Why Mars: NASA and the Politics of Space Exploration

Chapter Two. Beginning the Quest

chapter two Beginning the Quest NASA began its martian quest with a long-term program called Mariner. It planned a series of increasingly challenging probes. The Apollo Moon decision indirectly helped martian advocates. Apollo raised the level of NASA funding enormously. More money overall gave more money to Mariner. Mars enthusiasts had resources they needed to get started in a serious way. There was political consensus around Apollo and Mariner. Adopting Mariner Work on NASA’s program to Mars began at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory even before JPL had official blessings from headquarters. In 1959, Pickering told his JPL colleagues to start creating a “planetary machine.”1 JPL then formulated requirements for a spacecraft that could travel enormous distances, survive a very long time, carry sophisticated and vulnerable scientific instruments, and transmit data back to Earth. The Soviets were working on such a spacecraft, but they had not succeeded in launching one as yet. Pickering assigned John Casani, a young engineer who had joined JPL in 1956, to take charge of the initial planning and design effort. Casani formed a team of JPL specialists to tackle this exceptional challenge. They would aim at Venus and Mars. Pickering organized the planetary team so as to separate it from the lunar group. The lunar team was under much stricter 28 Why Mars deadlines. The planetary group had deadlines also, but a decision to develop hardware had yet to be made. Moreover, the planetary unit could learn lessons from its lunar colleagues. Casani had no illusions about the difficulty. He recalled his feeling at the time: “It would take a colossal effort on the part of an enormous number of people.”2 JPL planned a program, successive flights over a decade or more, with each more technically ambitious than the preceding one. In early 1960, JPL briefed Glennan on its plans: “first planetary flybys, then planetary orbiters, then orbiter-landers.” As before, Glennan insisted that the planetary program not get in the way of the lunar activity. Pickering was equally insistent about JPL interests. JPL would give lunar Ranger launches priority, but once this series was completed, JPL wanted “the major program activity of the laboratory” to be planetary flight.3 The discussions and negotiations continued, with Newell playing a mediating role. Glennan wanted to run a cost-conscious, technically sound agency, with clear priorities, and he intended to hold the reins on Mars enthusiasts. Nevertheless , on July 15, 1960, Glennan officially approved the proposed planetary program, to be called Mariner.4 A month later, NASA Headquarters authorized JPL to move forward with development. The issue was now not whether to go to Mars, but how quickly. Pace would depend on many factors, especially resources. Resources, however , were related not just to JPL and other NASA interests but to NASA’s priority in national policy generally. That in turn depended on Cold War competition with the Soviet Union, which also had its eye on Mars. The Soviet planetary program, like that of lunar exploration, was well ahead of the U.S. program. The leader of the entire Soviet space effort, Sergey Korolev, was a brilliant rocket engineer who dreamed of sending human beings to the Red Planet. The Soviet premier, Nikita Khrushchev, understood how space exploits could advance his nation’s prestige, and he provided ample resources to Korolev. As in the United States, Korolev made the Moon the immediate priority for spaceflight. However, it was Mars that fired his imagination. When he spoke of Mars, his excitement showed, and he could become almost “ecstatic” over the possibility of exploring Mars.5 Robotic probes would precede human ventures. In 1958, he had directed his space organization to start working on robotic flight to Mars. Mars and Earth would come into proximity every two years; he targeted 1960, the nearest opportunity for the first try with a flyby.6 In October 1960, Khrushchev came to New York to address the United Na- Beginning the Quest 29 tions. Visiting Eisenhower, he gave the president replicas of Soviet pennants Luna 2, the Soviet probe that had struck the Moon earlier, carried. Khrushchev had a replica of another, more advanced spaceship that presumably he would show if the Soviet Mars probe succeeded. It was launched also in October, but it fell back to Earth and crashed in Soviet territory.7 That the Soviets were trying hard was now known unmistakably by...