TEN YEARS TO REMEMBER

[Music] only a little more than a 100 years ago those who came before us could only add the energy of animals to their own strength our progress since then has been based on our learning how to develop and use new sources of energy of [Music] power and learning we have lifted the burden from the backs of men and put it on the minds of men where it always should have been the minds of men our Department of Defense called in the Strategic missiles evaluation committee their task to determine whether our technology could develop a long range missile capability within a limited period of time the Soviets had stolen a march on us we knew it and worse than that they knew it time had become a weapon when they faced the task ahead men like vanon noyman milikin Ramo litson Trevor Gardner general power General shr on the basis of their positive recommendation the Department of Defense through the air force launched our accelerated ballistic missile and space programs the date July 15th 1954 10 years later almost to the day on the 10th of July 1964 the Space Systems division Air Force systems command moved to New headquarters in El Segundo a next door neighbor to Los Angeles in that short 10-year interval the minds of many men had spearheaded our great National effort they have been 10 years of History not studied in book BS at school but Years of Living history in which all of us have played a part and in that brief period our technology has moved forward faster than the years and that which was considered unlikely improbable impossible to accomplish in 20 30 or 40 years has been accomplished in these historic years these 10 years to remember oh [Music] Looking Backward 1954 doesn't seem so very long ago it was in that year that we launched the Nautilus our first nuclear powered submarine but the energy potentials of Rocket engines and Motors were only hopeful tentative figures on Bits of Paper turning those Bits of Paper into reality was the task initially assigned to General Bernard a reever in 1954 Rockets meant different things to different people to some Rockets meant missiles a great added deterrent strength for our national security to others Rockets meant the power for extending that security farther into space for military and scientific research to the moon and beyond all turned out to be correct because today Rockets represent the power to to accomplish whatever missions we require how we got that power is a story worth telling the fact that it is a success story is due to many people in many areas of effort and to the foresight of our scientific advisory Boards of the industry of our Department of Defense and the Congress in 1954 we had small Rockets but our missiles and our Rocket Power power were still mostly on paper reduced to Basics what we needed were four items item one the airframe light but strong enough to carry the fuel and oxidizer for the engines which were item two rocket engines of sufficient power item three was the re-entry vehicle that must travel through space and re-enter the Earth's atmosphere without being burned to a cinder by friction item four was guidance to provide accuracy on a 6,000 Mi journey of the four items we had only a start and the knowledge that technically we could have them the question was how soon could we have them it had normally taken about 12 years to develop new weapon systems now it would have to be done in something like half that time and then within 2 years our first ICBM Atlas was in production the rocket engine program had been stepped up to a point where instead of one supplier and two or three test stands a number of suppliers and many test stands were active other companies and Laboratories were working on the complex problems connected with guidance other companies still were on the road to solving the problems of the Searing heat of re-entry in addition the Air Force had the services of a civilian organization staffed by top science ssts as systems engineer and technical director but results after only 2 years went far beyond one ICBM program making positive progress now several programs were driving forward to meet the Relentless challenge of our time an intermediate range missile Thor was also in production by taking advantage of engines and guidance systems already in advanced development the shorter range Thor could be made operational before our long range missiles the planners and managers of our national security had also decided to develop a second ICBM Titan Titan would have a more rugged construction and also would have growth potential in terms of range and future use as a space booster Titan would be our first missile to stand on guard in underground silos hardened against nuclear attack and long before we had the power to reach out into space a spacecraft was already in active development a spacecraft designed with the built-in versatility to perform a variety of missions and also even before we had our large liquid fuel engines off the ground tests were being made for development of large solid fuel engines these are historic scenes but in 1956 only a few people recognized what these tiny test Vehicles would mean to all of us today by 1957 Hills and Valleys once bare and Barren were brought to life where there had been nothing the pattern of progress was taking form and substance industrial facilities for production and required military facilities were expanding on top priority basis the responsibility of the Air Force systems command is to research develop and deliver the weapon systems required by other Air Force commands for their operational needs our nation was building our physical resources and people our greatest resource of all were increasing in number and in experience people with the necessary dedication and education on which to build more and more experience their first trial by fire came early in 1957 on 25 January Thor was ready for its first flight test hopes were high there is an old saying that you learn from failure there was to be a lot of learning ahead on all our programs when the product of your effort blows up higher than your hopes there are a number of things you can do work harder and longer to find the problems and correct them you can check and double check every item you do learn from failure you even learn to try to smile when they call your bird the pad to pad [Music] missile the one thing you can't do is give up then on September 20th 1957 Thor was ready again [Music] and Thor flew on course and true it blasted down the Eastern test range rocket power lifted our missile program literally off the ground this felt good it was good but only a few weeks later there was a forceful reminder of our competition on October 4th 1957 the Soviet Sputnik 1 was injected into orbit this is part of History we've all lived through it left a bitter taste we can still remember many people felt a strange new fear a new doubt about our own programs about our own capabilities what we needed was time every specific date became one more short step on our journey into space December 17th 1957 the first success of Atlas 6 weeks later on January 31st 1958 the Army's Jupiter C injected the first United States satellite into orbit and in March 1958 that small solid fuel motor sputtering back there in 1956 had by direction of our Department of Defense become our newest IC BM program Minute Man our Ace in the Hole on October 11th 1958 Thor launched NASA's Pioneer 1 to Mark the beginning of the highly productive Air Force NASA team December 1958 in cooperation with the Army signal Corps the power of an Air Force Atlas sent project score 8,000 lb into orbit on board was a recorded Christmas message from President Eisenhower which was transmitted from space a voice from space and on the ground the sound of [Music] power on 6 February 1959 Titans first flight test was completely successful only 3 years to the day after ground was broken for the factory near Denver where Titan is built 3 weeks later Thor's power injected an aena spacecraft into orbit the same spacecraft whose design had been started before there was the power descended on its journey by the end of 1959 less than six of those 10 years to remember had passed great progress had been achieved the groundwork for National Security and for space but critical and perhaps dangerous years still lay ahead in 1960 we elected John F Kennedy to the presidency now in retrospect 1960 doesn't seem very long ago cars of that year don't look too outdated it was 1961 when the building of the Berlin Wall was started although we may not recall those years as critical it was a time period when there was a chance that the balance of strength might have gone against us at that point in time at the beginning of 1961 our strategic strength was shaping up like this much of our strength was carried over the sea in the bomb racks of saxs InterContinental bombers part of our strength was carried Beneath the Sea and our Navy's Atomic submarines [Music] over in the United Kingdom Thor installations were completed and operational sites turned over to the Royal Air Force on our own soil Atlas D icbms were operational in the hands of sack flight tests of Titan were very satisfactory our Minute Man ICBM was only a few months away from its first fullscale flight test at the same time the planned growth potential originally designed into our Titan 1 ICBM 5 years earlier was about to pay dividends with Titan 2 using storable liquid propellants our most powerful missile would be able to react almost instantaneously from underground silos but no long range missile had ever been launched from a silo into free flight although tests indicated it could be done there was only one way to make make sure so mattz airlifted a modified Titan 1 to vandenbberg Air Force Base if it flew from out of that Silo we could be sure that Titan 2 would also fly the date May 3rd [Music] 1961 the long long range planning had started to prove itself out and Across the Nation new character lines were appearing on the face of the land just as aircraft need runways hangers and maintenance facilities our missile counterforce requires not only the missiles themselves but also underground bases missile sights hardened against attack some people said the tremendous combust job of building the missiles and the SES could not be done within necessary limits of time it wouldn't be easy but it would be done all bases were put under the command of handpicked Air Force senior Colonels tough people for a tough job each of them had a personal Telegram in their private files quote I want it thoroughly understood that I hold each site Commander personally responsible for successful activation of his site and its turnover to sack an acceptable operational condition at the earliest possible date it was signed courtesy L Air Force Chief of Staff with full cooperation of the army the Corp of Engineers ballistic missile Construction office was established with responsibility for actual construction under Air Force control it is a fact of life that twin Companions of tremendous effort us usually are problems and frustrations and all those who worked side by side during those years will remember the Relentless pressures and sleepless nights as well as the success they achieved together the schedule demanded that to meet our needs the number of bases completed in 1961 would have to be tripled in 1962 and the total number tripled again in 1963 that schedule would be met prototype sites for all our rcbm are built at vandenbberg Air Force Base in California as part of research and development they are also practical training facilities for Strategic Air Command operational Crews here at Vandenburg men and the systems they will operate meet and get to know and understand each other our icbms their bases and their operational Crews all were getting ready together and the powerful rocket engines developed for those long range missiles were providing the power for both civilian space flights and for research and development of military orbital Space [Music] Systems in that development our Lifeline to space is a tracking and Communications command and control Network which monitors our spacecraft orbiting at many thousands of miles an hour in Sunnyvale California the Space Systems division 65 94th Aerospace test Wing has command responsibility for the Air Force global satellite control facility from launch throughout flight in 1960 there had been a total of 29 military and civilian space flights there were 16 successes and 13 failures in 1962 there were seven failures and 52 successes remember February 20th 1962 a modified Air Force Atlas booster launched NASA's friendship 7 into space the power of the Rockets designed for our long range missiles had made possible our first Explorations in space they now also were making possible our nation's first man in orbit but to reach the moon and Beyond we needed Rockets many times more powerful even than those capable of delivering our heaviest icbms to get that power in 1962 all launch boosters currently on hand or in the planning stage were reviewed by selected managers and scientists of the Department of Defense and NASA together with independent scientists they recommended that NASA's Saturn be developed in increasing thrust configurations with man on the moon the primary scientific [Music] goal for earlier phases of the program modified Titan twos were specified to provide the power for launching the spacecraft on NASA's first two-man missions in orbit the missions will include rendevu with Air Force aen spacecraft the managers of our national launch vehicle program also recognized that maintaining freedom of operation in space in the same way that we maintain Freedom of the Seas and of the airlanes call for a different kind of booster power a booster system that would fulfill military requirements for realistic cost versatility and fast reaction in the past assembly and checkout operations could tie up one Launchpad for 3 months or longer but now in our new booster system Titan 3 developed by the Department of Defense through the air force assembly and checkout procedures are completed in specially designed buildings and the complete space vehicle is moved to the LaunchPad where only fueling and brief final checkout are required Titan 3 has a design objective of being launched in a time as short as 2 minutes and Pad use is planned to be increased about 500% over today's average first aage solid Motors provide more than 2 million lbs of liftoff thrust the core a modified Titan 2 plus a third stage can be used without the solids or lighter payloads the third stage called a TR stage is designed for versatility of operations and control and to change the spacecraft's orbital [Music] path Titan 3's total power can place 12 tons and More in orbit 200 mil above the Earth 10 years isn't very long not when you consider that it took some 50 years from that to this and these 10 years to remember we've shared them together and we've worked through them together and part of what we can show for our great National effort adds up to this by the end of 1964 more than 850 Atlas Titan 1 and Titan 2 and Minuteman icbms will have been delivered to sack on schedule for our Research In Space we have in being a proven Global operational space test system to support all military research and development activities we have made across the board advances in almost every field of scientific effort because expanding technology in one area has historically inspired and required advances in many areas but although machines can be designed for space humans can't be built to engineering specifications and therefore at the Air Force Aerospace medical division in San Antonio Texas great emphasis is placed on Research in human ability to adapt to a new environment Air Force Aerospace and research Pilots are screened and trained here at AMD and the future astronauts for NASA's Gemini and Apollo programs are given medical evaluation prior to selection we have acquired many things and the most important of these is experience and it was on the strength of experience in solid fuel Motors originally developed by the ballistic systems division for minute man that the Space Systems division following through on policies established by our Department of Defense has managed the development of the large solid fuel Rocket motors for space for Titan 3 each solid fuel motor has a million pounds of liftoff [Music] thrust even larger solid fuel Rockets with 3 million BS of thrust are being tested Secretary of Defense Robert S mcnamer said it we must plan our total program carefully and concentrate our human and physical resources where they will make the greatest contribution to our military [Music] requirements and in reliving all that has been accomplished since the days of Dr Godard one question is asked over and over just what single achievement can be considered the most important General Shri once answered that question this way he said that having the right people is always the most important thing people on the government industry team with the ability and courage to take a bold approach in order to turn new Concepts and ideas into practical reality these same people and others following in their steps will continue researching develop veloping building for we are a nation of Builders not destroyers what we build and how well we build will be written in the records of the next 10 years of history and on the Firm Foundation of the great advances in rocket power and technology that have already been made from our stronghold here on Earth we can look up and forward to meet the promise and the challenge of space boldly and with confidence [Music]