Russian, U.S. Policies Discussed

Press, Volume CII, Issue 30286, 12 November 1963, Page 24

Russian, U.S. Policies Discussed

■By

C. S. L. KEAYI

The group of top American businessmen who recently visited Russia and saw much of Mr Khrushchev returned convinced that he is as astute as the best of them. This suggests that Mr Khrushchev has some very good secret reasons for his contradictory statements concerning the Soviet space programme. The most obvious and plausible of these is that he wants to keep the Americans guessing for as long as possible about Russian plans for spaceflight. This, in turn, makes one wonder whether the Russians have decided on some alternative to lunar exploration—an alternative possibly designed to reduce or even cancel the value of an American moon-trip. Another reason may be the Soviet realisation of the growing momentum of the American space programme. About three years ago the Russians were having things almost all their own way, achieving manned orbital space flight before the Americans succeeded with their first manned ballistic flight. Shortly after this, if I recall correctly, Mr Khrushchev affirmed that Soviet cosmonauts would reach the moon by 1967. Since then the Americans have launched four successful manned orbital spaceflights—only two behind the Russians, wtio have, however, flown for much longer durations in space. The Americans have also flown four flawless test flights of their giant Saturn rocket which is probably equal to, if not larger than, any the Soviets now possess. Also, in the complex field of interplanetary exploration the outstanding voyage of Mariner II has been in sharp contrast to the long list of unsuccessful Soviet Mars and Venus shots. These factors may have a good deal to do with Mr Khrushchev’s abrupt reversal of space policy. They are certainly related to the fact that the tremendous industrial capacity of the United

States is only now being fully applied to problems of space exploration, and as the American space effort moves into top gear the Russians will be hard pressed to stay ahead. This brings us to the question of how the Russians have managed to stay in front ever since the dawn of the space age with their flight at Sputnik I.

It seems that the Russian lead in large booster rockets originated in 1947 when military planners and their scientific advisers were considering the feasibility of intercontinental ballistic missiles. The nuclear weapons experts of that time estimated the weight of a useful H-bomb to be not less than 20 tons. The Americans decided that 'a rocket capable of delivering it would weigh about 500 tons at lift off. This was considered to be out of the question and the Convair Company, at _ that time busy on the preliminary design of the 100-ton Atlas, was denied Government support and had to shelve its rocket plans for. as it turned out four years. On the other hand the Russians decided that if H-bombs had to be big, then they would build big rockets to deliver them, and pressed ahead with rocket development. In 1962 Dr. Edward Teller, “father of the H-bomb,” reported that it was possible to build a miniature megaton H-bomb war head which weighed only about a ton. This, as far as the Americans were concerned, put I.C.BM’s back in the picture. The Convair Company was given money to revive its rocket development and press on with the Atlas, while other smaller rockets were hastily conceived to stop the gap until Atlas was ready. This, in a nutshell, is wtiy the Russians have held the lead with large rockets until recently. Both sides had the assistance of many German V2 scientists and technicians and both had wartime experience with small tactical

rockets. It is their lack of boldness, coupled with the four-year marking time period from 1948 to 1952, which relegated the Americans to second place for so long. Now the situation is changing. as Mr Khrushchev is probably well aware. The Soviet Union, in spite of its phenomenal technological development is still not as capable as the United States of sustaining a major space effort. But it would be foolish to discount future Soviet capability: the launching, a bare fortnight ago, of the highly manoeuvrable Polyot I suggests that the Russians still have a few tricks up their sleeves. It seems very likely that they intend to concentrate on the problems of rendezvous in earth-orbit with a view to the construction of manned space stations.

Soviet intention it will sow further confusion in the American camp and may force them to downgrade their lunar effort and make a hasty switch toward the; establishment of space j stations, which are receiv-; ing only nominal attention by the United Sttaes at present. Confusion and lack of direction in American space policy seems to be the most likely goal of Mr Khrushchev's policy of outward vacillation. It doesn’t seem to have fooled President Kennedy l yet, but there is no telling what might happen if there is a change in the U.S. Administration after the next Presidential election. Mr Khrushchev is a wily enough fighter to know that the thing to do when an opponent gets too big and strong is to catch him off balance.