Tag: 1968

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THE ANTARES SECRET – CHAPTER 18: Second Inning – Secondary Secrecy

.Grainy image of first man on the Moon video, its production shrouded in secrecy

“Secrecy was of the essence,” said the legendary astronaut. “NASA had to fool a lot of important people for the plan to succeed, so it was a strict need-to-know approach to everything. They had to keep a lot of people in the dark.”  

“I’m sure they had to, but how can you keep such a monumental task secret with so many people involved.”  

“One would ordinarily think that something like that would be more complicated than it really is. But it’s all about compartmentalization of information. Segmentation of labors. No single person had the whole picture. You tell people only what they absolutely need to know in order to do their part, embellish it with a little bit of fiction and everything looks like business as usual. Everybody did what needed to be done under false but believable pretenses. This was done masterfully, and as a result, only a handful of people had the whole picture.”  

“And you were one of them?”  

“As commander of the mission with the most complex and important secondary protocol, I was made aware of much more than the average astronaut. The same applied to Buzz and Michael. Our mission was by far the most extensive and risky with a high-profile dimension upon our return to Earth. Still, I’m sure there were a few things we were not made privy of.  

“See, the secondary protocol was different for every Apollo mission. Each one had to either test or place a component of the whole plan. Only the commanders were aware of the whole picture. They would brief their crews on the details once the previous mission was concluded and it had become official that their own mission needed to implement the secondary protocol. But those briefings were limited to the extent of their mission. They did not include any information regarding the role of other missions.”  

“In November of 1968 America elected Richard Nixon as their new President,” said Lucas. “That must have thrown a curve on the secondary protocol plans. How was that handled?” 

“The powers behind the plan chose not to inform President-elect Nixon for two very important reasons. First, plausible deniability, and second, he was the person that would oversee the landings on the Moon. It was important that he believed everything was for real. That way his actions would convey the highest degree of credibility to the world. Remember, for the governments of the U.S. and the Soviet Union, the space race was more a political endeavor than a scientific one.  

“Anyway, besides the astronauts in the missions that carried out the secondary protocol, nobody knew about it outside a very small group of the highest top brass at NASA, plus LBJ and his most inner circle, and, I suspect, one or two Senators as well.”  

“What about mission control? How would you train for a secondary protocol without the collaboration of someone there?”  

“That’s an example of the compartmentalization of information I mentioned earlier. Over at Mission Control, the people developing simulations worked on scenarios pertaining to the secondary protocol without knowing they were generating the basis for a ruse. Since the secondary protocol was designed around the transmission of false but realistic data to Earth, the creation of such data could be concealed within the regular parameters of the development of regular training exercises. To the people working on simulations these were just more situations we had to train for. Little did they know that those streams of data they were creating were going to be used by the astronauts to transmit false data to the ground during secondary protocol missions.”

“So, does this transmission of false data included the video purportedly showing mankind’s first landing on the Moon?”  

“Yes, it does. A very small team sworn to secrecy worked on the production of the simulated transmissions of us on the Moon. NASA fed them the cover story that they were creating some training films. And that the videos were deemed classified because of the Cold War. They used doubles for the filming which meant that no astronaut ever put a foot on a filming studio. Just like with President Nixon: plausible deniability. I can say under oath that I never participated in the filming of any fake Moon landing video, blah, blah, blah.

“Anyway, to further minimize the probability that the production house could identify their material in the transmissions from the Moon, their videos where heavily edited and the images degenerated using the videotape technology of the era. Someone, I don’t know who, made several generations of the final edit until it reached the grainy look you saw on those transmissions.”  

“So, conspiracy theorists had it right when they said the whole thing had been filmed on a stage…” said Lucas.  

“They did, but they struck out when they took that to mean that we never landed on the Moon,” replied Armstrong.  

Over on the playing field:

The Indians once more started the inning well with a double to center but, just like before, the effort was fruitless. No score for either team in the second inning. Reds leading 1-0 after two.      

 

 

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THE ANTARES SECRET – CHAPTER 19: Third Inning – Who’s on First?

The third inning started, and Lucas’ list of questions increased with every pitch.  

“Who decided which astronauts were to carry out the secondary protocol missions?”  

“One simple directive guided the selection process: they had to be the ones most likely to keep their mouths shut,” said Armstrong. “Military background was preferred although in my case it was more of a psychological profile thing.”  

“What do you mean?”  

“In August 1968 George Low, Manager of the Apollo Spacecraft Program Office, had a secret meeting with Bob Gilruth, head of the Manned Spacecraft Center, Chris Kraft, Director of Flight Operations, and Deke Slayton, who as NASA’s Flight Crew Director was the person tasked with making crew assignments. They were Apollo program’s four senior administrators, and by that time had become an unofficial committee that got together often in Gilruth’s office to discuss and make decisions on the future of the program. Not much happened that didn’t originate with them.

“Well, in that August meeting Low convinced the group that the only way to meet Kennedy’s goal was to send Apollo 8 around the Moon on December of that year. It was a Hail Mary pass that would allow NASA to fulfill in one mission many of the program objectives needed to land on the Moon.

“That meant reshuffling the other missions and the crew assignments. The original Apollo 8 mission became Apollo 9 and in the process Buzz, Michael and me, instead of being back-up crew of Apollo 9 became back-up for Apollo 8. Something that meant that our place in the rotation suddenly had us in line for the prime crew of Apollo 11, which was, at the time, scheduled to be the first G-type mission. In other words, the first Moon landing mission.

“At the time I thought that such a realignment of missions had been simply a lucky break for us, but I found out shortly thereafter, that I had been chosen not to be the first man to actually land on the Moon but to be the commander of the mission with the secondary protocol to tell the world that we had landed on the Moon. Very big difference, believe me. And the reason I was selected for that was that Gilruth, Low, Kraft and Deke saw me as a person who did not have a large ego. Chris Kraft wrote about that in 2001 as part of his autobiography.”

“So, in June 6, 1968, LBJ gave the order to put the secondary protocol in motion,” said Lucas, “and in August, the Big Four laid out the whole plan. Right?”

“Pretty much. That Apollo 8’s crew, was the first to train for a secondary protocol. The crews of Apollo 7 and 9 were kept in the dark. Their missions were about testing the spacecrafts on Earth orbit and as such, were of little or no use to the overall plan.

“Only seven astronauts were aware of the whole secondary protocol: Commanders Frank Borman of Apollo 8, Tom Stafford of Apollo 10, Pete Conrad of Apollo 12, Jim Lovell of Apollo 13, Alan Shepard of Apollo 14 and myself on Apollo 11. Nobody else was made aware of the whole plan; it was just us. As a matter of fact Lovell carried out two secondary protocol missions; the only astronaut to do so. We were all members of the New Nine group except for Shepard who, as you know, was one of the Mercury Seven; the first American to go into space way back in 1961.”  

“What about their crews? You said that the commanders would brief their crews only to the extent of their mission and did not include any information regarding the role of other missions. Didn’t they have questions? How was that handled?”  

“There was a total of 10 crew members involved in the secondary protocol missions; all were military men. They knew how to follow orders without questioning them. Plus there was always the ‘that’s classified’ response,” said Armstrong with a smirk. “Actually, two of them, Young and Cernan, did get to walk on the Moon in later missions. And a third one, Dick Gordon was in line to do the same in Apollo 18 until his mission was cancelled due to budget cuts. I’m sure they didn’t need much more motivation to keep their mouths shut.  

“All astronauts involved were given a lifetime mission that transcended the primary mission objectives. Our mission would not be completed until we have taken what we know to our graves. It’s a very heavy burden I’ve come to regard as unjust, not for me, but for the ones who were not given the credit they deserved. Look Lucas,  I’m convinced that it was the right thing to do in the context of the era, but we now live in a different world. It’s time for people to know the truth.”  

Over on the field

The third inning was a testament to the pitching duel in front of us that day with only one hit between the two teams and no runs scored. Reds still leading 1-0 after three.      

 

 

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THE ANTARES SECRET – CHAPTER 20: Fourth Inning – 1968 Overture

Image of Surveyor probe on the surface of the Moon

On the top half of the fourth inning the Indians tied the game on an RBI single by Casey Blake. Lucas pumped his fist in celebration before resuming his conversation with the old astronaut.

“We’ve got ourselves a tie ball-game,” he said.

Armstrong smiled and continued his story.

“You know,” he said, “what prompted President Johnson to green light the secondary protocol in 1968 was the lunar module evaluation done by the Apollo 9 crew.

“Both mission Commander Jim McDivitt and his LMP, Lunar Module Pilot, Rusty Schweickart had been part of the many tests conducted at Grumman’s.”

“Grumman, yes, the company in charge of developing the lunar module,” added Lucas.

“That’s correct. In general terms their assessment was that the extent of things still not working properly on the module was such that it would be impossible to have a 1968 launch.”

“Which would have made it almost impossible to fulfill Kennedy’s promise,” said Lucas.

“Right, so when confronted with that situation in June, 1968 LBJ activated the secondary protocol. It’s no coincidence the LM-2, the designation for the lunar module initially assigned to McDivitt’s mission, was moved to NASA that same month.

“Production of the lunar module was already behind schedule, but when the LM-2 arrived at Cape Canaveral that June, NASA confirmed that the craft still had significant defects and some officials referred to it as a piece of junk. Grumman’s estimate at the time was that the first mission-ready lunar module, meaning LM-3 because LM-2 was beyond fixing, would not be a reality until at least February 1969.”

“And that’s when George Low came up with the idea of the circumlunar mission for Apollo 8,” said Lucas.

“You know your NASA history,” said Armstrong. “Another event added pressure on the Apollo program to make the 1969 landing goal. In September 1968 the Soviet Union’s Zond 5 mission successfully carried Russian tortoises in a cislunar loop around the Moon. This was the second consecutive successful cislunar mission for the Soviets, and NASA was getting antsy.

“The stakes were extremely high, and the pressure was mounting. There was speculation within NASA, that the Soviets were preparing to launch cosmonauts on a circumlunar mission before the end of 1968.

“As matter of fact the Zond 5 mission shocked the hell out of us when voices of cosmonauts were transmitted from the spacecraft,” said Armstrong. “The cosmonauts were apparently reading out telemetry data and computer readings, and even discussing making an attempt to land. It turned out to be a hoax perpetrated by the cosmonauts who were sitting comfortably at their command center in Crimea plugging into the Zond 5 transmitter.

“The official version was that it was a prank, but I always thought they were testing their own version of our secondary protocol. The fact that their transmission was discovered to be a fake so fast taught us a critical lesson: our communication of a Moon landing very probably would have to come from a transmitter on the surface of the Moon and not from the orbiting command module.

“Which brings me to the next point. The one thing that finally convinced President Johnson that the secondary protocol was the way to go,” said Armstrong, “was the fact that there were five Surveyor probes on the surface of the Moon.”

“You mean the probes sent by NASA to test soft-landing capability?”

“Yes, from May 1966 to January 1968 NASA’s jet propulsion laboratory sent seven robotic spacecrafts to the surface of the Moon. One crashed and another one exploded before landing, but five made it to the surface and those could be used to simulate transmissions from the surface of the Moon.

“Of all the Surveyor missions only number 7 at the Tycho crater was not used for the secondary protocol. Surveyors 1 and 3 were in the Ocean of Storms which ended up being Apollo 12’s landing site and one of the alternate landing sites for Apollo 11. Surveyor 5 was on the Sea of Tranquility which ended up being Apollo 11’s landing site. And Surveyor 6 was on Sinus Medii, another one of Apollo 11’s alternate landing sites.

On the bottom half of the fourth inning

The Reds regained the lead on a solo homer by Adam Dunn. 2-1 Reds after four.      

 

 

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