Three Russian Space Shot Deaths-- Pre-Gagarin?

Guppy06 writes: "According to this Interfax article, a senior engineer with Experimental Design Office 456 has come forward stating that the USSR attempted launching test pilots on parabolic trajectories (like what American Alan Shepard did in 1961) three different times in 1957, '58, and '59. According to Mikhail Rudenko, after losing test pilots Ledovskikh, Shaborin and Mitkov, the Soviets decided to start giving their cosmonauts special space-flight training, as well as deciding to forget the parabolas and try to reach orbit. Unfortunately, Mr. Rudenko seems to have neglected to tell us how this has yet to turn up in papers released by the CIA or KGB, or about how exactly these three died (on the pad? Re-entry?), but it seems to have a little more meat than the usual conspiracy theories (*cough* fake moon landing *cough*)."

Comments

My favorite space conspiracy theory

[roystgnr]

comes from Robert Heinlein's 1960 essay, "PRAVDA" means "TRUTH":

About noon on Sunday, May 15, we were walking downhill through the park surrounding the castle that dominates Vilno. We encountered a group of six or eight Red Army cadets. Foreigners are a great curiosity in Vilno. Almost no tourists go there. So they stopped and we chatted, myself through our guide and my wife directly, in Russian.

Shortly one of the cadets asked us what we thought of their new manned rocket. We answered that we had had no news lately -- what was it and when did it happen? He told us, with the other cadets listening and agreeing, that the rocket had gone up that very day, and at that very moment a Russian astronaut was in orbit around the earth -- and what did we think of that?

I congratulated them on this wonderous achievement but, privately, felt a dull sickness. The Soviet Union had beaten us to the punch again. But later that day our guide looked us up and carefully corrected the story: The cadet had been mistaken, the rocket was not manned.

That evening we tried to purchase Pravda. No copies were available in Vilno. Later we heard from other Americans that Pravda was not available in other cities in the USSR that evening -- this part is hearsay, of course. We tried also to listen to the Voice of America. It was jammed. We listened to some Soviet radio stations but heard no mention of the rocket.

This is the rocket the Soviets tried to recover and later admitted they had had some trouble with the retrojets; they had fired while the rocket was in the wrong attitude.

So what is the answer? Did that rocket contain only a dummy, as the pravda now claims? Or is there a dead Russian revolving in space? an Orwellian "unperson," once it was realized that he could not be recovered.

I am sure of this: At noon on May 15 a group of Red Army cadets were unanimously positive that the rocket was manned. That pravda did not change until later that afternoon.

I'm not sure what to think. Heinlein's opinion of the Soviet Union was unabashedly critical; but it's not like I'd be any more trusting of official 1960s USSR reports.

The Encyclopedia Astronautica confirms that a Vostok program (the first Russian manned spaceflight) launch did occur on that day, and that it was pushed into a higher orbit when its retrorockets were fired at an incorrect attitude. The Astronautica claims that the launch was intended to test the spacecraft systems, that it was unmanned, and that it was unrecoverable because the heat shield had not been installed. If it lacked a heat shield, then it certainly wasn't a manned flight. But if they were testing reentry by firing the retrorockets, I don't understand why they wouldn't install the heat shield on the vehicle.

I think the "military cadets didn't know what they were talking about" theory is much more likely than the alternative "Heinlein made up some anti-Soviet propaganda" or "the Soviets killed a man, then tried launching dogs for a year until they felt confident to try a manned launch again" theories... but there's nothing quite so entertaining as a good conspiracy theory, is there? And the spacecraft components eventually did reenter, at a random attitude where they would burn up with or without heat shielding, so we'll never really know...

One way moon mission

[XNormal]

Two engineers from Bell Aerospace systems submitted a plan to NASA in 1962 for a one-way manned moon mission in order to beat the russians. The astronaut would have no means of immediate return and would be sustained on the moon by a series of supply rockets until the technology for a return mission is developed.

This wasn't a joke. These engineers were serious.

The 1962 book "The Pilgrim Project" by Hank Searle and the 1968 movie "Countdown" were based on this plan.

It seems to me that such a plan would not only have been a way to beat the russians but also a very effective budget ratchet - you can't cut the budget with a man stranded on the moon...

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Chinese manned space flight

[TMB]

This has come to mind a lot concerning Chinese manned space flight, which is expected to happen sometime within the next 5 years.

Would they announce an attempt beforehand? Or would they wait and see if it were successful first? The Americans could never afford the luxury of waiting to see if it were successful before they told the public it was happening because of the potential outcry, but the Chinese could conceivably do it. It's unlikely, but they may have already tried (and failed) to launch someone into space. The Chinese government has certainly been priming the world to expect an attempt within the next year or two.

I wonder how much a Chinese astronaut (anyone know what the Chinese version of astronaut/cosmonaut would be?) would kick the USA into being more ambitious about the manned space program?

[TMB]

It's all BS.

[cmowire]

There's a pretty good article at http://www.friends-partners.org/mwade/articles/pha part1.htm about that.

The experts pretty much agree that it's very very unlikely that the russians could have mounted a suborbital program.

I personally am inclined to agree with them. They would have turned up a body by now. I suspect that the engineer is looking for cash.

Re:Leftists carelessly sacrificing lives . . .

[TGK]

So holding a degree in Russian History I feel compelled is get really annoyed when people make comments like this.

Firstly, Bolshiviks are different then Communists. W.E.B. DeBouis was a communist. He wasn't a brutal inhuman monster, he was a central figgure in the US civil rights movement, something few people (but the insanely ignorent and bigoted) will be willing to denounce as "brutal [and] inhuman"

Secondly, equating Bolshivism with US leftism is like equating an M80 with a tacnuke. US leftism embrases the ideals (admitedly corrupted by the politicians that enact them) of egalitarianism and equality. US Leftists don't want to abolish the capitalism system, they don't want to set up a system of single party rule, they don't want to nationalize every single industry in the country, and they certainly don't want to deport the population of say, Georgia, to parts of Siberia (little historical joke there, don't expect the fanatic right winger I'm responding to to get this one).

Finaly, to equate even Bolshivism, which was the ideological construct utilized by Lenin in his government with the perverted monstrosity that was Stalinism is another classic historical blunder. Stalin's reign of terror over the USSR changed completely and totaly the nature of the government of the country. Khruschev, Stalin's successor, and Premire of the USSR during the period mentioned (1957-1959) was a follower of Stalin's who broke with Stalin shortly after his death (Stalin's that is, not Khruschev's).

Khruschev's willingness to sacrifice human lives in the interest of science are not really that different then the COUNTLESS crimes our government (as well as the Soviet government) committed against her own citizens. Sending soliders into a nuclear blast zone to test the effects of radiation on troops comes to mind for instance.

Yes, the USSR was a dictatorship. Yes this is a deploreable and horrid thing. But the arrogance of the American people to assume that our system is that terribly much better then theirs is one of the greatest mistakes this country can make. The USSR has much yet to teach us. For example, before Stalin's death in 1953 the USSR claimed (rightfully) a 100% literacy rate. Pretty impressive for a backwards basicly 3rd world nation. Yes, we won the cold war. Yes, capitalism triumphed. But let's try to learn something from our fallen enemy, rather then continuing to blindly demonize him to prop up our own sordid nation.

I'm not even going after the obvious abortion trolls.

This has been another useless post from....