Correct me if I'm wrong, here--not you, Eric; other people--but wasn't the Apollo capsule a naked-eye object? I know the ISS is. Leaving aside the enormous if that is "if they have antigravitic flight capability," that still wouldn't be enough to keep people from being aware of unscheduled space missions. For one thing, where would they be launched from?

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Gillian

"Now everyone was giving her that kind of look UFOlogists get when they suddenly say, 'Hey, if you shade your eyes you can see it is just a flock of geese after all.'"

"You can't erase icing."

"I can't believe it doesn't work! I found it on the internet, man!"

Boy, that's a lot of stuff you have there, Eric. Any evidence for ANY of it??
Sounds like you're just brainstorming there.

Sure there's lots evidence of them stealing our money for 50 years ... as far as what they've done with it ... I"m speculating.

I don't think they've used it for the common good ....

My initial comment though bears reflection .... If we went there 40 years ago there are really no logical reasons why we haven't gone back ... and why our space technology hasn't progressed accordingly with other spectacular advancements such as in computing.

I"m not necessarily saying we didn't go ..... mainly that if we did ... the situation we now find ourselves in is illogical ....
If the Russians continued and put men on the moon ..... would the US allow them to do this without response?

Would they just say " well .. it doesn't have any military strategic value"
so the Russians can just have it and we'll trust that they don't do anything underhanded?

How did they know the Russians would stop their plans to go there ...? and why did the Russians not go? ...very strange ..

Sure there is.

It's expensive, there is no economic (or other really important) incentive to do so, and there is insufficient interest. Why is that so hard to understand?

This again? In what way hasn't it progressed accordingly? What is your basis of comparison?

Physics places limits on what can be done with rockets or computers. In the case of microelectronics, there was a lot of room for performance improvements, but there is only so much you could do with a chemical rocket. Rockets in the '60s were at a high level of technological development. You can refine them a little, but you aren't going to get any big performance improvements over what we had then.

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I say there is an invisible elf in my backyard. How do you prove that I am wrong?

Disclaimer: Avatar is not an official NASA image and does not imply any specific interplanetary or interstellar capability.

The Leif Ericson Cruiser

What kind of underhanded things could someone do on the moon?

Did "they" know that?

Because their heavy lift rockets were blowing up, there were other issues with their moon effort, and we had won the moon race.

Instead, the Soviets moved forward with space stations.

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I say there is an invisible elf in my backyard. How do you prove that I am wrong?

Disclaimer: Avatar is not an official NASA image and does not imply any specific interplanetary or interstellar capability.

The Leif Ericson Cruiser

If there is lots of evidence then you won't have any difficulty producing some will you? Also who exactly are "they", remeber that the government isn't a monolithic entity, its made up of lots of people who in tern work for lots of different agencies, many of which don't get on and/or work as crossed purposes.
Because our general materials technology hasn't advanced nearly as fast as electronics, you can only squeeze so much energy out of a given amount of fuel so you can only lift so much with it. For much the same reason there hasn't been a the same increase in aircraft technology as there was in computing, the SR-31 Blackbird is still the fastest plane (there may be classified ones that are faster but there isn't any solid evidence) and dates from that era, as does the Boeing 747 which until recently was the biggest commercial plane, and Concord is from that era as well.
I don't know, let me know right as soon as you are able to look into a parallel universe where the USSR did manage to get to the Moon and tell me what the US did about it. In this universe the USSR never got anywhere with their plans for the Moon (and the US intelligence agencies presumably knew about this) so there was no need to do anything else about them going there.
Mostly because the N-1, their answer to the Saturn V, kept blowing up when they tried to launch it and without it they couldn't launch enough mass to the Moon to do a manned mission.

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"Any Sufficiently Analyzed Magic is Indistinguishable from SCIENCE!" -Agatha Heterodyne

"Any technology, no matter how primitive, is magic to those who don't understand it." -Florence Ambrose

You don't remember the Deep Impact mission, do you?

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"Time travel gives me a headache." - Capt. Kathryn Janeway

Oh, cripes, not this one again!

Trodas, the ice believed to be on the Moon does not have tubes of hot water routed through it.

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"You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means."

Depends on your goal. If your goal is to determine whether any water exists there in the first place, then no, not really. To do that would be like buying a Lambourghini to see if you want to learn how to drive. Sure, it'll get the job done, but there are far cheaper, simpler and quicker alternatives to achieve the same goal...

Is your inference that the Apollo astronauts were permanently in shadow? If not, precisely why do you equate the two processes?

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"I'd take the awe of understanding over the awe of ignorance any day." - Douglas Adams

"Certainly, in the topsy-turvy world of heavy rock, having a good solid piece of wood in your hand is often useful." - Ian Faith

I'm sorry, but that's just silly. If you are going to call upon imaginary antigravity technology for this idea, you might as well just call upon warp drive, transporters, and magic. And if THEY had all of this, why would need they need to put missiles on the moon, they could just use the invisible antigrav to bomb Russia.

Please show some proof that trillions of dollars have disappeared out of the stock market and that this has some how been funneled into "black ops" and your moon base idea.

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One Earth, One Sky - IYA 2009
All moderation in purple

Yes, and I remember watching Apollo-Soyuz going overhead. It's very hard to hide things in space, though if somebody has anti-gravity drives, why not a cloaking device?

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I say there is an invisible elf in my backyard. How do you prove that I am wrong?

Disclaimer: Avatar is not an official NASA image and does not imply any specific interplanetary or interstellar capability.

The Leif Ericson Cruiser

Firstly - give me one good reason why the Military would want to 'control' the Moon. All that's been back in 40 years is half a dozen or so unmanned spacecraft.

Secondly - the International Space Treaty explicitly forbids the militarisation of other bodies in the solar system.

Do you have any evidence we actually didn't go to the moon?

You find a lot of things strange that others do not.

What bases would those be?

Are there? Perhaps you could describe them. Specifically any that are simpler and cheaper than crashing an expended rocket stage (that was already along for the ride anyway because you used it to get there in the first place) into the surface and analysing the plume from impact using a spectrometer (not by collecting the material that is blasted out, as you seem to think).

It's a very common approach when researching objects from a distance. Ever hear of Lunar Prospector or Deep Impact?

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"The very powerful and the very stupid have one thing in common: They don't alter their views to fit the facts, they alter the facts to fit their views." The Doctor, Doctor Who: The Face of Evil.

They're not bombing the moon.

Incidentally - if they're using this mission to 'hide' what's in the South Pole....I have several questions

Firstly - how? The level of accuracy in the targeting for the impacts of the centaur upper stage and LCROSS sheaparding spacecraft is significantly worse than the size of the resultant crater. So you could not point at a feature and guarentee it's destruction.

Secondly - we would notice. Whatever it is you think they are 'bombing' would produce a dramatic spectral signature in the resultant ejecta plume - which will be observed by NASA as well as non-NASA scientists.

Thirdly - HOW, exactly, are you suggesting something is there, and how is it that Smart 1, Chandrayaan-1 (with SAR, no less), Kaguya and ChangE' 1 all managed to miss these features, despite both poles being a MASSIVE area of focused scientific investigation. They are all non-US missions. You can bet your *** China would LOVE to break a news item like that to the world and embarass the Americans. So would the Russians with their orbiters back in the '60s.

But no.

They're using kinetic energy to do bulk excavation to understand if there is ice there. It's not unusual, it's not wierd, it's not a 'BOMB'. It's science.

You might find it interesting if you cared to take notice of it.

If they have antigravitic flight capability ... you would never see them going there or back. And they could cover all their activity if they used the dark side of the moon.

OK, I know I'm going to get into trouble for this, probably lose my security clearance and my job. I may even go to jail.

You're on to us. Oh, you're wrong on many details but you're on to us. We do have secret military bases on the moon! Now, we don't have anti-gravity technology because that just doesn't exist. We ride unicorns that fly by pooping rainbows. Everytime you see a rainbow, that's us flying to the moon. Now you know.

Oh, there is no dark side of the moon, either. There's the side that faces away from the Earth all of the time but it has the same day/night cycle as the side we see.

Seriously, if you believe in made up technology, then anything is possible. However, when constrained by reality such as physics and budgets, life is a lot more dull.

That's been mentioned a few times, and I have agreed with that thinking.

But elsewhere, someone posted a PDF of a Russian discussion in the 50's where they were fearing this.

The base would make sense from the point of a deterrent. But; that still does not provide any more validity to the statement. In fact, it makes it worse. You would want the base to be well-known, because a deterrent is not effective if no one knows about it.

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Numbers are not case sensitive. (me)

Your single best piece of evidence for this please.

Actually, a modest sized payload can be launched from some of the ballistic missiles that are launched from submarines. Russia has done it. They used a SSBM to launch a small satellite.

I think the reasoning was simply that they had a surplus submarine launched ballistic missile that could send a payload to orbit and that it was easier to actually launch it from a submarine, since it had the comparable launch hardware, than to try to do so at a space launch site.


But that's one way you could have a covert space launch, the sub does not even need to surface. Just launch the rocket from some place remote and away from shipping lanes and land.

If you want to keep the launch secret from other countries then you would have to worry about things like radar or the plume being detected by satellites. There are ways of addressing this, like stealth materials or plume suppression methods. Although the later is not perfect.


Launching a Saturn-V though... that could be a little harder.

of course first of all you would need a sybmarine taht could fire large enough rockets to launch a payload into orbit. And once it orbit it could be tracked, regardless of where it was launched. Not to mention that a spacecraft large enough to carry people is well beyond the capability pof any submarine launched missile

The military purpose of the Apollo program was demonstrating the superiority of the Capitalistic multi party Western system Vs a single party totalitarian communism system.

The Cold War was a war.

At the time of the Cold War, many in the military believed that nuclear war was inevitable. During the Cuban missile crisis America put all bombers on the highest alert possible, one step below war, fueled up, with armed nuclear bombs, with crews, with instructions for complete nuclear war, with both China and the Soviet Union. China being included to ensure the Chinese would not attack a US weakened by the Soviet retaliatory strike.

It is difficult to imagine the Military disagreements within the US civil government and between Military and civil government at the time. The US had fought the Chinese a short time before in the Korean war. The US was becoming involved with the Vietnam conflict at the same time, There were many people in the Military with direct combat experience who understood that killing and complete war, what every is necessary for victory, is required to defend against a powerful fanatical enemy.

A conspiracy requires wet work and fanatical motivational. There was wet work during the Cold War which requires separation from the normal intelligence service and the Civil government to protect the government from political repercussions.

There was to fight the Cold War the infrastructure and clandestine fund sources to run a major conspiracy. Skills, techniques, and methods are develop to run clandestine operations, such as propaganda. (Remember the US is completing against totalitarian states.)

A conspiracy with wet work spawns other conspiracies.

The necessary conditions for a conspiracy does not prove there was a conspiracy.

Whether there was or was not an Apollo conspiracy, I do not find interesting.

Whether there was or was not Alien contact. That is interesting as, the existence of Aliens and contact of human and Aliens, is paradigm changing.

The Illuminati and the Freemasons want to control the world. If we had really gone to the moon, they would have established their base there to achieve their nefarious goals. Since they didn't, we obviously never went there.

You have no proof that I am wrong, therefore I am right.

Military Motivation for Conspiracies

Source all quoted sources Wikipedia except as noted.

Are there any unusual political events prior to and during the Apollo program?

At a time of possible all out nuclear war with the Soviet Union, in the middle of the Cold War and as the Vietnam War was being fought what was the military purpose of the Apollo program?

What was the scientific purpose of the Apollo program? Why send men to the moon?

Apollo Program Starts 1961 first man on the Moon 1969


World War II 1939 to 1945 – 70 Million Casualties

Korean War – 1.5 Million to 3.0 Million Casualties (Typical Estimate is 2 Million) 54,000 American Soldiers

On 27 June 1950, two days after the KPA invaded and three months before the October Chinese intervention to the Korean War, President Truman dispatched the 7th US Fleet to the Taiwan Straits, to protect Nationalist Republic of China from the People’s Republic of China (PRC).[70] On 4 August 1950, Mao Zedong reported to the Politburo that he would intervene when the People's Volunteer Army (PVA) was ready to deploy. On 20 August 1950, Premier Zhou Enlai informed the United Nations that “Korea is China’s neighbor ... The Chinese people cannot but be concerned about a solution of the Korean question”—thus, via neutral-country diplomats, China warned the US, that in safeguarding Chinese national security, they would intervene against the UN Command in Korea.[38]:83 President Truman interpreted the communication as “a bald attempt to blackmail the UN”, and dismissed it.[71] The Politburo authorized the Chinese intervention to the Korean War on 2 October 1950—the day after the ROK Army’s northward crossing of the 38th-parallel border.[72] Later, the Chinese reported that US bombers had violated PRC national airspace when on en route to bomb North Korea—before China intervened.[73]


http://library.thinkquest.org/11046/days/index.html



Vietnam War
American Soldiers Killed 58,000
North Vietnam Soldier Killed 1 Million Civilians Killed 2 Million
South Vietnam Soldiers Killed 184,000 Civilians

Are there any unusual political events prior to and during the Apollo program?

Are there any unusual religious, culinary, financial, and cinematic events prior to and during the Apollo program?

When dealing with history, mere coincidence in time does not establish causation. You have mentioned Apollo. You have mentioned military operations. Where is the causation?

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"Facts are stubborn things." --John Adams
Clavius Moon Base

Or even a point?

A conspiracy requires both motive and the power to implement the conspiracy. The thread title is military connection to the Apollo program.

i.e. Why state in 1961 that the US will go to the moon by the end of decade? What is the military significance? Why by the end of the decade? What difference does it make whether the US does or does not go to moon?

The Apollo program was initiated as part of the Cold War.

Is there motivation for a conspiracy? Yes. Why the frantic statement that the US will put a man on the moon by the end of decade, in 1961?

What difference does it make from a scientific standpoint that a man is placed on the moon by the end of decade? What is the space race? Do you know anything about the Cold War?

The US was at the brink of total nuclear war with the communists, when the Apollo program was implemented. (During the Vietnam war and and during the Cuban missile crisis.) The Apollo program was initiated to prove a multiparty system with capitalism is superior to communism.

There is no technical military purpose for men walking about the moon.


Does that prove there was a conspiracy? No.

President Kennedy's so called Man on the Moon Speech. Note the context of the speech.


http://www.australianpolitics.com/us...n-speech.shtml

As you said, the Cold War. I was around in those times...there was intense competition to prove that each form of government (Democracy & Communism) was the better, more efficient system. We went to the moon largely to prove our system was better. That was not a motivation to create a hoax...that was motivation to get to the moon. Why would Kennedy make that speech? I can answer in 2 words: Nikita Khruschev.

The notion that the U.S. government could pull off a conspiracy involving dozens of nations and hundreds of thousands of people (including amateur astronomers and radio operators) is in itself evidence (proof) that the U.S. would not have attempted such a hoax. We were desperate to prove our system superior...and there is NO WAY such a HUGE conspiracy would or could remain secret. The U.S. would have ended up looking like complete nincompoops all over the world. A blind man could have seen that coming with a cane.

My God, the U.S. president couldn't even bug the Democratic headquarters without getting caught. And that involved a mere handful of people!

These HBs really need to think about what they are saying.

William, what is the conspiracy?

A conspiracy to engage in a "space race" with the Soviet Union? But this state of affairs was public knowledge and well-understood at the time. No secret there. No conspiracy.

A conspiracy to fight "cold war" with the Soviet Union (to include things like "space races" in place of "mutally assured destruction")? Again, it was public knowledge and well-understood at the time. Again, no secret. Again, no conspiracy.

A conspiracy to synergize NASA's aerospace efforts with those of the military? NASA's operations and budgets are a matter of public record. They always have been. NASA's relationship with the military has been well-understood since the agency was first established. The continuous cross-pollination of civilian and military aerospace programs, personnel, and potential has never been hidden from the public. Again, no secret. Again, no conspiracy.

And so again I ask: What do you think is the conspiracy here?

I will repeat what I said:

Is there motivation for a conspiracy? Yes. Why the frantic statement that the US will put a man on the moon by the end of the decade, in 1961? Why spend 135 billion 2009 dollars to put a man on the moon? Note the importance of completing the project by the end of decade.

I did not say there was a conspiracy.

The investigation of a conspiracy has the same components as a criminal investigation. There must be motive. Secondly, there must be the ability to commit the crime. And lastly there must be evidence that shows a crime was committed.

There does appear to be motivation if it was not physically possible to have men walk about the moon by the end of the decade (See Kennedy's speech) to make it appear men did walk about the moon. The US military unlike the Civil government is capable of a significant clandestine project. The secret service would not be the secret service if if could not keep secrets.

I agree, it would be difficult to make it appear men walked about the moon if they did not, however, I do not think it would be impossible. Are you saying it would be impossible?

I have not seen any hard evidence that proves the moon landing was fudged.

One item that is against a conspiracy is the lack of counter rumors from the Soviets. It is expected the Soviets would have been aware of a conspiracy and would have leaked that information to reduce the propaganda value of the US being the first to walk on the moon.