Exploring the Unknown: Selected Documents in ... - The Black Vault

Exploring the Unknown 685
Document II-57
Document Title: Director of Central Intelligence, “The Soviet Space Program,”
4 April 1968.
Source: Central Intelligence Agency Historical Review Program.
Throughout the 1960s the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) used its various capabilities
to track the Soviet space program. This update to a November 1967 National Intelligence
Estimate gives a sense of what the CIA was saying about the Soviet lunar landing program.
According to this estimate, the United States was well in the lead in achieving the first lunar
landing. Of particular note , however, is the estimate that the Soviet Union might attempt
a manned circumlunar flight before the end of 1968. Senior NASA officials were certainly
aware of this possibility as they considered whether to approve sending the Apollo 8 mission
into orbit around the moon in December 1968.
TOP SECRET [DECLASSIFIED]
CONTROLLED DISSEM
[declassified 1/16/1997]
NIE 11-1-67
4 April 1968
TS 0089284/1
MEMORANDUM TO HOLDERS
NATIONAL INTELLIGENCE ESTIMATE
NUMBER 11-1-67
The Soviet Space Program
Submitted by
[Signed Richard M. Helms]
Director of Central Intelligence
Concurred in by the
UNITED STATES INTELLIGENCE BOARD