Race to the moon
Race to the Moon (Original title: Space Race ) is a four-part docudrama of the BBC in 2005. It is the race between the United States and the Soviet Union to destinations in the universe , especially for moon shown. The focus of the documentary is on space pioneers Wernher von Braun ( Richard Dillane ) on the American side and Sergei Pawlowitsch Koroljow ( Steve Nicolson ) on the Soviet side. The German premiere took place on January 16, 2006 on Das Erste .
background
When the Second World War ended in 1945 , the Allies looked for the German V2 rocket and the corresponding construction plans. Both the Americans and the Soviets knew that this contained a key technology that would be of great use in the future. Therefore, the designer of the V2, Wernher von Braun, was arrested by the US Army and then appointed head of the American missile program. The Soviet Union, on the other hand, made the rocket specialist Sergei Korolev, who had been interned in Stalin's Gulag , head of the Soviet space project. It was a dream of the two engineers to transport a person into space. The documentary Race to the Moon depicts the duel between the two men and their personal goals. In 1949, the Soviet Union developed its first rocket. Von Braun, on the other hand, had to secure the necessary funds to finance the project. With the beginning of the so-called " Cold War ", the Soviet Union was apparently always one step ahead of the Americans.
content
The departure into space
First part: Shortly before the end of the war, Wernher von Braun had constructed the most modern rocket in the world, a so-called " retribution weapon " (V2 for short), in the German missile center in Peenemünde . The Allies searched feverishly for it, as it was decades ahead of their own technology. Therefore, von Braun and his team were searched intensively, but they had long since left Peenemünde. They had moved into an underground factory in the Harz Mountains where more than 5000 V2 rockets were built. In April 1945 they left the factory, which was shortly afterwards captured by the Americans. The equipment and missiles were removed immediately so that they could not fall into the hands of the Russians. Von Braun surrendered to the American armed forces. He and his colleagues were flown to the United States.
Stalin had the leading Soviet missile builder Sergei Korolev brought from the Gulag to advance the Soviet missile program. The Russians deported many of the German missile experts to the Soviet Union to work on a secret missile program. The Soviet Union achieved its first success in the space race in 1949 when it launched its first rocket, the R-2 , which had twice the range of the V2.
The Sputnik shock
Second part: In 1949, at the beginning of the Cold War, both Korolev and von Braun had the goal of being the first to venture into space. In 1952, a few years after the United States, the Soviet Union detonated its first hydrogen bomb . Powerful launchers were required to transport this new type of weapon of mass destruction . Korolev developed the gigantic R-7 , which could fly around 8,000 kilometers. For Korolev, this development represented a step towards the realization of his lifelong dream: landing on the moon. The Soviet military initially had no interest in this. However, Khrushchev soon recognized the high propaganda value of the "race to the moon". It was therefore planned to launch a satellite into space. Koroljow worked at full speed on this project and on October 4th, 1957, he succeeded in sending the " Sputnik " into orbit around the earth. The entire Western world reacted in shock to this event, which was particularly humiliating for the United States. In addition, the Soviet Union still had a head start in missile technology, and afterwards Korolev also managed to send the first living being, the dog Laika , into space. The people in America and Europe increasingly felt threatened by the Soviet missiles, because the Russian ICBMs were able to reach almost every point on earth. In order to polish up the tarnished image of the United States, President Eisenhower commissioned Wernher von Braun to also launch a satellite into space. Indeed, as early as January 1958, the “ Explorer 1 ” circled the earth.
The first person in space
Third part: At the beginning of the 1960s, the space experts of the two superpowers were looking for men who would be suitable for a flight into space. These were called " astronauts " by the Americans and " cosmonauts " by the Soviets . Initially, the Soviet attempts failed because the test rockets repeatedly exploded and even 130 technicians and workers were killed in one attempt. The experiments with the Vostok capsules , which were supposed to transport the cosmonaut, did not go smoothly either, because the experimental animals used did not survive the re-entry into the earth's atmosphere. One of the cosmonauts also died in a fire in a test chamber. After these severe setbacks, Korolev had to postpone the planned manned space flight.
In the United States, meanwhile, it was decided that Alan Shepard would be the first American in space. However, von Braun did not want to risk human life. It was different with the Soviet Union; When Yuri Gagarin boarded his Vostok capsule for the first manned flight, he was taking a very high risk, as he only had a 50 percent chance of survival. But the launch of the rocket on April 12, 1961 was successful. Then the Americans succeeded in shooting Alan Shepard into space with a Redstone rocket , but without it orbiting the earth. In response, President John F. Kennedy announced that an American would be the first person to land on the moon within the next ten years.
The Apollo Mission
Fourth part: The Americans invested more than 20 billion dollars in their space project. Von Braun developed a new engine for the Saturn V rocket , which was supposed to bring the first man to the moon. There have been some successes to report in the meantime, for example John Glenn's triple orbit in a Mercury space capsule . Soviet space exploration, on the other hand, suffered a severe setback with the death of Sergei Korolev. Nevertheless, the development of the new spaceship “ Soyuz ” was pushed ahead. But the test flight ended with the death of the cosmonaut Vladimir Komarov , who hit the ground with his capsule unchecked after re-entry.
The Americans also suffered first casualties and failures: the three astronauts Virgil Grissom , Edward White and Roger Chaffee died in a test on the ground in 1967 and the Apollo 1 lunar capsule burned out. But finally the breakthrough came when the Apollo 11 was launched in July 1969 with the astronauts Edwin Aldrin , Neil Armstrong and Michael Collins on board. On July 21, 1969, the first lunar module "Eagle" landed on Earth's satellite and Armstrong stepped onto the moon with the words: "This is a small step for a man, a giant leap for mankind."
criticism
“With elaborate computer animations as well as a mixture of feature film elements and archive material that has never been broadcast, the four-part documentary tells the 'race to the moon'. This material and other documents shed a new light on the history of space travel. The documentary looks behind the scenes of the official portrayals of the ambitious space programs. She reports on the hectic activities of the secret services, the people who perished in the rocket projects and the unscrupulousness with which the programs were pushed. "
Publications
The documentation was published on March 24, 2006 in German stores on DVD and on May 24, 2013 on Blu-ray Disc . The age rating is set at FSK 12 .
further reading
- Ulli Kulke: Space striker: Wernher von Braun and the race to the moon. Bastei Lübbe, Cologne 2012, ISBN 978-3-86995-026-6 .
- Ulli Kulke : ´69 - The dramatic race to the moon. The Apollo 8 mission changed the world . LangenMüller, Stuttgart, 2018 ISBN 978-3-7844-3452-0 .
Web links
- Race to the moon in the Internet Movie Database (English)
- Race to the moon in the online film database
- The race to the moon on fr-online.de (chronological sequence)
- Cold War. With the bomb to the moon on zeit.de (background information)
Individual evidence
- ↑ Race to the moon on wunschliste.de, accessed on August 20, 2013.
- ↑ The Departure into Space - Race to the Moon (1/4) ( Memento of the original from December 21, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. on arte.tv, accessed on August 20, 2013.
- ↑ The Sputnik Shock - Race to the Moon (2/4) ( Memento of the original from December 21, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. on arte.tv, accessed on August 20, 2013.
- ↑ The first man in space - race to the moon (3/4) ( Memento of the original from December 21, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. on arte.tv, accessed on August 20, 2013.
- ↑ The Apollo Mission - Race to the Moon (4/4) ( Memento of the original from December 21, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. on arte.tv, accessed on August 20, 2013.
- ↑ Race to the Moon - Space Race. In: Zelluloid.de. Archived from the original on April 22, 2016 ; accessed on August 10, 2018 .
