Campaign Advice on Space

To develop background material on the various issues he would have to address during his presidential campaign, Senator Kennedy in December 1958 established a “brain trust” drawn primarily from the faculties of Harvard and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Even before the presidential campaign began, Harvard law professor Archibald Cox began collecting research memoranda and reports from experts at both universities and from across the country. According to the authoritative account of the Kennedy campaign, “The professors were to think, winnow, analyze and prepare data on the substance of national policy, to channel from university to speech writers to Cox to Sorensen—and thus to the candidate.” This process failed in its execution. While an impressive amount of material was generated, little of it was read by Kennedy or used during the campaign. Regarding the products of Cox’s efforts, Theodore Sorensen comments that “not all of their material was usable and even less was actually used. But it provided a fresh and reassuring reservoir of expert intellect.”10 The differ­ent perspectives of those caught up in the frenzy of Kennedy’s presidential campaign, such as Sorensen, and those with the time to reflect on issues that Kennedy would have to address if he was elected were a continuing source of campaign tensions.

Kennedy himself on September 2, 1960, asked Cox to contact Trevor Gardner, former assistant secretary of the U. S. Air Force for research and development, and a man to whom Kennedy looked for advice on space and missile issues. Kennedy wanted from Gardner “an account of the Administration’s failures in missiles, 1953 to today” and his “judgment on the significance of our being in a secondary position in space in the sixties.” Kennedy also asked, “Will the Soviet Union have a reconnaissance satellite before we do, and what will it mean?”11

Another source of largely unused but remarkably prescient input into Kennedy’s campaign was the Advisory Committee on Science and Technology of the Democratic Advisory Council, which in turn reported to the Democratic National Committee. Among its inputs was a September 7 “Position Paper on Space Research.” Leading the preparation of this paper was physicist Ralph Lapp, who, after working in the Manhattan Project to develop the atomic bomb, spent most of the rest of his career warning about the dangers of nuclear war. The position paper pointed out that “the United States has failed to define its real objective in space. If purely scientific, this should be so stated so that the American people and others understand our objective. If aimed at ‘winning the space race’ then this must also be stated and the U. S. program must be directed toward this goal.” The paper went on to discuss landing a man on the Moon as a possible objective of a compet­itive space effort, asking, “Can the United States afford to allow the Russians to land on the moon first?” and noting that the answer to this question was “more political” than technical, since “there is no great scientific urgency” in a manned lunar landing. It noted that “in the psycho-political space race the rewards for being first are exceedingly great; there is little pay-off for second place.”

The paper outlined two alternative space programs. One of the programs was “an imaginative and vigorous program of research in space science and technology and to exploit useful applications of this new technology. . . in collaboration with other nations.” The other suggested program aimed at “American supremacy in the exploration of space,” including “early attain­ment of a thrust capability consistent with manned flights to the Moon.” The paper noted that “Senator Kennedy must make the decision, essentially political in character,” between the two programs. The costs of the politi­cally driven second program were estimated to be $26 billion from 1960 to 1970, compared to the then planned expenditures during that period of $12 to 13 billion. The scientifically oriented but faster-paced program was estimated to cost $19 billion. While this paper was unlikely to have been read by Kennedy or his top advisers, it was a quite insightful statement of the central space issue that would occupy Kennedy once he entered the White House, and its cost estimates were surprisingly close to the actual costs of the program that President Kennedy in 1961 chose to pursue.12

Yet another input into Kennedy’s position on space during the campaign was a briefing paper prepared for the candidate’s “Position and Briefing Book”; this was a resource that traveled with the campaign team as a ready source of speech material and responses to media questions. The briefing paper suggested “eliminating the unrealistic distinctions between civilian and defense space projects” and said that there should be “one coordinated space program with joint civilian and military space uses.” The paper pro­posed that Kennedy should “place one man in charge of all space activities, reporting directly to the President.”13