Meaning what, exactly? This is still "If I Ran the Zoo". We're not talking about combat sorties or other missions accomplished by the dozens or hundreds. We're talking about a handful of missions with intense training requirements and an aggressive schedule. In order to launch a mission every three to six months, you have to have trained crews "in the pipeline" because the training program takes longer than that. Otherwise your project drags on for years at astronomical expense.

Consider also the significant probability of loss of crew. A trained crew is a very valuable commodity. If your program relies on one or two trained crews, what happens when one is lost to accident?

Finally, the author's conclusion presumes that actual flight experience is significantly more valuable than training experience. Each of the crews had undergone hundreds of hours of simulator training. The information gleaned from flight experience is simply what wasn't covered in simulation. The progressive nature of Apollo missions means that as flight experience is rolled into simulation, the discrepancy between them diminishes.


Except that you can't hide a spacecraft in low earth orbit.

Without seeing the lunar surface at close hand, how would these convincing fakes be accomplished? Why would NASA plan to do something so likely to emphasize the difference between real and fake?

Recall that our author says that NASA knew in 1958 it would be impossible to go to the moon. Even though they were given until 1970 to come up with moon-capable technology, they allegedly couldn't do it. So why would they try to fake it for 1969 and hope that some short time later they could solve the problem that they "knew" they couldn't solve in 12 years?

He never worked for NASA, never studied anything technical, and left Rocketdyne before Apollo work had progressed beyond pre-design.

Further, a detailed hypothesis is still a hypothesis. The ability to adorn one's theory with lots of unsubstantiated detail does not result in erudition or correctness.

This presumes NASA's silence is motived by fear instead of indifference. It presumes NASA has (or had at the time) the motive to disprove Kaysing's thesis. This is circular.

NASA's silence frustrates the conspiracy theorists because they need NASA's acknowledgement and attention in order to increase their credibility. Anybody can come up with a cockamamie story, but if you come up with a cockamamie story that people pay attention to who already have the public's ear, that's more money in your pocket.

The fact that you or I or any number of qualified individuals give evidence against the conspiracy theory is irrelevant. None of us has the stature to give the conspiracy theorists the exposure and attention they want. For them it's NASA or nothing. Unfortunately for them, NASA realizes that by keeping silent they do they worst thing possible to the conspiracy theorists -- ignore them.

Not true. From the Earth to the Moon was filmed in the traditional Hollywood way of spending several days preparing for a shot that may last only four or five seconds in the final version. The film is produced by connecting hundreds of such shots. The result appears seamless only because the public is used to being entertained for hours each day in that medium. Effects that persist for only a few seconds and which rely on post-production editing to remove evidence of them are not equivalent to keeping the same illusion going for up to an hour in some cases.

The Hollywood effects are convincing only because most people -- including conspiracy theorists -- do not have eyes for detail. This is why the shots are typically short. The longer they persist, the greater chances someone will see the "giveaway".


Numerous LRVs were constructed, not just the flight model. HBO does not in any way represent that they used a flight LRV. In fact, flight LRVs cannot hold up their own weight in earth gravity.

Correct. Those who defend Apollo have told essentially the same story since 1975 when the first organized conspiracy theory was published. However, the conspiracy theories have become more and more fanciful, and bounce wildly between competing assertions. Now, for example, instead of telling us the hoax was undertaken to fool the Soviets, they're telling us the Soviets were in on it all along.

This undoubtedly refers to the Fox program and some of its prototypes, whose interviews were conducted in 1999. While Brian Welch did not go into great detail, he did correctly summarize the major failings of the conspiracy theorists. Further, this author neglects to realize that these programs are produced by conspiracists who have the final editorial control over what is said -- and more importantly, what is left on the cutting room floor. Do you really believe that a program produced by conspiracy theorists for the purpose of promulgating the theory will air material contrary evidence? A film producer who seeks to make NASA look like fools can easily succeed.

Goldin is talking about long-term risk. The chances of a dangerous solar flare during Apollo missions were essentially negligible. But during a mission lasting many months it's a possibility that has to be considered.

The author tries to convince us that Goldin's "slip" is due to his not having been around for Apollo. It's more likely that it's due to the author's misrepresentation.

Since when did the CIA lead the U.S.?

No. They initially appeared to be ahead. Their feared heavy-lift boosters -- which indeed had greater payload-to-orbit capacity -- were based on large numbers of small engines because they didn't have the metallurgy to build larger ones. This is why so many of them blew up. Further, the Soviets didn't tell people about their failures. So it's easy to convince the world that they had superior technology. Some retired Soviet rocket scientists have said their efforts during the early space race focused on breaking records, not building a space program.

By the mid-1960s the Soviet slap-dash hare had given way to the American tortoise. Zond fell behind Apollo and never made up the difference. The Soviets then concentrated on space station technology, and this gave them a recognized expertise in human factors for space travel. They maintained this superiority until the fall of the Soviet Union when the U.S. and the Soviets combined forces.

Whether the claim about Cuban schools is true or not, a country is rarely portrayed accurately and reliably by its enemies. The author seems to believe that the Cubans have "seen through" the illusion and are teaching the truth. This is simply circular. An equally justified conclusion is that the Cubans are teaching their children propaganda for ideological reasons, just as people in the U.S. foist off propaganda for capitalistic reasons.

And even if we choose to agree with the author and say the CIA believed the Soviet bloc citizens were unintelligent, it's not the rank-and-file we feared. We feared the Soviet scientists and engineers, because those were perceived to be the formidable enemies of the cold war and the space race. If the Soviet leaders could truthfully show their citizens how duplicitous and dishonest the American capitalists were by giving evidence of a fake moon landing claim, then they would win an overwhelming political victory. In short, the Soviet scientists had both motive and opportunity to uncover a hoax.

It's simply more circularity. The CIA's estimates were "wrong" because the Cubans -- supposedly ill-educated bumpkins -- were teaching the "obvious" truth of the Apollo hoax.

I've read countless moon landing conspiracy theories, and this is the only mention of "mind expanding drugs" used to somehow control the behavior and attitude of the astronauts. I can't imagine that "many" believe this.

Powerful psychotropic drugs such as LSD might have been "common", but only among the counter-culture which was the ideological antithesis to NASA and the government. And the author doesn't explain how any of these drugs would produce the desired effect.

Finally, even if the astronauts were somehow "mind-controlled" there would be evidence in their behavior, as testified by wives, family, and friends. The author correctly notes a certain disposition common to test-pilots. Where did this disposition go? Why do the astronauts, instead, seem to maintain the test-pilot disposition throughout Apollo?

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"Facts are stubborn things." --John Adams
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