Epic Rivalry Page 9
The R-3, with a projected range of 1,900 miles, was the intended next step in that direction. While a significant improvement over the R-2, its trajectory was well short of the 5,000 miles necessary for a true intercontinental rocket. Korolev therefore proposed to Malyshev that the R-3 be cancelled in favor of development of a full-scale ICBM. According to the noted Soviet space historian Asif Siddiqi, “Korolev almost casually announced to the attendees (at a high-level meeting) that work on the R-3 should be terminated immediately to concentrate forces on going directly to an ICBM.”36
Malyshev was astonished by the proposal, given his own belief that the R-3 was a critical project for the Soviet military. He rejected Korolev’s idea out-of-hand, accusing him of placing his long-term interests in using rockets for space exploration ahead of the country’s real needs. Korolev, however, refused to abandon his proposal, whereupon Malyshev turned to threats: “No! Really! He refuses?…People are not irreplaceable. Others can be found.”37 In the end, Korolev would get his way. The R-3 was cancelled in 1952, and the Soviet Union moved inexorably toward his goal—the R-7 ICBM.
The demise of the R-3 also paved the way for development of the R-5, which Korolev conceived in order to give Soviet forces a rocket with greater range than the R-2. The R-5 eventually became the first Soviet nuclear-armed rocket, with a range of 750 miles. It employed special thermal shielding to protect its nuclear warhead, which would encounter tremendous heat reentering the atmosphere at a speed of nearly two miles a second. In February 1956, a modified version, the R-5M, successfully carried out the world’s first test of a ballistic missile carrying a live atomic warhead.38 With the success of the R-5M, Korolev received full independence from NII-88 that same year, when OKB-1 became an independent design bureau.
A key aspect of Korolev’s success in gaining support for his ICBM was the impression he made on Khrushchev when he briefed the ruling Soviet Politburo on his work not long after Stalin’s death. Khrushchev later recalled in his memoirs, “I don’t want to exaggerate, but I’d say we gawked at what he showed us as if we were a bunch of sheep seeing a new gate for the first time.” Korolev showed the Politburo members one of his rockets, took them on a tour of the launch pad, and attempted to explain how the rocket worked, Khrushchev said. “We were like peasants in a market place,” he continued. “We walked around the rocket, touching it, tapping it to see if it was sturdy enough—we did everything but lick it to see how it tasted.”39
FASHIONING A NUCLEAR THREAT
Less than 10 months after the United States detonated the world’s first H-bomb, the Soviets followed suit in August 1953 with their own successful thermonuclear test in Central Asia at the Semipalatinsk site in Kazakhstan. This was a much narrower margin than the several years that separated the two superpowers’ tests of their first atomic bombs.
Soviet leaders had originally planned to use an atomic warhead for their planned ICBM, but they eagerly switched to the newly created H-bomb for the long-range missile. Malyshev, the head of MSM and now promoted to deputy chairman of the powerful Soviet Council of Ministers, had both H-bomb and ICBM development in his portfolio. He asked Andrei Sakharov, the lead nuclear physicist behind the Soviet H-bomb, to make an estimate of the weight of a “second generation” H-bomb. Sakharov was uneasy about the request, but decided that he could not refuse; his estimate was five tons.40
In October 1953, Malyshev went to see Korolev and his top staff at OKB-1 to discuss their progress in developing an ICBM, soon to be designated as the R-7. He asked Korolev for an estimate of the R-7’s payload, or lifting capability, and was not pleased to hear Korolev’s estimate of three tons. Malyshev insisted that five tons was the requirement, with no room for negotiation, and his order was soon confirmed at the highest government levels. Korolev and his design bureau were to produce a rocket able to carry a five-ton warhead—several times the capability of missiles at that time—over a 5,000-mile range. This hastily estimated payload requirement of five tons drove the design of the R-7, producing a missile with lifting capabilities that made it useful for launching Russian cosmonauts on space missions for decades to come.41
Work on revising the R-7 to carry the increased payload started immediately. The first challenge was how to create the enormous rocket power, or thrust, needed to carry out the missile’s intercontinental mission. The solution was found in a pair of engines developed by Valentin Glushko’s Gas Dynamics Laboratory starting in 1954: the RD-107 and RD-108. The engineering breakthrough was that each engine—with four RD-107s and one RD-108 powering the R-7—would have not one, but four, combustion chambers. The multichambered concept was a way to avoid expanding a single conventional combustion chamber to the required size. That would significantly increase the chance of creating damaging pressures inside the large chamber that could destroy the engine, a phenomenon known as combustion instability.42 In addition, the four combustion chambers were fueled by a single turbopump; this resulted in a cumulative thrust significantly greater than using a single combustion chamber. The sharp reduction in the risk of combustion instability was an additional benefit.43
The requirement for five main engines in the R-7 led to a missile that looked different from anything seen before. Korolev borrowed a key idea from Mikhail Tikhonravov, a brilliant rocket engineer on his staff. Tikhonravov had long proposed the idea of clustering multiple rocket engines to achieve high payload capabilities. Application of his concept resulted in a revolutionary approach: The single main RD-108 “core” engine would be surrounded by four RD-107 booster engines “strapped on” to the core. Viewed from the side, the boosters made the R-7 much broader at its base than at the top. The strap-ons tapered upward to a point, making it appear almost as if the rocket were wearing a skirt. With all engines burning, the entire ensemble would produce 398 tons of thrust at liftoff, about nine times more than any other Soviet rocket.44
At a height of 30 miles, the four strap-on engines fell away from the core stage, which continued in powered flight until its engine cut off and the payload entered into a ballistic trajectory until its reentry into the Earth’s atmosphere. (The American Atlas ICBM, used the same layout. All three of the Atlas’ engines burned at liftoff and two were later jettisoned, leaving the core, or sustainer engine, to complete the powered portion of its flight.) Korolev’s team explored various methods to steer the R-7. They settled on using small steering, or vernier, engines with swiveling nozzles instead of the simple graphite rudders employed on the V-2 and other early rockets. When Glushko refused to manufacture the vernier engines, claiming that they wouldn’t be effective, Korolev’s staff used a group of young engineers from another scientific institute to successfully develop them.45
Korolev also tackled the challenge of developing a guidance system to reliably deliver the R-7’s thermonuclear payload on target after a 5,000-mile flight. Because an inertial guidance system of the type used by the V-2 would not provide the needed accuracy, Korolev proposed a combination of inertial guidance and a radio-controlled system to correct deviations from the desired trajectory using the small vernier engines attached to the core engine. In May 1954, the Soviet Union’s powerful Council of Ministers issued a decree calling for full development of the R-7. This was followed soon after by Minister of Defense Industries Ustinov’s decree that development of the R-7 ICBM was a matter of “state importance.”46
The May 20 Council of Ministers’ decree also set in motion a process that would lead to the development of a new firing range to test the R-7. Besides having outdated facilities, the exising Kapustin Yar site was within range of American radar stations in Turkey, established by U.S. intelligence services to monitor Soviet missile tests.47 A high-level commission reviewed a number of alternatives and eventually chose a site in Kazakhstan in Central Asia. The Soviet Council of Ministers approved the selection in early 1955.
INTO ORBIT
Another ambition in space was taking hold as well. The idea of an orbiting man-made Earth satellite captured
the imagination of Americans and Russians alike. Such a project offered an opportunity to achieve a landmark heretofore regarded as little more than science fiction: shooting a man-made object into space at a speed great enough to place it in orbit around Earth. Both American and Russian experts studying every aspect of the German V-2 immediately following World War II soon concluded that this missile possesed more potential than as a mere weapon. Just days after surrendering to the U.S. Army in the spring of 1945, several Peenemünde engineers briefed members of a U.S. Navy technical team on their rocketry work. They spoke enthusiastically of the possibilities of artificial Earth satellites and even manned space stations.48
The Army Air Forces (AAF) agreed to examine the concept, turning again to the RAND Corporation to perform an independent assessment. Even six decades later, the resulting May 1946 report, Preliminary Design of an Experimental World-Circling Spaceship, remains fascinating reading. Assuming no major engineering or design breakthroughs, it concluded that a successful satellite launch vehicle was possible, perhaps within five years, and with an expenditure of about 150 million dollars.49 The report observed, prophetically as events turned out, that an Earth satellite, launched into orbit by a 17,000-mile-per-hour rocket, would be “one of the most potent scientific tools of the 20th century.” Further, the report asserted, an Earth-orbiting satellite “would inflame the imagination of mankind and would probably produce repercussions…comparable to the explosion of the atomic bomb.” Nor did the study ignore the many potential military, as well as civilian, uses of Earth satellites. Among those cited were assessments of the weather conditions over enemy territory, post-attack damage assessments of hostile targets, communications relay, and the provision of vastly improved guidance to missiles in flight to their targets.50 In the end, funding at a level of 150 million dollars represented a huge sum in the post–World War II era of sharply reduced military expenditures, and both the AAF-RAND study and the Navy’s work failed to gain the support needed to go forward.
The report noted that the response of the Soviet Union to an American satellite launch, if the United States was first to go into space, was unpredictable. It quoted contemporary Soviet publications asserting that a satellite was an “instrument of blackmail” and that the United States was using “Hitlerite ideas and technicians” in its missile research. The report therefore suggested that the United States place great emphasis on the nonmilitary uses of satellites.51
The concept of “freedom of space” would be a driving force for years to come as the United States continued to develop its space policies visà-vis the Soviet Union. A “benign” test of the satellite concept, with an experimental satellite on an equatorial orbit that would avoid the Soviet Union, could—if there were no objections from the countries that were overflown—establish the precedent of “freedom of space,” and thus pave the way for a second “working” satellite, the RAND study asserted.52
In the spring of that year, Mikhail Tikhonravov on Korolev’s team presented what apparently was the first detailed Soviet assessment of the technical aspects of launching an artificial Earth satellite. The paper proposed using a rocket with multiple engines clustered together to achieve the necessary thrust to orbit a small satellite, which was ultimately used on Russia’s R-7 ICBM. Beyond its content, the paper was noteworthy for the fact that Tikhonravov likely was one of the few engineers sharing Korolev’s closely held vision of eventually using rocketry for space travel rather than only for weaponry.53
While the paper contained no timetable, it seemed to imply that a satellite might be sent into orbit by the mid-1950s, provided the needed resources were made available. The audience’s reaction to Tikhonravov’s presentation was generally negative, ranging from open hostility and sarcasm to silence. Korolev, however, publicly supported his friend’s ideas at the session. Little came of Tikhonravov’s efforts at the time, no doubt reflecting the very limited support in Russia for any aspects of rocketry unrelated to the military.54
A YEAR TO CELEBRATE
Following the recommendation of the TCP report to fly reconnaissance satellites over the Soviet Union to assess Soviet military activities, the Eisenhower administration in the mid-1950s made a concerted effort to publicly promote the concept of “Open Skies” as a way to reduce international tensions. In late May 1955, just 13 weeks after the TCP report, the president’s National Security Council (NSC) took action. In a top-secret document, known as “U.S. Scientific Satellite Program,” the NSC endorsed the TCP’s recommendation that “intelligence applications warrant an immediate program leading to a very small satellite in orbit around the Earth, and that reexamination should be made of the principles or practices of international law with regard to ‘Freedom of Space’ from the standpoint of recent advances in weapons technology.”55 Noting that the TCP had specifically suggested such a small satellite, the NSC added: “From a military standpoint, the Joint Chiefs of Staff have stated their belief that intelligence applications strongly warrant the construction of a large satellite. While a small satellite cannot carry surveillance and therefore will have no direct intelligence potential, it does represent a technological step toward the achievement of the large surveillance satellite and will be helpful to this end…. Furthermore, a small satellite will provide a test of the principle of ‘Freedom of Space.’” The benefits from such a satellite were obvious to the NSC, allowing for continuous surveillance of Soviet installations and the ability to obtain “fine-scale detail” of such objects as airplanes, trains, and buildings on the ground.56
The notion of “freedom of space” still remained unsettled in 1955. While long tradition held that nations had sovereignty over the airspace above their territories (the Chicago Convention of 1944 eventually codified such national ownership), the question remained as to just how high such sovereignty extended. Where, if at all, did it end? Where—such as at the height at which a satellite would orbit—would the concept known as “freedom of the seas” take effect in space? That ancient, time-honored tradition held that any nation’s ships were entitled to sail the open sea at will, anywhere on the globe.57
When the International Geophysical Year (IGY) was announced for 1957-1958, the United States found a convenient “cover” for its plans to launch reconnaissance satellites. The IGY itself was conceived at an unusual meeting in April 1950 in Silver Spring, Maryland, just outside Washington, D.C. The meeting took place at a dinner in the living room of the small brick home of James Van Allen, a physicist then working at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory. Van Allen, who was to achieve great fame early in the space age for his discovery of two Earth-circling radiation bands, had already acquired considerable experience in American rocket research. He sent Geiger counters aloft to measure cosmic radiation on the first German-built V-2 launched in the United States in April 1946 and continued his scientific work on American-built sounding rockets.58
Sydney Chapman, a British geophysicist, had asked Van Allen to host the meeting in Silver Spring, a conclave that would ultimately include eight or ten top scientists to discuss international cooperation in scientific research—what Time magazine would later call “a pedigreed bull session.”59 Chapman, Van Allen, and a third eminent physicist, Lloyd Berkner, argued for an international program that would conduct geophysical research of the planet, its atmosphere and space beyond. Berkner was an early advocate of using artificial satellites for scientific research. Van Allen realized that the diminishing U.S. supply of captured German V-2s would exhaust one established vehicle to carry out high-altitude research. A new international scientific initiative one linked to artificial satellites—would be a reliable way to achieve that end.60 Walter Sullivan, science editor of the New York Times, later summed up the feelings that drove the dinner participants to dream of new ways to explore the Earth’s surroundings. “From the ground, our view into space is hardly more enlightening than the view of the heavens obtained by a lobster on the ocean floor,” he wrote.61
The suggestion made by Berkner for another global scientific research program in 1957-1958 prompted enthusiastic support at the dinner and gained international scientific support over the next several years. In 1954, the Polar Year was renamed the International Geophysical Year, reflecting a much broader agenda to study the Earth’s atmosphere, its oceans, the polar regions, and outer space. Berkner found strong support for the use of Earth satellites to help achieve the IGY agenda. Given how much had to be done, the IGY could not be contained in a mere 12 months; it would run from July 1, 1957, to December 31, 1958.62
This was a perfect intersection with the urgent (and highly classified) drive by the U.S. government to establish the principle of freedom of space via the launch of a scientific satellite.
FINDING A ROCKET THAT WORKS
In early 1956, von Braun and his Redstone Arsenal rocket team began work on a critical new project, the Jupiter nuclear-armed intermediate-range ballistic missile (IRBM) with a range of 1,500 miles. This was one of several new weapons systems recommended to President Eisenhower in 1955 by his top-level commission reviewing future American strategic needs. As part of that assignment, which was in addition to ongoing work on the shorter-range Redstone missile, von Braun and his group were placed under a new command, the Army Ballistic Missile Agency (ABMA).
The new boss for ABMA was Army Major General John B. Medaris, a tough up-from-the-ranks officer who had begun his military career as an enlisted man in the Marine Corps. He and von Braun became friends and allies, making common cause in the Army’s battle with the Air Force for control of development and operation of medium-and long-range missiles. “Our survival as a rocket-building team is at stake,” von Braun said. “Only a tough fighter in command of the ABMA has a chance to keep it alive, and General Medaris is such a man.” Years later, Medaris would return the compliment, noting, “Wernher and I were about the most perfect possible match between two men who wished to pursue great projects together.” But even as he worked closely with the general and pursued the development of military weapons, von Braun’s frustration at being unable to secure government support for his space exploration dreams was unabated. “Galileo, the Wright Brothers, and Thomas Edison wouldn’t have a Chinaman’s chance here today,” he told a journalist in 1956. “They’d be thrown right out of the Pentagon on their ears!”63