the space race

• In 1955, Eisenhower announced that the United States had a plan to make a satellite which could orbit earth from space.
• In 1957, the Soviet Union beat the Americans to launching its own satellite called Sputnik.
• In 1975, the USSR launched a second, much bigger satellite called Leica into space.
• In 1958, the United States increased their funding to their space program and launched their Explorer 1 satellite.
• In 1961, the Soviet Union shocked the United States again by sending the first man into space.
• President Kennedy set up the Apollo program which aimed to send a man to the moon in 1969.
• Neil Armstrong became the first man to walk on the moon in July 1969.
• The technology that was able to send the rockets into space could also be used to launch nuclear missiles, which was one of the reasons why the superpowers spent so much money on developing their own space programs.
• Khrushchev, the leader of the Soviet Union, built a top secret rocket base, which increased the tension between the east and the west during 1957.
• In 1957, the USSR tested the world's first intercontinental ballistic missile known as an ICBM.
• In 1959, America developed its own ICBM system.
• In the 60s, America developed Polaris missiles, which were missiles that could be fired from submarines and were harder to detect, making the threat even more prominent.
• During the 60s, the media in America reported a missile gap between the USA and the USSR, causing widespread panic.
• President Eisenhower knew that there was no missile gap because of the secret intelligence, but he never actually revealed this to the public.