By Christopher Adamo, 7/17/22
This coming Wednesday will likely pass as most others do,
amid the turbulent issues of the current era, with little recollection
of former days of real American greatness. And that is extremely sad.
Fifty three years ago, as the world was in the throes of the Vietnam
War, and an attempted global domination by the Soviet Union, accompanied
by moral collapse and the rise of the leftist counterculture in America,
the upheaval took a pause. Everyone within hearing distance of any news
outlet collectively held their breath in a brief but excruciating period
of silence that had followed a laconic exchange of technical data,
relaying positions, speeds, and the operating condition of equipment
that was highly advanced for its time. And then, at 4:53 pm Eastern, a
message resounded across the globe “Houston, Tranquility Base here. The
Eagle has landed!” And life on this planet would never be the same.
For the first time in history, human beings had landed a
spacecraft on another world. Within hours, human footprints would be
present on the surface of the Moon, as Apollo 11 Commander Neil
Armstrong stepped down the ladder of the Lunar Module and walked on a
truly unearthly landscape. The event was the culmination of a National
effort spanning the decade of the 1960s, beginning in May of ’61 when
President John F. Kennedy challenged the Nation to reach the Moon
“before this decade is out.” Through the turmoil of the era, and despite
a major setback in January of 1967 when three Apollo astronauts died in
the launchpad fire of Apollo 1, Americans rallied and persevered, which
in former days had been their way.
Apollo 11 achieved President Kennedy’s milestone with
barely four months to spare. Yet during that remaining four months of
the decade, another Apollo mission again succeeded in landing on the
Moon and returning safely to Earth. With the December 1972 voyage of
Apollo 17, the last Moon mission, a total of twelve Americans had
actually visited the lunar surface, six of whom rode in vehicles
designed for traversing Earth’s planetary neighbor. In typical American
fashion of the day, Kennedy’s goal had not merely been met, it was
vastly exceeded.
Of course the same forces were at work to undermine that
great effort which are now wreaking havoc on our Nation. Thankfully,
until recent times, the inherent decency and moral certitude of
Americans had not been sufficiently eroded to allow such a malignancy to
prevail. Still, the era was not without its disinformation and controversy.
The single biggest instigator of discord over America’s
Moon program was the Soviet Union. Having launched the first artificial
satellite, Sputnik 1, into orbit in October of 1957, and having put a
human being into orbit nearly a year before America was able to do so,
the Soviets and their media propagandists (many of whom were already
infiltrating American “news” organizations) gleefully trumpeted the
“superiority” of collectivism for ostensibly advancing the human
condition through technology. Yet Kennedy’s challenge, and America’s
response to it, proved that a free society could indeed advance further
and faster, when given the incentive to do so.
Not willing to simply accept defeat, the Soviets initiated
a two pronged strategy, in hopes of demoralizing the Americans. First,
upon realizing that their own efforts to beat us to the Moon were
doomed, they attempted several unmanned missions by which they had hoped
to land there and return a tiny sample of Moon rock back to Earth ahead
of Apollo. At that point they would have claimed victory, with their
dutiful minions happily echoing. Here again, their technology was simply
not up to the task. So as those hopes faded, they unleashed their backup
plan. Sadly, they had much greater success with this one, since it
didn’t involve technology, but instead relied on their ability to spread
propaganda among a sometimes gullible, sometimes willingly complicit
leftist American press.
Suddenly, in the final months before the triumphal mission
of Apollo 11, disparaging claims began to be leveled by Americans who
not coincidentally happened to be Soviet sympathizers, to the effect
that the money allocated to the Space Race was being misused. The
narrative was that it could do “more good” if it was passed out in
welfare and other social programs here on Earth. And not surprisingly,
the “usual suspects” were happy to grandstand on that basis, ultimately
carrying the water for the Soviets and other anti-Americans everywhere.
By the time of Armstrong and Aldrin’s walk, the leftists had made enough
noise to be able to claim the mission, a triumph of American engineering
and American resolve, as “controversial.”
Since then, the overwhelming media silence on the event as
a victorious milestone in the annals of our Nation has caused many to
virtually forget all about it, while sadly allowing others of
appallingly deficient scientific background to make absurd claims that
it never happened. Like the Nazi Holocaust, those who actually beheld
the Moon Program as it transpired are fewer in number with the passage
of years. Eventually, not enough people will remain to bear personal
witness to it, and if the powers that be want it to be forgotten or
swallowed up in conspiracy theories, that will be its fate.
But American Patriots need not allow such a scenario to
befall us just yet. Enough remember the struggle, the achievements, the
failures, and ultimately the successes to celebrate that great moment
for humanity, and for our Nation. On the front leg of that first lunar
lander was a plaque which read “HERE MEN FROM THE PLANET EARTH FIRST SET
FOOT UPON THE MOON, JULY, 1969 A.D. WE CAME IN PEACE FOR ALL MANKIND.”
Americans should shun the critics and the skeptics, and once again fly
our flags in commemoration and celebration, this July 20.