Space propaganda is a form of propaganda relating to achievements in space exploration and space science. It is used primarily to further a nation's perceived technological superiority, through the operation of a state-funded space agency. Space propaganda was first emergent during the Space Race of the mid-20th-century, an indirect extension of the Cold War. Although primarily associated with nationalistic pursuits, space propaganda has also been used to promote international organizations and collaborative space efforts.
Space race
During the Cold War, both the United States and the Soviet Union engaged in extensive political warfare in an attempt to promote contrasting political ideologies. This manifested in demonstrations of technological superiority, complementary with exceptionalist Cold War ideology.
Space propaganda during the Space Race also appealed to a sense of strategic and military advantage. Due to the large amount of potential military applications to innovations in space science, such as rocket technology and the development of ballistic missiles in the wake of the nuclear arms race, fearmongering is common in space propaganda of this period.
Examples Many forms of space propaganda have been used by public and government officials to influence space policy. Because that very few people have been to space, propaganda often relied on artistic depictions and imagery to convey its messages.
Sputnik Crisis
The successful launch of Sputnik in 1957 undermined the belief of American technological superiority. This event showed that the Soviets were ahead of the Americans. This Soviet achievement put pressure on U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower and was looked on by many as his greatest failure. According to McDougall, "The concomitant arrival of Sputnik and the Third World generalized the problem of the American image. The Soviet challenge and European colonial heritage made it vital for the United States to present and image of progressive anticolonialism."
Yuri Gagarin Yuri Gagarin was the first man in space. This was a monumental event not only in Soviet history but also world history. His achievements made him a celebrity and he was perceived as a international hero. He had a common background, his wife recalling a story about a time he was thrown out of a house and had to live in a dugout of a garden for three years during the German occupation of the Soviet Union. As his popularity soared, it also became threatening. President Kennedy did not let Yuri Gagarin tour the United States. Yuri Gagarin's story was told to millions of people throughout the world. Books, magazines, TV shows, movies have been made to honor this man. Posters and stamps were issued with Yuri's face on it. April 12 is known as the Day of Space in Russia to commemorate Yuri Gagarin's flight. In the Soviet Union, being the first to reach space was seen as a great victory. Yuri Gagarin's 1961 flight into space was seen by many as another Sputnik moment. Khrushchev stated that Gagarin's flight was the "...greatest triumph of the immortal Lenin's ideas." Egypt's President Nasser stated the "gigantic scientific capabilities of the Soviet people and had no doubt that the launching of man into space will turn upside down not only many scientific views, but also many political and military trends". American newspapers characterized Soviet advancement as: "a psychological victory of the first magnitude"; "new evidence of Soviet superiority"; "cost the nation heavily in prestige"; "marred the political and psychological image of the country abroad"; "Neutral nations may come to believe the wave of the future is Russian."
Gherman Titov Gherman Titov's flight into space, being the second human to orbit Earth, was seen as a major accomplishment not only for the Soviet Union as a whole but the Premier himself and was boasted about in Pravda which stated that the Premier, "directs the development of the major technical projects in the country, and determines the basic directions of planned growth in cosmic science and technology. In his able proposals there is evidence again and again of his great conviction in the triumph of Soviet rocket technology." Khrushchev felt pressure to put money into missiles and space technology but diverted much of it towards self-serving political objectives.
Valentina Tereshkova
The USSR launched the first woman (also the first civilian), Valentina Tereshkova, into space on Vostok 6; this was a propaganda stunt rather than a good faith step for women's equality, and possibly a medical experiment. Prior to flying on Vostok 6, Tereshkova worked in a textile factory and was an amateur parachutist. After Gagarin's flight, Nikolai Kamanin, director of cosmonaut training, read in American media about the "Mercury 13", female pilots trying to become astronauts. Although this article noted that the women passed the same medical qualification tests as the male candidates, it must not have mentioned that they were not accepted or trained as astronauts by NASA, and thus had absolutely no chance of being accepted into the all-male test pilot-astronaut community. In his diary, Kamanin wrote, "We cannot allow that the first woman in space will be American. This would be an insult to the patriotic feelings of Soviet women." He got permission to choose a small corps of female cosmonauts; Tereshkova was the only one of five women amateur parachutists to fly. Although she had to join the Soviet Air Forces to become a cosmonaut, Soviet male test pilots of the 1960s were no more accepting of women in their ranks than their American counterparts, though the Soviet Air Force had three segregated all-women combat air regiments in World War II. On November 3, 1963, Tereshkova married Vostok 3 cosmonaut Andriyan Nikolayev, and they had a daughter, Elena Andrianovna Nikolaeva-Tereshkova, the first person with both a mother and father who had traveled into space. Kamanin wanted to fly more women on the last two Voskhod flights, but the cancellation of these flights in 1965 put an end to this. The USSR didn't again open its cosmonaut corps to women until 1980, two years after the United States opened its astronaut corps to women.
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