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.