No Soviet Response

There was no immediate response to the president’s proposal from Nikita Khrushchev or any other official Soviet source. The newspaper Za Rubezhom on September 28 suggested that Kennedy’s proposal was “propaganda” and “distracts attention from joint earthly exploits directed at attaining peace and reduction of world tension.” Pravda, the Communist Party newspaper, on October 2 reprinted without comment a column by Walter Lippman, who was widely respected in both the United States and the Soviet Union; the column had appeared in the American press on September 24. In the column, Lippman had suggested that “the main merit of the proposal” was “the opportunity it offered for the US to escape its commitment to the moon goal.”39

As the White House waited for a Soviet reply, a report from a new source appeared that seemed to counter the idea that the Soviet Union had aban­doned or postponed its lunar landing program. The Washington Post on October 8 reported that Leonid Sedov, characterized as the “father of the Sputnik,” had said that it would be two or three years “at least” before an initial Soviet lunar landing attempt. The headline for the story read “Red Expects Moon Shot in 3 Years.” Wiesner reported to the president that there was nothing in the story that “really supports the headline that was attached to it.”40 When cosmonauts Yuri Gagarin and Valentina Tereshkova (the first woman in space) visited the UN General Assembly in October, they made no direct mention of Kennedy’s proposal.

In response to an October 25 question posed to Nikita Khrushchev about whether the Soviet Union had a lunar landing program planned for the not too distant future, the Soviet leader said: “It would be very interesting to take a trip to the moon. But I cannot at present say when this will be done. We are not at the present planning flight by cosmonauts to the moon. . . I have a report to the effect that the Americans want to land a man on the moon by 1970. Well, let’s wish them success. . . We do not want to compete with the sending of men to the moon without careful preparation. It is clear that no benefits would be derived from such a competition.”41

There were a number of interpretations of Khrushchev’s remarks within the U. S. intelligence community. A “current intelligence memorandum” prepared by the CIA suggested that “Khrushchev’s statement on a manned lunar landing suggests that at least one program bearing on defense may already have fallen victim to his new economic priorities,” interpreting the Soviet premier’s remarks as acknowledging the cancellation of an ongoing lunar landing program. This memorandum noted that “Khrushchev’s actual remarks hardly warrant the dramatic US news agency treatment that the Soviet premier has ‘withdrawn’ from the moon race.” A different office in the CIA on October 29 advised McGeorge Bundy that “the primary intent of Khrushchev’s statement was to change the focus of the space race.” This analysis noted that Khrushchev’s remarks were similar to statements he had made to visiting journalists in 1961 and 1962 and to views “deliberately given to Western scientists by Soviet scientific officials earlier this year.” (This presumably referred to the Soviet contacts with Bernard Lovell.) Thus, the analysis suggested, Khrushchev’s statements should not be interpreted as indicating “that the Soviet leaders have taken some major decisions in recent weeks affecting the scope or pace of their lunar program.” Rather, a major intent of Khrushchev’s statement was a “deliberate effort to downgrade the urgency of a manned lunar landing” and thus influence “U. S. Congressional and public opinion on the question of the expenditures and pace of the U. S. lunar program,” thereby “making it clear that the Soviet Union is unwilling to allow the United States to set the terms for competition in space.” The head of the State Department’s Bureau of Intelligence and Research told Secretary of State Rusk that in his answer at the press conference, Khrushchev “did not withdraw from the space race,” “did not say that the USSR might not make the first successful moon landing,” “did not accept President Kennedy’s pro­posal,” and “committed to nothing.” The State Department analysis sug­gested that Khrushchev regarded Kennedy’s offer of cooperation “as a vague one, to which he can appropriately respond in vaguely approving terms with­out undertaking negotiations or obligations.” One of Wiesner’s staff sug­gested that Khrushchev’s statement “recognizes that the U. S. determination to send a man to the moon and back has called the bluff of their pretentions since 1957 to world technological leadership.” The U. S. lunar landing deci­sion has also “contributed in a non-belligerent way to imposing major strains on the Soviet economy and their ability to carry out expansionist objectives. Our technological challenge, along with steadfastness over Cuba exactly a year ago, has been successful in getting them to trim their sails.”42