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Space race memories

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It’s been 40 years since the United States’ astronauts landed on the moon. It’s been one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind and it appears even more of a leap for some Russians to believe that the Americans actually landed on the moon first. Jessica Golloher has the details from Moscow.
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LISA MULLINS: I’m Lisa Mullins, and this is The World.  Forty years ago, the space race ended when American astronauts walked on the moon.  The race between the United States and what was then the Soviet Union obsessed both countries, and cost tens of billions of dollars and rubles.  The space race was portrayed as a competition to prove whether communism or capitalism was superior.  And, as Jessica Golloher reports from Moscow, Russians, at least still some of them, still smart from the contest.

JESSICA GOLLOHER: Russia’s state run TV network, Vesti acknowledged the climax of the two decade-long space race showing pictures of Neil Armstrong, walking on the moon, planting an American flag and saluting. The package commemorating the landing was the fourth story broadcast.  But the channel did not miss the chance to feature current and former Soviet cosmonauts and space experts, recalling Russia’s glory days that began in 1958 with Sputnik, the first satellite to orbit the earth. Sergei Krikalev, head of the cosmonauts training center seconded the mood at a press conference today, again acknowledging the moon landing.  But touting Russia as number one in space firsts.

SERGEI KRIKALEV (TRANSLATOR): Sure, we would have wished a Soviet, a Russian person to be the first on the Moon, but life is life and at some point we succeeded in being ahead of the Americans by launching the first satellite, putting the first man and the first woman into space and the first space walk. We had many accomplishments.

GOLLOHER: And there was some belittling of the Americans. Another state run channel, Rossiya, last week devoted time in a report on the Apollo Landing to listing conspiracy theories that the landing was faked. For example, the program said that many people found it strange that Neil Armstrong had kept a low profile since his walk on the moon. State run English channel, Russia Today, addressed those allegations by running an interview with space analyst Yuri Krash.

YURI KRASH: Well it’s widely regarded that the man on the moon was there 40 years ago.  There have been, nevertheless been allegations that the United Sates moon landings were actually faked.  What do you think of about that, can those allegations really be true?

EXPERT: Not at all, absolutely not.  All those allegations are absolutely baseless.

GOLLOHER: It’s unclear whether the average Russian believes the landing was a product of special effects. And it’s also unclear whether Russia wants to restart the space race. Yuri Salnikov is a space historian.

YURI SALNIKOV (TRANSLATOR): The military space race will continue, no doubt about it, but despite its negative traits, it has a lot of benefits, namely dual-use technologies and dual-use ideas. All these can be used for a future Mars project.

GOLLOHER: Russia has recently talked about a manned mission to mars, although official say it could take 20 years to get off the ground. For The World, I’m Jessica Golloher in Moscow.

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