Why did the space race start?
There are a few alternate viewpoints on exactly how and when the Space Race began, but the most accepted view is that it began on October 4, 1957, when the Soviet Union launched Sputnik 1, the world’s first artifical satellite, into Earth orbit. This led to a rapid sequence of events in both the United States and the Soviet Union that helped mobilise the industrial resources of both superpowers towards the goal of ‘beating’ the other in space technology. If you look a little further back in time, however, one could argue that the Space Race began in the years after World War Two with the ballistic missile programs of the United States and the Soviet Union. Ballistic missiles (in particular ICBM’s, or Inter-Continental Ballistic Missiles), are an example of what is known as dual-use technology, in that whilst they are designed primarily for a military purpose (i.e. delivery system for nuclear weapons across continents), they also have the power to launch satellites into space. After Naz
