Soviet and Russian Lunar Exploration

programme encountered ever more difficulties, the Russians gave their space station
programme ever more retrospective justification.
The Soviet Union's space station programme in the early to mid-1970s was cursed
with difficulties, and these certainly contributed to Mishin's downfall as much as the
moon race. The first crew to reach Salyut was able to link to the station, but not dock
properly or enter the station and had to make an emergency return. In the worst-ever
disaster to affect the manned programme, the three cosmonauts who flew to Salyut in
June 1971 perished on their return, when a depressurization valve opened at high
altitude. The next Salyut crashed on launch in July 1972.
The racing days of the moon programme echoed again in spring 1973 as the
Americans at last prepared to launch their space station, Skylab. To match Skylab, the
Russians prepared two space stations for launch, planning to have both of them
operational and occupied at the same time. The first, which was also the first Almaz
station, suffered an on-orbit engine explosion and had to be abandoned before it was
manned. The second accidentally exhausted all its fuel on its first orbit and also had to
be abandoned. It must have galled the Russians that America's Skylab then went on to
become such a stunning success.
The first successful space station occupation did not take place until July 1974,
when Pavel Popovich and Yuri Artyukin occupied the second Almaz station. This was
the first flight after the dismissal of Mishin and the first to take place on Glushko's
watch. Even then, the space station programme was to suffer many setbacks and
disappointments. Soyuz 15, 23 and 25 had to come down early when their docking
manoeuvres failed. The space station programme did not reach maturity until Salyut 6
(occupied 1977-82) and 7 (occupied 1982-6). Here, Soviet cosmonauts learned to live
in space, pushing back the frontiers of long-distance flight to 96,139,175,185,211 and
237 days. Salyuts received regular visitors: unmanned refuelling craft and visiting
missions from the socialist countries. With Mir (occupied 1986-2000), the Soviet
Union built a permanent orbital station. Mir became to the Soviet programme what
Apollo had been to the Americans. Only by returning to its roots in the writings of
Tsiolkovsky and the other early visionaries did the programme at last find its true
vocation.
THE RACE THAT NEVER WAS
Conventional wisdom about why the Russians lost the moon race is that their
technology was inferior and simply could not match the sophistication of Apollo.
During the 1970s and 1980s, most Western observers took the view that the Soviet
Union never had the technical capacity to send cosmonauts to the moon or land them
on it.
Examination of the two paths taken to the moon by the space superpowers shows
that this is not the case. The Soviet Union:
• Proved, with Zonds 7 and 8, that it could send cosmonauts around the moon and
recover them safely, using different return trajectories.