Because it finally forced the rest of the world, especially the United States, to pour resources into space research that the Capitalists, who solely function on a profite incentive and not the common good of humanity, would have never done it by themselves. The Communists achieved their primary objective. To venture onto the space exploration.
Ironically, it was also the beginning of the end. Because, instead of saying “sweet, you wanna work together on that?”, the US thought it best to say “hold my beer”. Then put all of it’s resources into destroying the Soviet Union at the cost of it’s own citizens, while starving and murdering millions around the world. It set the entire world back. We should have hotels on the moon by now.
I think the US was already in the process of putting all of it’s resources into destroying the Soviet Union.
For sure. But the Soviets having a scary satellite in the sky certainly helped them with the “kill the commies” propaganda.
🤔
The capitalists were interested in space flight but only as a means to belligerent ends. MW 18014, the first handmade object to reach outer space, was something that Axis scientists and their neoslaves designed as a weapon of war. Later, Imperial America’s dictatorship of the bourgeoisie wanted space flight so that it could spy on the Soviets (allegedly in case they launched a ‘surprise attack’ on Imperial America):
Eisenhower did, in fact, have an informed grasp of the power of space flight and a clear vision of its exploitation, but his was not a romantic vision of exploration and space travel. His eye was on spy satellites, with which he hoped to establish continuous surveillance of the Soviet Union and thus ward off the possibility of a surprise attack on the United States.
Presently, many Westerners dismiss the space race as a series of vanity projects. The knowledge that Sputnik was a relatively ‘primitive’ satellite has bolstered this notion. But without satellites, telecommunication as we know it would cease to exist. It would be a nightmare for almost any moderner.
Without Sputnik, we couldn’t be talking to each other right now. The Communists really connected the world!
