After Apollo?

Richard Nixon and the American Space Program

John M. Logsdon

• Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan
• Year: 2015
• ISBN:
  9781137438546
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: North American History
• Index: History

Once the United States landed on the moon in July 1969, it was up to President Nixon to decide what to do in space after Apollo. This book chronicles the decisions he made, including ending space exploration and approving the space shuttle. Those decisions determined the character of theUS human space flight program for the next forty years.

Act 1

No More Apollos

Chapter 1

Richard Nixon and Apollo 11

President-elect Richard Nixon, like most Americans, was thrilled by the December 1968 Apollo 8 mission, the first space flight to leave Earth orbit with humans aboard. Apollo 8 sent Frank Borman, Jim Lovell, and Bill Anders into orbit around the Moon on December 24. In his Memoirs, Nixon recalled that on that Christmas Eve, he “was a happy man.” At his retreat on Key Biscayne, Florida, “a wreath hung on the front door and a beautifully trimmed Christmas tree stood in the living room . . . Far out in space Apollo VIII orbited the moon while astronaut Frank Borman read the story of the Creation from the Book of Genesis.* Those days were rich with happiness and full of anticipation and hope.”¹

The afterglow of the bold Apollo 8 mission was still bright as Richard Milhous Nixon was sworn in as the thirty-seventh president of the United States on January 20, 1969. References to that mission and to space exploration in general appeared throughout the new president’s inaugural address:

• “In throwing wide the horizons of space, we have discovered new horizons on earth.”

• “We find ourselves rich in goods, but ragged in spirit; reaching with magnificent precision for the moon, but falling into raucous discord on earth.”

• “As we explore the reaches of space, let us go to new worlds together—not as new worlds to be conquered, but as a new adventure to be shared.”

• “Only a few weeks ago we shared the glory of man’s first sight of the world as God sees it, as a single sphere reflecting light in the darkness. As the Apollo astronauts flew over the moon’s grey surface on Christmas Eve, they spoke to us of the beauty of earth.”

• “In that moment of surpassing technological triumph, men turned their thoughts toward home and humanity—seeing in that far perspective that man’s destiny on earth is not divisible; telling us that however far we reach into the cosmos, our destiny lies not in the stars but on earth itself.”²

As he assumed the presidency, Richard Nixon was well aware that the success of the Apollo 8 mission meant that the United States during his first year in the White House almost surely would achieve the lunar landing goal set by Nixon’s long-time nemesis John F. Kennedy eight years earlier. He also knew that in his first year in office he would face significant space policy decisions, choices that would set the path in space for the United States for the coming decade and beyond. But there was no sense of urgency within the Nixon administration with respect to defining what the United States would do in space after landing on the Moon; the space program was not high on Nixon’s policy agenda. More important in the short run was making sure that the lunar landing program was a success and that Richard Nixon was closely identified with that success.

Preparing for a Lunar Landing

To Nixon, “the most exciting event of the first year of my presidency came in July 1969 when an American became the first man to walk on the moon.” Not only was the historic Apollo 11 mission to the Moon personally exciting to the president, it also provided him an ideal vehicle to promote many of the themes he hoped would characterize his time in the White House, particularly America’s global leadership. In addition, by linking himself closely with the message left on the Moon—“We came in peace for all mankind”—Richard Nixon could portray himself as a peacemaker, eager to reduce the tensions that had led to conflict among nations in the years since World War II. To Nixon, the American spirit, as exemplified by the Apollo missions to the moon, was “the most important psychological weapon that could be used in building the generation of peace.” Nixon had decided that the lunar landing “was (a) a necessary shot in the arm to the American body politic, (b) a lift to the spirit of a war-weary people, (c) a boost for technology that was being unfairly derided by environmentalists—and (d), (e), and (f)—that he was going to be an enthusiastic part of it.”³

Project Apollo had in fact been intended from its 1961 approval by President Kennedy to be a large-scale effort in “soft power,” sending a peaceful but unmistakable signal to the world that the United States, not its Cold War rival the Soviet Union, possessed preeminent technological and organizational power, and that the American way of life provided an example other nations should admire and aspire to follow. In his May 25, 1961, address to a joint session of Congress in which he proposed setting as a national goal sending Americans to the Moon, Kennedy had said “if we are to win the battle for men’s minds, the dramatic achievements in space . . . should have made clear to us all . . . the impact of this adventure on the minds of men everywhere who are attempting to make a determination of which road they should take.”⁴ Although he was extremely reluctant to acknowledge that the Apollo 11 mission would be the culmination of the pledge Kennedy had made eight years earlier, Richard Nixon agreed with Kennedy’s rationale for the lunar landing effort. Even after the dismal events of the 1960s—assassinations, urban riots, and seemingly endless U.S. involvement in a war in Southeast Asia—landing Americans on the Moon, thought Nixon, was an achievement that could help both communicate to the rest of the world an extremely positive image of U.S. leadership and power and restore national morale.

Nixon and the Apollo Astronauts

According to his senior advisor John Ehrlichman, the Apollo astronauts were to Nixon “very wonderful people. There was just not enough the country can do for these guys, and they are doing an enormous amount for the country . . . He would always be enormously stimulated by contact with these folks. And there was an element of hero worship on his part.” Nixon “liked heroes. He thought it was good for this country to have heroes.”⁵ Apollo 8 commander Frank Borman suggested that the president believed that the Apollo astronauts were “something special—not as individuals so much as for what we represented.” According to veteran Time/Life correspondent Hugh Sidey, whenever Nixon met with one or more of the Apollo astronauts, “the color comes to his face and the bounce to his step.” Sidey suggested that Nixon saw the astronauts as “the sons he never had . . . They are the distillers of what Nixon considers to be the best in this country.”⁶ Nixon saw the Apollo astronauts as exemplars of the best characteristics of Americans and was eager to use them both overseas and in the United States as role models for what humans could achieve with positive intent and sufficient determination. Nixon’s attitude toward the Apollo astronauts led to a judgment on the part of those planning post-Apollo space efforts that he would never accept a proposal to end U.S. human space flights; any future NASA program would have to keep Americans flying in space.

While Nixon may have had positive feelings toward all of the Apollo astronauts, he developed a continuing relationship with only one of the group—Frank Borman. The Apollo 8 commander was invited to Nixon’s inaugural; to Borman, the invitation suggested that “Nixon was not only genuinely interested in space, but seemed to have embraced me personally as the space program’s symbolic representative.”⁷ By the time of the inauguration Borman was already scheduled to go on a three-week European “goodwill” tour. One of the first decisions of the incoming Nixon administration was to give its approval to the trip; Nixon’s secretary of state, William Rogers, later told Borman “we clearly made a wise decision.”

The Apollo 8 crew was invited to the White House on January 30, as the president announced that “it is very appropriate for Colonel Borman to go to Western Europe and to bring . . . not only the greetings of the people of the United States, but to point out what is the fact: that we in America do not consider that this is a monopoly, these great new discoveries that we are making; that we recognize the great contributions that others have made and will make in the future; and that we do want to work together with all peoples on this earth in the high adventure of exploring the new areas of space.” Upon his return to Washington, Borman reported that “space technology in Europe lags behind American achievement by a considerable amount” and suggested that the United States “immediately request an international agency to select a certain number of qualified scientists from different nations of the earth to join our program to participate as scientists/astronauts in future earth-orbital space stations.” This suggestion interested Richard Nixon; in the months to come he would press his associates to find ways to fly non-U.S. individuals on future U.S. space flights.⁸

Borman was surprised by “the extent to which Richard Nixon accepted me.” Indeed, until he left NASA and government service in mid-1970, Borman served as Nixon’s “in-house astronaut,” frequently consulted on space policy and personnel issues as well as serving as liaison between the White House and NASA during the Apollo 11 and Apollo 13 missions. Borman in early 1969 and again in fall 1970 might even have become head of NASA if he had been so inclined. With respect to his relationship with President Nixon, Borman recalls that “I liked him, I really did . . . I know he was terribly shy, even ill at ease with people he didn’t know, and when it came to making small talk he was a disaster.” However, “we never had to engage in small talk; at every meeting I had with him, we always discussed important matters on a one-on-one basis. He took advice—and sometimes it was advice that he either didn’t want to hear or that was contrary to what his advisers had told him.” Borman was “sure that he trusted me personally and he trusted my judgment in areas in which he knew I had some knowledge.”⁹

Planning for Presidential Involvement

In the five months after Richard Nixon was sworn in as president on January 20, 1969, there were two Apollo missions, both of which had to be successful in order for the July Apollo 11 flight to be the first try at a lunar landing. Both did succeed, clearing the path to the Moon. Apollo 9 (March 3–13) was an Earth-orbit test of the lunar module. Apollo 10 (May 18–26) was the dress rehearsal that performed all elements of the lunar landing mission except the landing itself.

Several of Nixon’s immediate staff, including chief of staff H. R. “Bob” Haldeman and appointments secretary Dwight Chapin, had worked in the advertising agency J. Walter Thompson, and they applied that expertise to making sure that the Apollo 11 mission and its aftermath would communicate the messages important to the president and in the process burnish Nixon’s image as a world leader. On May 28, two days after Apollo 10 splashed down, Chapin and Peter Flanigan, Nixon’s assistant with specific responsibility for space issues, met with NASA Administrator Tom Paine “to go over the Apollo 11 activities which could conceivably involve the President, either directly or indirectly.”¹⁰ Nixon, briefed on these discussions, quickly suggested that NASA assign Borman to the White House to help manage activities “with relation to this shot and subsequent congratulation of the astronauts.” Borman recognized that the Apollo 11 mission was “obviously going to be one of the most epochal events in history if it succeeded, and by the same token an unparalleled catastrophe if the crew didn’t survive.” Those within NASA close to Project Apollo, like Borman, realized just how risky missions to the Moon were, and thus were very conscious of the possibility of failure in the first landing attempt.¹¹

Haldeman, Chapin, and Flanigan had their own ideas on how best to portray the president in the most positive possible light, and they did not trust Paine and other top NASA officials to give the president’s interests top priority in the run up to Apollo 11. Paine had been selected as the NASA administrator only after several candidates preferred by the White House had turned down the position. Paine was a holdover from the Johnson administration; as a liberal Democrat, he was an unlikely choice as Nixon’s top space official. (His selection is discussed in chapter 2.) After discussing Paine’s suggestions with Nixon, Haldeman told Chapin that “the President is intrigued with having a very big dinner” after the Apollo 11 crew was released from quarantine; the dinner would include all U.S. astronauts and the widows “of the three that were burned.” [This was a reference to the deaths of Apollo 1 astronauts Gus Grissom, Ed White, and Roger Chaffee when a fire broke out in their spacecraft during a launch pad test on January 27, 1967.] Nixon first considered having the dinner at the White House, then thought “it ought to be bigger.” After considering both New York and Chicago as venues, Nixon “ended up being primarily intrigued with the possibility of Los Angeles, doing it at the Century Plaza.” Nixon proposed charging $100 a person for the dinner and “using the income for space scholarships for underprivileged kids.” (This proposal was later dropped.) He “definitely wants to go ahead with plans to visit the Cape for the shoot” and “liked the idea of watching the launch from aboard a ship.” Nixon wanted to make sure that any prelaunch reception “would clearly be the President’s affair—not NASA’s.” Nixon had been told that it would be possible to talk on split-screen television with the astronauts while they were on the Moon; he was “extremely anxious to pursue the television participation idea.” The president, reported Haldeman, “still feels he probably should go to the carrier for the pick up,” but “we can talk him out of that.” A week letter, the idea of President Nixon having dinner with Apollo 11 crew—Neil Armstrong, Edwin Aldrin, Jr., better known as “Buzz,” and Michael Collins—the night before their launch had been added to the list of possibilities.

Nixon’s interest in going to the recovery carrier had been communicated to NASA, which was skeptical of the desirability of such an undertaking. NASA’s top public relations official, Julian Scheer, told the White House that Nixon could not greet the astronauts personally, but only “talk with the Apollo 11 ...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title
• Overture
• Act 1   No More Apollos
• Act 2   What Next?
• Notes
• Bibliography
• Index