Who won the Space Race? Community poll

[czokletmuss]

There were similiar threads but as far as I remember there wasn't a pol about it. Of course it's not like we can resolve this once and for all, but I'm really curious which option has the majority within the KSP community. We're all space geeks after all, so I expect some good arguments to show up in the discussion. If you are not sure about your answer, take a look at this articles which can be helpful to make up your mind:

1. Space race (wikipedia)

2. Timeline of the space race

3. Timeline of the space race (thespacerace.com)

4. Video (TED-Ed)

Let the voting begins!

Also please remember to post your arguments for chosen superpower.

EDIT: Small update, since there are almost 100 votes already.

Edited September 16, 2013 by czokletmuss

[SuperFastJellyfish]

The USA landed men on the moon. Winner.

[Drunken Hobo]

Depends if you see it as having finished. USSR took the early lead, then USA romped ahead with Apollo & the Space Shuttle. Mir clawed some back for USSR/Russia and they are now ahead, with the USA currently unable to launch any of its own people into space.

[Luigi Broglio]

From a tactical point of view, USSR was at least some months (occasionally some years, see Salyut 1 vs Skylab) ahead of US on determinated period (start of the race, from 1957 to 1962, and first space stations, including one big ss, the MIR, from 1971). USSR did not land on the moon because of N1 program failure, but if the race is intended to take supremacy on earth surrounds, well it could compete with USA.

[BubbaWilkins]

You're going to have to define what "Space Race" really means.

Most people define it as putting a man on the moon.

If you're talking about overall progress in space, than the US has accomplished far more than any other country in both manned and unmanned flight. It's not even close.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_space_travelers_by_nationality

I didn't spend much time looking, but I was unable to locate a single non-US space mission which successfully left the Earth's SOI and travelled to any other location in our system...or recently, out of entirely.

Edited September 13, 2013 by BubbaWilkins

[Tiberion]

...and they are now ahead, with the USA currently unable to launch any of its own people into space.

No, just no. In no way does continuing to use a 40 year old launcher to launch people give them any credit for a "win" in the space race. We could have kept throwing people up there with saturn rockets (not the V) but moved on and did more things.

There is the Apollo program with multiple manned landings, and then long and highly successful career of the Shuttle (which delivered and built most of the ISS) and then the sheer number of unmanned science programs that NASA has ran over the years (Anyone remember a little rover named Curiosity? We had 2 long running rovers on Mars BEFORE that. And probes to every planet in the system and now into interstellar space.)

Russia has done some cool things, but it really doesn't compare at all to the sheer amount of accomplishment that NASA has. It's not even a close "race"

And that's without even considering the things that the US Air Force has done. It runs its own space program.

[czokletmuss]

You're going to have to define what "Space Race" really means.

I'm leaving it undefined on purpose. However, one may say that the Space Race ended in 1991 with USSR collapse. Or maybe it was ended by Soyuz-Apollo. Or maybe it's not yet over

[Ralathon]

It was a long distance pissing contest. Not something that could actually be won from an objective PoV. The USA got humans the furthest because they dumped more money and effort into it, but does that equal winning? The Sovjets figured out a lot of the early tech and managed to do a lot of planetary exploration. It is completely subjective who won. And as Drunken Hobo just said, if you count the race as still going Russia is winning bigtime with some newcomers from Asia as upcoming competition.

[Tiberion]

And as Drunken Hobo just said, if you count the race as still going Russia is winning bigtime

Justify this statement. Explain how the Russian Space Agency is outperforming NASA on any level besides launching people in a can.

[iDan122]

USA won, sent humans farther than anyone before, created the Space Shuttle, launched a bigger space station than Salyut, invented the MMU, sent a lot of probes which Russia often fails at, created the worlds first GPS network(Russia failed again to launch GLONASS), launched the worlds first commercial satellite, performed first rocket launch from airplane.

[lajoswinkler]

The tension was dropped with men landing on the Moon. Later projects have nothing to do with space race as it existed. Otherwise we could speak of a neverending space race.

[BubbaWilkins]

It really doesn't matter how you define the race, by any quantifiable metric the US has achieved more than rest of the entire planet combined.

[Kryten]

Justify this statement. Explain how the Russian Space Agency is outperforming NASA on any level besides launching people in a can.

If 'launching people in a can' is as easy as you're trying to imply, what does it say about NASA that it can't do it?

[Mr Shifty]

I didn't spend much time looking, but I was unable to locate a single non-US space mission which successfully left the Earth's SOI and travelled to any other location in our system...or recently, out of entirely.

You must not have looked very hard. There have been loads of missions launched by other countries which have left Earth's SOI:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Solar_System_probes

China, Russia, Italy, Japan, ESA, Germany, India at least. The Soviets landed 12 probes on Venus; the US has landed zero. The Soviets also landed the first probes on the moon and on Mars, and are the only country to have landed robotic rovers on the moon. (First robotic rovers ever used.)

Edited September 13, 2013 by Mr Shifty
India, not Isreal

[BubbaWilkins]

Kryten,

If you look at the number of people who have been to space on the wiki link I posted, you'll see that the US has put over twice as many people in space than the entire rest of the planet combined. 3x than the Russians. NASA chose to retire the orbiter programs for financial and political reasons. Within a few years, Space X will resume manned flights while the Russians have nothing new on the horizon. To say that the Russian space agency is outperforming Nasa on any level is laughable.

Shifty,

Lots of non-US failures on that list, still you got me there. But that list is completely dominated by US missions as well.

Edited September 13, 2013 by BubbaWilkins

[Tiberion]

If 'launching people in a can' is as easy as you're trying to imply, what does it say about NASA that it can't do it?

NASA absolutely could do and has done it many many times. Currently they choose not to while they develop other things.

It's so easy (in this case, easy meaning the engineering requirements are completely understood and the fabrication of vessels is advanced enough to be automated and 'industrialized') that they're basically letting private companies take care of it. NASA is a scientific organization, not a space taxi company.

If they had really thought it was mission critical to have their own launcher capability they would have helped ULA get the Atlas V man rated and fast tracked a pod for it way before the Shuttles stopped flying. They had plenty of lead time. It's a matter of "Could, but don't want to"

They worked on Constellation instead. Which ended up a mess, but you have to lay the blame on that on on the fools in Washington, not NASA.

Honestly I would say the "race" was over when we touched the Moon, and by the time the USSR finally collapses in the 80s any competition in the space program was exhausted and it was better to cooperate. The 2 programs have really cooperated since then, so it can't be too much of a race.

But for us backseat analysts, its still very clear that NASA has accomplished far more on the scientific front, which is their goal.

[Mr Shifty]

It really doesn't matter how you define the race, by any quantifiable metric the US has achieved more than rest of the entire planet combined.

Hard to justify this statement. R-7 rockets have more total launches than any other rocket family by far. It's quite possible that Russia/Soviets have landed more probes on other planets. Russians astronauts occupy the top 6 slots for longest space flight and the top 19 spots for total time in space.

US definitely leads in deep solar system exploration to the outer planets and beyond, but more and more missions these days are collaborative, rather than national, and the question of who is winning the space race has long been moot.

[Kerbart]

When it comes to manned flight, Russia/Soviet Union clearly won the race. Yes, the USA put men on the moon. But it has seemed to struggle with manned flight every since and the shuttles pulverized the "but that's because it's so much safer" argument where Russia seems to be launching (and landing) their ancient–but–proven–beyond–any–doubt Soyouz with clockwork precision and routine.

When it comes to exploration, the USA is in the lead. As others pointed out, that's not to say that other countries don't do anything. But four probes outside Uranus orbit (with Voyager one being the ongoing joke of "no, really really really this time it has left the solar system!!–but no other craft can even remotely come close to that claim!!), ongoing exploration of Mars and the outer planets... I doubt that anyone would claim NASA is not leading in that segment.

"Race" suggests a finish line, and competition rules. Who crosses that line first is up to the definition of the rules, I don't think you can clearly say one nation is ahead of the other. It all depends on what you choose to look at.

[Kryten]

Within a few years, Space X will resume manned flights while the Russians have nothing new on the horizon.

PTK-NP is 'nothing new' to you? Or OPSEK? Or Yenisei-5?

[Drunken Hobo]

If they had really thought it was mission critical to have their own launcher capability they would have helped ULA get the Atlas V man rated and fast tracked a pod for it way before the Shuttles stopped flying. They had plenty of lead time. It's a matter of "Could, but don't want to"

I feel you're making excuses for them. For NASA, it's hugely embarrassing not to have manned spaceflight capabilities, and that certainly wasn't planned. Russia's Soyuz may be ancient, but it still works & is still cost effective. Better than the USA's nothing.

It's difficult to pick an end point for the space race. If you choose the Moon then USA won, but seeing as a lot of the decisions made back then are still relevant today, I think it's possible to say it's still going.

[Tiberion]

When it comes to manned flight, Russia/Soviet Union clearly won the race. Yes, the USA put men on the moon. But it has seemed to struggle with manned flight every since and the shuttles pulverized the "but that's because it's so much safer" argument where Russia seems to be launching (and landing) their ancient–but–proven–beyond–any–doubt Soyouz with clockwork precision and routine.

Are you somehow trying to suggest that NASA "struggled" with manned flight because it used the Shuttle? The same shuttle fleet that flew 135 missions over 30 years of Service? They were certainly blindly optimistic that it might actually turn into a space taxi with weekly flights, but just because it didn't meet the original, wildly optimistic plans doesn't mean it was a failure. It suffered two awful tragedies in its career, and it was certainly a complex machine, and maybe at its very core it was flawed, but it had a long and successful career nonetheless, and nothing (besides Buran of course) comes close to the capabilities it had)

And you're glossing over some of the issues that Soyuz has had from time to time too.

Kryten: I am not sure that something that is still in the preliminary design phases is quite "on the horizon" yet. Just focusing on PTK-NP which should certainly be the program closest to being done;

It's been under development for almost a decade now, first as ACTS/CSTS as partners with the ESA, then after the ESA decided to move on and do something on their down, as the PPTS. It was supposed to use the RUS-M rockets, which was finally quietly cancelled and then they finally moved on to use the Angara rocket. But we don't know when they'll actually have facilities for Angara to launch from, or when the rocket will be ready. And the craft itself was supposed to be ready within the same timeframe as Orion. Yet despite Constellation's cancellation and the changeover of Orion to to SLS, we're seeing lots of information about the Orion capsule actually being built for its 1st flight (it has its own twitter account, you can follow it) but PTK-NP still seems to be on paper, from what I can see.

I feel you're making excuses for them. For NASA, it's hugely embarrassing not to have manned spaceflight capabilities, and that certainly wasn't planned. Russia's Soyuz may be ancient, but it still works & is still cost effective. Better than the USA's nothing.

Well you can feel that if you want, but it absolutely WAS planned. They didn't just decide one day "oops, no more shuttle flights" - it was known for 4 years that it was ending and NASA made zero efforts to develop a replacement LEO people carrier.

They weighed options on the future of the ISS and basically chose between rushing something Atlas V related into service, or letting Soyuz handle the work while the Commercial Crew program continued.

It is not "hugely embarrassing" outside of having absurd subjective discussions like this about who is winning. What would the US have gained by starting a new manned program that they aren't getting now by using Soyuz and developing a responsible partnership with their commercial partners? Nothing.

Edited September 13, 2013 by Tiberion

[Bunsen]

When it's described as a "race," that suggests that it's won by whoever crosses a line first, not by who does it bigger or accomplishes how much science. Who could still run, or even walk, after the race is also separate question. Things are inherently ambiguous without specifying a finish line, but the Soviets crossed a hell of a lot of lines first (satellite in orbit, man in space, man in orbit, probes orbiting and/or landing on the Moon, Mars, and Venus).

Defining manned landing on the Moon as the sole finish line seems pretty arbitrary -- If you had asked people in 1955 to describe the ultimate milestone in the space race, I don't think many would have said "land on the Moon, and robots don't count." It can be credibly argued that it was the most demanding line that anybody has yet crossed, but following your competitor until he collapses, passing him, and then declaring the finish line doesn't sound right.

If you don't paint it as a race, though, and measure by points scored or yardage or what-have-you, then the USA is the clear leader today.

[Person012345]

USSR. It did everything first except one arbitrary thing. Not that I think anyone really "won" it. Whoever gets the first functional and profitable (not necessarily in monetary terms) off world colony wins the space race imo.

[Britpoint]

Round 1: USSR.

Round 2: USA.

Current leader: USA.

I see "The Space Race" as a bunch of little races. So I'm voting for the USA because as of this moment - Russia can take us into orbit, the USA could take us to the moon. OK, they'd have to ring up a few companies to build a new Saturn V and Apollo capsule, but they would be perfectly capable of rolling a moon mission off the production line. They also have a car-sized robot wandering around the surface of Mars and are the closest to having crewed deep-space capability again, as well as a promising commercial spaceflight industry. Russia, on the other hand, has Soyuz and that's pretty much the lot.

So for me asking "Who won the Space Race?" is a bit like asking "Who won the Olympic 100m?" Well, in 1896 it was Thomas Burke, but every year there's someone new. At the end of the day it's all arbitrary milestones, so I think it is most sensible to view it as an ongoing thing. Otherwise I think you could make a strong case for Germany having won the space race in 1944 for putting the first V2s above the Karman line.

[Camarada Anonimo]

USSR... Won but the USA put the first men in the moon.

That was good times...

Edited September 13, 2013 by Camarada Anonimo