NASA and the U.S. Space Program

Why did we go through all of the trouble of landing on the moon in the first place?

Going to the moon was more about the culture and events that were occurring during the 1960s than anything else. When Kennedy announced in 1961 that the U.S. would put a man on the moon, it was more about the Cold War and showing up the Soviets than merely for scientific discovery. "So we decided to engage in this major scientific and technological endeavor and prove to the world that we were second to none," Roger Launius, the curator of the Smithsonian's National Air and Space Museum stated (Lamb, 2012). Most of the top scientist in the United States were not at all concern with the moon mission and had other priorities that they felt were more important.

Besides the purely political motivations, it could be...
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