ross4569]

Mike, never give up on this channel. It’s such a hidden gem!

[@HistoryTimeTravels]

Thank you! 🙌

[@juliadagnall5816]

An early incident that kind of set the tone for what was to come was the 1960 Nedelin catastrophe that occurred at the Baikonur Cosmodrome. A prototype R-16 missile, a massive multi stage rocket that was intended to support the Soviet moon shot, was being prepared for a test flight when the second stage fired prematurely causing a massive explosion. People near the pad were killed instantly and those farther away were poisoned by vapors from the extremely toxic fuel. The accident was not acknowledged by the Soviet government until 1989 and the exact number killed still remains unknown, but the most recent estimate I could find is 126. The scientists and engineers who worked on the R-16 knew it wasn’t ready but they were pushed to try to meet an unrealistic deadline for propaganda purposes. Any engineering project where the possibility of failure cannot even be discussed is a recipe for disaster, as NASA found out later with the loss of the Challenger space shuttle.

[@sebastiansullivan2323]

TT delivering again with the quality content

[@HistoryTimeTravels]

There's plenty more to come!

[@mikedicenso2778]

You barely touched on one of the biggest contributors to the failure of the USSR to land men on the Moon before the US: The four consecutive failures of the N1-L3 super heavy lift Moon rocket. The problems with the political infighting, combined with the death of Sergei Korolev sealed any chance of there being even a distant runner up manned Soviet landing on the Moon. The lack of funding the program properly certainly contributed since there was no money to adequately test the 30 engines on the massive first stage of the rocket as a whole system on a battleship test stand as was the case with the Saturn V's S-IC first stage, which in turn lead to numerous failures in-flight over the course of four test flights until the program's cancellation in 1974 in favor of other programs and super heavy lift vehicles.

[@paveloleynikov4715]

There more on this. Firstly, N1 was somewhat too late, because after Apollo's first successes support for it allready began to dry out. Secondly - there were fierce battle between Korolev/Glushko and Chelomey (who was working on heavier variant of UR-500/Proton). It was likely that hypothetical UR-700 was far more sound concept than flawed N1

[@plusplusplusplusp]

Great to see you again Mike!

[@chrisleech333]

Another cracking video Mike!

[@PiddeBas]

This channel is gold

[@grvdggr53]

Like others said, Mir, the Venus programs continued so it wasn't over at all after the moon landing. It's just the thing we keep focusing on in the west, but yes it was an amazing feat.

[@hwplugburz]

I always thought it was Glushkos expolding N1 rocket that sealed the faith of the soviet moonprogram. But as usual thers always more that one reason...

[@Cryovenator]

Fun fact: my grandfather used to work at Baikonur

[@ogjk]

Did he get to urinate where the cosmonauts did preflight?

[@Cryovenator]

@@ogjk I’m not sure about that.

[@hwplugburz]

@@Cryovenator they have a sermonie around that. Ever since Gagarin..

[@briannicholas2757]

A great video Mike, keep going. This video reminded me of a n article and photo published by The Onion, a tongue in cheek, satirical "newspaper". The picture was of a bedraggled man, hammering away at a wooden framed structure, a brown paper bag with a vodka bottle neck sticking out, and the caption that this was a Soviet space worker constructing the great Soviet space station. Other than tanks and the occasional jet, the Soviets never were able to buold much of anything that worked right. The communist ideology that failure was never an option and to even think so merited a death sentence or a lifetime of hard labor in a gulag, meant that soviet engineers relued more on good luck than good design practices.

[@brianarbenz1329]

_the Soviets never were able to buold much of anything that worked right._ Except for subways and rail transit, dams and electric power plants, a school system that ended illiteracy (which had been 80 percent in 1917), the first cornea surgery to end nearsightedness (a technique still in use in the U.S.), total oil self sufficiency despite vast industrial and transit expansion, the first space stations (which were not wooden, actually). Sure, there were lots of terrible quality lapses and shortages of basic goods; I'm not a supporter of the Soviet-style model, but I am a supporter of better understanding of history than your sweeping statement that they never were able to "buold" much that worked right.

[@alanluscombe8a553]

I am fascinated with space flight. I am glad America was first in the moon and Apollo program was incredible. I do wish soviets had made it to the moon as well. The reds did have massive early success but I do believe they had many failures that were hidden.

[@TheHylianBatman]

I wish we could band together to make space travel accessible and beneficial to all, rather than just the rich or the government. I don't want a space race. I don't want billionaires doing anything. I just want mankind to explore, to discover. To learn.

[@alanluscombe8a553]

Well it takes someone with money and it is being privatized more now. Maybe we get there one day as we did with air flight but it just takes time and money

[@charlietbarnes4842]

I so luv this lil cutie x

[@davidpawson7393]

Which flerf will comment first? Behind the Curve is such a fitting name.

[@brianarbenz1329]

There would have been no moon race if the U.S.'s first satellite Explorer 1 had beaten Sputnik into orbit (which it nearly did), and Alan Shepherd's first flight had beaten Yuri Gagarin into space, or conceivably if even John Glenn's first orbital flight had beaten Gagarin. John F. Kennedy desperately needed a way to end the perception that we were perpetually behind the Soviets in space. He was facing heat from conservatives for not being anti-communist enough. So, at Lyndon Johnson's suggestion, he pushed the finish line off to the end of the decade to get the media to frame the race as just beginning, rather than the U.S. having already lost. In fact, in the early years of space exploration, the United States was not behind; Explorer 1 achieved huge successes, while Sputnik merely beeped. The first Mercury flights did many more things than the first Vostoks did, like fly manually. If we had launched those slightly before the Soviet missions, our lead in space would have been apparent, and there would have been no challenge to get to the moon by 1969. We still would have endeavored to get people to the moon, maybe by the late 1970s, and maybe as an international mission.

[@JuPiTeR_0211]

Then the soviets would have pushed and landed on the moon and mars, like the usa did later

[@Edward135i]

Well basically we had better space Nazis working on our rockets than the Soviet's did.

[@thejudgmentalcat]

Soviets did land on Venus...

[@ogjk]

For 2 hours...

[@ogjk]

Yes they did I agree with you on that point, its impressive that the USSR/Russia was able to do so much with 1/3 the population, less budgets and pilford tech.

[@Cryovenator]

Korolev was a Ukrainian not a Russian

[@filip1408]

Lol you really lack perspective

[@Cryovenator]

@@filip1408 what do you mean?

[@hwplugburz]

Makes sence :) After all you were known as "the brain of the USSR" at the time.

[@paveloleynikov4715]

Yes, but in that context there are another technicality. Many US creators think that "Russian" could be used interchangebly with "Soviet", which is much more appropriate in this case

[@SPACE_NERD_2009]

1st

[@davidpawson7393]

Yep, thanks for the recognition. I was too modest.