[music playing]
I believe that this nation should commit itself
to achieving the goal before this decade is out of landing
a man on the moon and returning him safely to the Earth.
NARRATOR: Four months after John F. Kennedy was sworn
into office, he promised that the United
States would put a man on the moon
before the end of the 1960s.
And on July 20, 1969--
NEIL ARMSTRONG: That's one small step for man,
one giant leap for mankind.
NARRATOR: But why was landing a man on the moon so important?
When Kennedy made that promise, the United
States and the Soviet Union were at the height of the Cold War.
A major front in that war was space,
and putting a man on the moon?
That would be the ultimate victory.
On October 4, 1957, the Soviet Union
had launched Sputnik, the first artificial satellite
and the first man-made object to orbit the earth.
ANNOUNCER: Today, a new moon is in the sky,
a 23-inch metal sphere placed in orbit by a Russian rocket.
NARRATOR: One month later, they launched Sputnik 2.
The American press speculated that these launches
gave Russia a military advantage in the Cold War.
This marked the beginning of what would
be known as the space race.
Feeling pressure, the United States launched the Vanguard
satellite in December.
And after its launch rocket reached
the height of a few feet, it burst into flames.
Despite the slow start, by the end of 1958,
Congress passed, and President Eisenhower signed, the 1958
Space Act, which created NASA.
Both the US and the USSR created lunar exploration programs,
each successfully launching moon flyby missions in 1959.
But Russia led the space race.
In September 1959, Luna 2 became the first spacecraft
to reach the moon's surface.
On April 12, 1961, Yuri Gagarin became
the first human in space.
The US was in dire need of a win in the space race,
and it had to be something big.
So President Kennedy asked Vice President Lyndon B.
Johnson to look into what the US could
do to beat the Soviet Union.
Put a laboratory in space?
Orbit a man around the moon?
Land a man on the moon?
NASA's administrator, James E. Webb,
said there was no way to beat the Soviets in building a space
station, and the Soviets could probably
send a man into the moon's orbit just as quickly.
But maybe, just maybe, the US could be the first to land
a man on the moon.
On May 25, 1961, JFK publicly proposed that the US send a man
to the moon and return him safely to Earth
before the end of the decade.
The effort to land a man on the moon
was christened the Apollo program,
and Kennedy predicted its success would inspire people
worldwide to choose American-style freedom
over Soviet-allied tyranny.
A few weeks later, Kennedy, ever the diplomat,
met with Soviet premier Nikita Khrushchev
and suggested the moon landing be a joint effort.
But Khrushchev said no.
The Soviets deny that they were trying to reach the moon,
but they were.
They built a moon suit prototype and designed
a lunar module much like their American counterparts.
Even though the Apollo program was launched in the spirit
of competition, there were multiple efforts
to diffuse the space race for diplomatic reasons.
In September of 1963, Kennedy even
suggested that the US and Soviet Union could still work together
on project Apollo, but any prospect of cooperation
ended when he was assassinated two months later.
Apollo became a memorial to the fallen president,
and the space race continued.
Many firsts went to the Soviets.
The USSR achieved the first long duration
spaceflight, the first multi-person spaceflight,
and the first spacewalk.
In 1966, Russia pulled off the first soft landing on the moon
with Luna 9, but they still hadn't put a man on the moon.
On July 20, 1969, the United States
did, only five months before the deadline Kennedy had set
at the beginning of the decade.
On that day, the Apollo 11 mission landed two men--
Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin--
on the moon.
They walked on the moon's surface for over two hours,
and were then brought safely back to Earth.
The US had finally accomplished something
big the Soviets had not, and set the stage for the future
of space exploration.