7 ms·

One thing I've found facinating was, after the USSR launched the first satelite, and put the first man in space, the USA managed to redefine "win" as being "the

One thing I've found facinating was, after the USSR launched the first satelite, and put the first man in space, the USA managed to redefine "win" as being "the moon".

simonh 8y ago
I think if the Russians had put a man on Mars in the 70s and America hadn't, we would have a different definition of Winning. In most wars for example who ever wins the first battle is important, but it's who wins the last battle that really matters.
- isostatic 8y ago
  Given that Russia and China can put a man in space, keep him there for a year, and return him to Earth safely, and the US can't, I guess that means Russia and China have won then.
  - simonh 8y ago
    Yep, for now definitely winning.
  - qaq 8y ago
    USSR could do that Russia not so much.
    - garmaine 8y ago
      They’re doing it every six months...
      - qaq 8y ago
        They can send a human in space they can not keep human in space for a year without use of ISS. Russia does not have resources or human capital to build a new space station.
        simonh 8y ago
        They built and still own big chunks of the ISS and the ISS has only been habitable and functional thanks to them for many years. It's not like they don't have space station technology. If they really wanted to put something up separately, they'd just do it, no problem. It's just a matter of resource allocation, not absolute capacity.
        qaq 8y ago
        It's a matter of human capital USSR specialists are either dead, retired or about to retire there are no replacements for them plus total and absolute corruption is significantly affecting ability to produce anything.
        jessaustin 8y ago
        This is the sort of claim for which I'd like to see some support.
        qaq 8y ago
        Look at the photo of Roskosmos senior people :) On a serious note you can just look at all the launch issues Roskosmos is having. They have prosecuted people for stealing gold parts from rocket engines among other things.
        madeuptempacct 8y ago
        What is there to support? Russia is very much a mafia state at this point. Any leads in tech that Russia had are lost by Putin refusing to invest in technology and small business. By Putin putting incompetent people in leadership positions of corporations that run the space program and fighter production (note how PAK FA is dead). Sure, Russia's military is decent, and great giving the budgetary constraints, but there is no future without economy and tech. I am definitely not anti-Russian, but it's in a depressing state.
        ForHackernews 8y ago
        I think they are in fact planning to continue with their own station after the non-Russian components of the ISS are deorbited: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orbital_Piloted_Assembly_and_Experiment_Complex https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orbital_Piloted_Assembly_and_E...
  - ApolloFortyNine 8y ago
    Is there a doubt we couldn't though? I think that's what defines the moon landing as an accomplishment, it was an impressive feat, especially for the time (an ESP8266 is much more powerful than any computer they had at the time). I'm sure if you gave 20 billion more a year to NASA and said put a man in space, we could do so. It's just that quite frankly, we've out grown human beings in space, beyond simply doing so for bragging rights. You can do any kind of tests you want, with almost no limit to complexity, with robotics nowadays, and I don't believe we feel the need to "race" Russia and China to goals we've already accomplished. There's simply better ways to spend the money, research wise.
- mariuolo 8y ago
  > I think if the Russians had put a man on Mars in the 70s and America hadn't, we would have a different definition of Winning. Putting a man on Mars would have required a monumental investment, which the USSR couldn't remotely afford. And if they somehow had found a way to do that, they would have had to quit the arms race, which could very well have been considered a "win" for the US.
NikolaeVarius 8y ago
This seems needlessly diminishing of the accomplishments of the Space Program. The Soviet Space program (and US) explicitly wanted to place men on the Moon and Mars, and Korolev had a goal of doing that by 1968. Hell, the only reason the Soviets didn't start their specific Moon program earlier was due to personal issues between competing departments as well as the Governments insistence that the space program be specialized toward weaponry rather than outright exploration.
porpoisely 8y ago
So goes the world of propaganda. Another interesting spin is how we frame ourselves as being the anti-imperial liberators of the world and praising ourselves for workers' rights, anti-child labor and pro-living wage. It was actually the soviets who were anti-imperial and pro workers rights. It's why they initially won so many fans in china, india, africa, vietnam, etc. Didn't someone say history is a lie we tell ourselves over and over again until we forget it is a lie? Now in defense of the US, the soviets did put a satellite up first, but we were more than capable of doing so at the same time or even before. We sent up a satellite 2 months after the soviets. Contrast that with the moon landing. The soviets never sent a man to the moon even decades after we did. So in that light, I think the moon landing was far more impressive and representative of "victory" for a lack of a better word. Perhaps we can say the soviets won the first space battle, but we won the space war? Without a doubt, we won the PR war as the moon landing and armstrong's "That's one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind" will be the iconic and defining moment of the space race for the rest of history.
- dnautics 8y ago
  > It was actually the soviets who were anti-imperial and pro workers rights. Now that I know more about just how atrocious the us was internally to it's minorities and worse to several foreign countries during the cold war era, I sometimes wonder just how it was that the US won the cold war, and then I see something like 'death of stalin' and I come to understand that the other side was just as venal and absurdly incompetent, and just as incapable of living up to it's founding ideals
  - wazoox 8y ago
    Don't forget how ridiculously small USSR economy was compared to the US, too.
- e12e 8y ago
  > The soviets never sent a man to the moon even decades after we did. So in that light, I think the moon landing was far more impressive and representative of "victory" for a lack of a better word. Well, Soviet was first to "touch" the moon (Luna 2, 1959),first to "soft land" on the moon (Luna 9 and 13, 1966), did a unmanned lunar soil sample return (Luna 16, 1970), moon rover (Luna 17, 1970). Particularily combining first human safe return trip to space followed by landing a rover (shortly after Apollo) - it makes sense for Soviet to claim Mars as the "real" target for human exploration... After having tested "all parts" to a certain extent.
Tsubasachan 8y ago
Well nobody in the West wanted the USSR to win the space race so the victory was graciously granted to the United States. Ah the Cold War: when everyone was united in a common struggle against communism whether you spoke Italian, American or Japanese.

One thing I've found facinating was, after the USSR launched the first satelite, and put the first man in space, the USA managed to redefine "win" as being "the moon".

simonh 8y ago

I think if the Russians had put a man on Mars in the 70s and America hadn't, we would have a different definition of Winning. In most wars for example who ever wins the first battle is important, but it's who wins the last battle that really matters.

isostatic 8y ago
Given that Russia and China can put a man in space, keep him there for a year, and return him to Earth safely, and the US can't, I guess that means Russia and China have won then.
- simonh 8y ago
  Yep, for now definitely winning.
- qaq 8y ago
  USSR could do that Russia not so much.
  - garmaine 8y ago
    They’re doing it every six months...
    - qaq 8y ago
      They can send a human in space they can not keep human in space for a year without use of ISS. Russia does not have resources or human capital to build a new space station.
      - simonh 8y ago
        They built and still own big chunks of the ISS and the ISS has only been habitable and functional thanks to them for many years. It's not like they don't have space station technology. If they really wanted to put something up separately, they'd just do it, no problem. It's just a matter of resource allocation, not absolute capacity.
        qaq 8y ago
        It's a matter of human capital USSR specialists are either dead, retired or about to retire there are no replacements for them plus total and absolute corruption is significantly affecting ability to produce anything.
        jessaustin 8y ago
        This is the sort of claim for which I'd like to see some support.
        qaq 8y ago
        Look at the photo of Roskosmos senior people :) On a serious note you can just look at all the launch issues Roskosmos is having. They have prosecuted people for stealing gold parts from rocket engines among other things.
        madeuptempacct 8y ago
        What is there to support? Russia is very much a mafia state at this point. Any leads in tech that Russia had are lost by Putin refusing to invest in technology and small business. By Putin putting incompetent people in leadership positions of corporations that run the space program and fighter production (note how PAK FA is dead). Sure, Russia's military is decent, and great giving the budgetary constraints, but there is no future without economy and tech. I am definitely not anti-Russian, but it's in a depressing state.
      - ForHackernews 8y ago
        I think they are in fact planning to continue with their own station after the non-Russian components of the ISS are deorbited: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orbital_Piloted_Assembly_and_Experiment_Complex https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orbital_Piloted_Assembly_and_E...
- ApolloFortyNine 8y ago
  Is there a doubt we couldn't though? I think that's what defines the moon landing as an accomplishment, it was an impressive feat, especially for the time (an ESP8266 is much more powerful than any computer they had at the time). I'm sure if you gave 20 billion more a year to NASA and said put a man in space, we could do so. It's just that quite frankly, we've out grown human beings in space, beyond simply doing so for bragging rights. You can do any kind of tests you want, with almost no limit to complexity, with robotics nowadays, and I don't believe we feel the need to "race" Russia and China to goals we've already accomplished. There's simply better ways to spend the money, research wise.
mariuolo 8y ago
> I think if the Russians had put a man on Mars in the 70s and America hadn't, we would have a different definition of Winning. Putting a man on Mars would have required a monumental investment, which the USSR couldn't remotely afford. And if they somehow had found a way to do that, they would have had to quit the arms race, which could very well have been considered a "win" for the US.

NikolaeVarius 8y ago

This seems needlessly diminishing of the accomplishments of the Space Program. The Soviet Space program (and US) explicitly wanted to place men on the Moon and Mars, and Korolev had a goal of doing that by 1968. Hell, the only reason the Soviets didn't start their specific Moon program earlier was due to personal issues between competing departments as well as the Governments insistence that the space program be specialized toward weaponry rather than outright exploration.

porpoisely 8y ago

So goes the world of propaganda. Another interesting spin is how we frame ourselves as being the anti-imperial liberators of the world and praising ourselves for workers' rights, anti-child labor and pro-living wage. It was actually the soviets who were anti-imperial and pro workers rights. It's why they initially won so many fans in china, india, africa, vietnam, etc. Didn't someone say history is a lie we tell ourselves over and over again until we forget it is a lie? Now in defense of the US, the soviets did put a satellite up first, but we were more than capable of doing so at the same time or even before. We sent up a satellite 2 months after the soviets. Contrast that with the moon landing. The soviets never sent a man to the moon even decades after we did. So in that light, I think the moon landing was far more impressive and representative of "victory" for a lack of a better word. Perhaps we can say the soviets won the first space battle, but we won the space war? Without a doubt, we won the PR war as the moon landing and armstrong's "That's one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind" will be the iconic and defining moment of the space race for the rest of history.

dnautics 8y ago
> It was actually the soviets who were anti-imperial and pro workers rights. Now that I know more about just how atrocious the us was internally to it's minorities and worse to several foreign countries during the cold war era, I sometimes wonder just how it was that the US won the cold war, and then I see something like 'death of stalin' and I come to understand that the other side was just as venal and absurdly incompetent, and just as incapable of living up to it's founding ideals
- wazoox 8y ago
  Don't forget how ridiculously small USSR economy was compared to the US, too.
e12e 8y ago
> The soviets never sent a man to the moon even decades after we did. So in that light, I think the moon landing was far more impressive and representative of "victory" for a lack of a better word. Well, Soviet was first to "touch" the moon (Luna 2, 1959),first to "soft land" on the moon (Luna 9 and 13, 1966), did a unmanned lunar soil sample return (Luna 16, 1970), moon rover (Luna 17, 1970). Particularily combining first human safe return trip to space followed by landing a rover (shortly after Apollo) - it makes sense for Soviet to claim Mars as the "real" target for human exploration... After having tested "all parts" to a certain extent.

Tsubasachan 8y ago

Well nobody in the West wanted the USSR to win the space race so the victory was graciously granted to the United States. Ah the Cold War: when everyone was united in a common struggle against communism whether you spoke Italian, American or Japanese.