What if no Vietnam War?

[NOMISYRRUC]

The two J-5 launch facilities used for the four launches of N-1 are only about 500 m apart.

The 1969 N1 explosion is infamous for the damage it did, windows shattering 40km away I struggle to believe the other pad facilities 500m away escaped that blast unscathed.

I wrote Message 240 before I read the article that the above links to.

 

[Byeman]

On the face of it, yes.

The points of having 2 launch pads instead of one are: a) a faster launch rate and b) you have a backup launch pad in case the the other one is out of action for long periods or destroyed outright.

The gap of nearly 2 years between the failure of Serial 5L on 3rd July 1969 and the failure of Serial 6L on 26th June 1971 suggests that the other pad was put out of action for a long time too. If it hadn't been it's likely that they'd have attempted to launch Serial 6L several to many months earlier than they did.

***** ***** ***** ***** ***** *****​

So I was wrong. The failure of 3rd July 1969 didn't destroy both launch pads. Therefore, the gap of nearly 2 years between it and the next launch attempt must have been for another reason or reasons.

"On the face of it",no, it doesn't. Shuttle, Apollo, Atlas Centaur (AC-1) had long stand downs after accidents that had no pad damage.

 

[NOMISYRRUC]

At present I think that at the very least NASA gets everything it asks for to FY 1967, FY 1968 or even FY 1969. Which means it gets all the money it wants for Apollo, AAP, Surveyor, Lunar Orbiter, the Planetary Program and NERVA to FY 1967, FY 1968 or even FY 1969, including enough money to order 18 extra Saturn IBs and 10 extra Saturn Vs.

Then the cuts begin, but they're between one and 3 years "behind the curve"

I hadn't previously understood this part of your idea, but it makes sense because it's like so many other programmes that start optimistic but encounter financial and politic reality.

To paraphrase Professor Higgins, "By George, I think he's got it!"

According to the table in Message 197 the peak year in the period we're discussing was FY 1965 the extra money available in the period FY1966-75 is:

• $2,312 million or 6% if FY1966 is the same as 1965 and subsequent cuts are "one year behind the curve".
• $4,328 million or 11% if FY1966 and 1967 are the same as 1965 and subsequent cuts are "two years behind the curve".
• $6,077 million or 16% if FY1966, 1967 and 1968 are the same as 1965 and subsequent cuts are "three years behind the curve".

In the first one NASA gets all the money it requested for AAP in FY 1967 and FY 1968. That includes permission to order 18 Saturn IBs, 10 Saturn Vs and a batch of Block II Apollo CSMs in 1967. The OTL cuts of August 1968 are postponed to August 1969 which results in the cancellation of 14 Saturn IBs, 8 Saturn Vs and most of the CSMs. However, its allowed to complete 4 Saturn IBs and 2 Saturn Vs due to their construction being more advanced and more money being available despite the cuts.

This is why I've written that at the very least SA-213 to 216, SA-516, SA-517 and more Apollo CSMs are completed. It's also why I think at the very least all the completed hardware (including the extra rockets and spacecraft) is used by 1975. So Apollos 18 to 20 aren't cancelled in 1970 and the interval between moon landings might not be increased from 4 to 6 months. The launch of Skylab A is brought forward to 1972 or even 1971 with the number of CSM visits increased from 3 to 10.

If it's the second one NASA gests all the money it requested for AAP in FYs 1967 to 1969. In that case the OTL cuts of August 1968 are postponed to August 1970 so more of the Saturn IBs, Saturn Vs and Apollo CSMs are completed. Therefore, Apollos 18 to 20 aren't cancelled and the interval between moon landings isn't increased from 4 to 6 months. Some or all of the 5 lunar M&SS missions planned for 1969-73 are launched with the number launched depending upon the number of Saturn Vs completed ITTL and whether the GEO "wet" Skylab is launched.

The OTL Apollo 1 fire puts the earth orbit part of AAP back one year. Therefore, the first "wet" Skylab is launched in 1969 and is visited by one ATM and 6 CSMs 1969-70 instead of being launched in 1968 and being visited by one ATM and 6 CSMs 1968-70. All other things being equal the second "wet" Skylab would be launched in 1971 and be visited by one ATM and 4 CSMs 1971-72. Except the "dry" Skylab is still launched in 1971 (as planned in 1966) and it is visited by 12 CSMs 1971-74 instead of being visited by 8 CSMs 1972-74 if the second "wet" Skylab wasn't cancelled. Whether the third "wet" Skylab is launched into GEO ITTL depends upon the number of extra Saturn Vs completed and the number of lunar M&SS missions flown ITTL.

If it's the third one NASA gets all the money it requested for AAP in FYs 1967 to 1970. In that case the cuts of August 1968 are postponed to August 1971 most of the hardware will be complete, the rest will be so far advanced that cancelling them will cost more money and a batch of hardware ordered in 1969 or 1970 would be in progress. Therefore, AAP as planned in 1966 is completed. So 10 moon landing attempts 1969-73 instead of seven 1969-72 including one G, one H, 2 J and 6 Profile-K missions* instead of one G, 3 H and 3 Profile-J missions and 5 lunar Apollo M&SS (Profile-I) missions 1969-73. And 20 Apollo CSM visits to 3 Skylabs 1969-74 consisting of 6 launched 1969-70 to the LEO "wet" Skylab, 2 launched 1970-71 to the GEO "wet" Skylab and 12 launched 1971-74 to the "dry" Skylab.

It would be a similar story for the unmanned lunar and planetary programs, which I haven't worked out in detail. However, in the first one the Voyager Mars probe is cancelled a year later and the Viking missions are launched in 1973 instead of 1975. In the second one the Voyager Mars probe is cancelled two years later but the Viking missions are launched in 1975 due to the lost time. In the third one a pair of Voyager Mars probes are launched in 1973 and a second pair is launched in 1975.

It also means that work on the F-1A, HG-3, J-2S, J-2T, M-1 and NERVA rocket engines continues for another one-to-three years (depending upon the TL) along with the second-generation Saturn IB and Saturn V rockets and more work on reusable S-IB and S-IC stages. If it's the "one year" TL then the result is more money spent for no return. If its "two years" the result is even more money spent for little return and its "three years" the result is a lot more money spent for some return. That is if it's "two years" the S-IC stages from SA-516 onwards may have F-1A engines while the S-IVBs from SA-213 and SA-516 onwards may J-2S engines. If it's "three years" the S-IC and S-IVB will have those improvements and we probably see the reusable S-IB and S-IC stages developed.

Footnote
* There wasn't an Apollo K mission profile IOTL. However, I think the six 14-day lunar visits that were planned for 1971-73 would have been called Apollo K.

 

[NOMISYRRUC]

At present I think that at the very least NASA gets everything it asks for to FY 1967, FY 1968 or even FY 1969. Which means it gets all the money it wants for Apollo, AAP, Surveyor, Lunar Orbiter, the Planetary Program and NERVA to FY 1967, FY 1968 or even FY 1969, including enough money to order 18 extra Saturn IBs and 10 extra Saturn Vs.

Then the cuts begin, but they're between one and 3 years "behind the curve"

I hadn't previously understood this part of your idea, but it makes sense because it's like so many other programmes that start optimistic but encounter financial and politic reality.

These May Help



The above was constructed from this.

5.97% more 1966-75.



The above was constructed from this.

11.17% more 1966-75.​

The above was constructed from this.

15.68% more 1966-75.​

 

[Archibald]

Tom Heppenheimer The Space Shuttle decision (1999, NASA history SP-4421) details a few budget tresholds : what can be afforded with a NASA annual budget ranging from $10 billion (Mars 1982) to $1.5 billion (goodbye, manned spaceflight).

Some manned vehicle development costs, spread across the 1970's
-fully reusable shuttle --------------$10 billion
-partially reusable shuttle ----------$8 billion to $5.15 billion
-fat DynaSoar riding a Titan IIIL :---$3.5 billion
-Big Gemini -------------------------$2.5 billion
-Block III Apollo ---------------------$1.5 billion.
........
Skylab A development cost $2.5 billion.
Mars in 1982 is $10 billion

The Shuttle was cost-capped by Nixon OMB to $5.15 billion to be spent from 1972 to 1978. In the end it was 20% overrun and 3 years late, mostly because of two issues : exploding SSME, falling silica tiles.
It should be noted that a 20% cost overrun is not big considering, it's NASA, it's the 1970's and it is the Space Shuttle, a wholly new aerospace vehicle. Compare that to Lockheed C-5 Galaxy miseries.

 

[NOMISYRRUC]

It should be noted that a 20% cost overrun is not big considering, it's NASA, it's the 1970's and it is the Space Shuttle, a wholly new aerospace vehicle. Compare that to Lockheed C-5 Galaxy miseries.

Or the Ohio class SSBN, the Los Angles class SSN, the first 3 Nimitz class, the California & Virginia class DLGNs, the Spruance class DDs. The list goes ever on and on down from the Total Procurement Package where it began (apologies to JRR Tolkien).

There's a Rowan and Martin sketch about the cost of cancelled American defence projects.

 

[Rule of cool]

I'm not a fan of the wet workshops. If getting extra money means speeding up the schedule so much that wet workshops are used, I wouldn't consider that the optimum use of such valuable hardware.

Then again, if extra money was available and some extra Saturn Vs were produced perhaps the wet workshop would die faster due to the availability of Saturn Vs to launch them earlier than OTL.

I also think there is declining utility with each extra moon mission, so there's little point in rushing those.

 

[NOMISYRRUC]

I'm not a fan of the wet workshops. If getting extra money means speeding up the schedule so much that wet workshops are used, I wouldn't consider that the optimum use of such valuable hardware.

It's not what I want to happen. It's what I think will happen.

What I did was take the OTL plan at March 1966 and made estimates on how much would be implemented if NASA's budget declined one, two or three years later than it did IOTL. The OTL plan included the launch of 3 wet and one dry workshops, so we get the wet workshops whether we like them or not.

For the record, I don't disagree with you and prefer an "all dry" AAP too, but that's what I want to happen, not what I think will happen.

Then again, if extra money was available and some extra Saturn Vs were produced perhaps the wet workshop would die faster due to the availability of Saturn Vs to launch them earlier than OTL.

I thought that's what I wrote.

 

[NOMISYRRUC]

It would be a similar story for the unmanned lunar and planetary programs, which I haven't worked out in detail. However, in the first one the Voyager Mars probe is cancelled a year later and the Viking missions are launched in 1973 instead of 1975. In the second one the Voyager Mars probe is cancelled two years later but the Viking missions are launched in 1975 due to the lost time. In the third one a pair of Voyager Mars probes are launched in 1973 and a second pair is launched in 1975.

Project Surveyor

A total of 17 Surveyor missions were in NASA’s budget request for FY 1966 which was reduced to 10 in the FY 1967 request and 7 in the FY 1968 request. 7 Surveyor missions were actually launched. FY 1966 began on 1st June 1965, FY 1967 began on 1st June 1966 and FY 1968 began on 1st June 1967.

This internet article (https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4304/2) says Surveyor was cut to 10 missions in October 1965 (during FY 1966) and to 7 missions by December 1966 (during FY 1967) due to budgetary limitations.

The full programme of 17 Surveyor missions would be funded ITTL.

 

[publiusr]

-fat DynaSoar riding a Titan IIIL :---$3.5 billion
-Big Gemini -------------------------$2.5 billion
-Block III Apollo ---------------------$1.5 billion.

Keeping an Apollo capsule the cheapest option--I bloody knew it.

 

[Rule of cool]

What about Australia and Britain?

Australia sent about 50,000 personnel and had over 500 deaths in Vietnam; without the wider war this might have been capped at less than 100 advisors.

LBJ wanted Britain to send troops to Vietnam and apparently tied all sorts of financial aid and arms deals to this, I've seen the cancelation of the TSR2 tied to Vietnam.

 

[NOMISYRRUC]

What about Australia and Britain?

Honourable mentions to New Zealand, South Korea, Taiwan, Thailand and the Philippines.

Australia sent about 50,000 personnel and had over 500 deaths in Vietnam; without the wider war this might have been capped at less than 100 advisors.

It wouldn't have been that many. The OP says.

Let's assume in this scenario the Geneva Accords of 1954 end up in a single united Vietnam (under Ho Chi Min).

Maybe they get sent to Malaysia to reinforce the Commonwealth Strategic Reserve or fight in the confrontation with Indonesia over Borneo.

Maybe the post-1972 defence cuts of OTL are brought forward to 1965-ish. Although, you'll know better than me that strictly speaking they wouldn't be defence cuts, rather the ADF (particularly the army) wouldn't expand as much between 1964 and 1972 as it did IOTL.

LBJ wanted Britain to send troops to Vietnam and apparently tied all sorts of financial aid and arms deals to this, I've seen the cancelation of the TSR2 tied to Vietnam.

I don't know what to say to that. AFAIK Harold Wilson refused to send British troops to Vietnam so the aid wasn't given. ITTL there's been a unified Vietnam under Ho Chi Min since 1954. So no offer of aid in the first place. But, I repeat, the aid wasn't actually given, so it's a non-thing.

 

[Rule of cool]

Australia had advisors in Vietnam from 1962 and sent a sqn of Sabres to Thailand to assist with the communist insurgency in 1962. In addition, Australia was confronting Indonesia from 1962, firstly over West Papua and then over the Federation of Malaysia. It was in this environment that Australia did a big buy of military gear in 1963: DDGs, F111s, M113s, UH1s. In addition, Australia was trying to expand the Army size with little success in the booming economy, this included expanding the situations where the CMF could be mobilised, leading to conscription in November 1964 (6 months before we sent a btn to Sth Vietnam)

A unified Vietnam won't have advisors, but there still might be a communist insurgency in Thailand requiring an Australian deployment, so I suspect the big military buy in 1963 would still happen more or less as it was most likely bought to deter Indonesia long before Vietnam escalated. Conscription is a different kettle of fish, as it was the result of failed attempts over a couple of years to expand the Army, but that it was passed a couple of months after the Gulf of Tonkin incident and the Australian commitment to Vietnam had expanded to a flight of Caribou, some engineers and medical personnel doesn't strike me as a coincidence.

I don't know what to say to that. AFAIK Harold Wilson refused to send British troops to Vietnam so the aid wasn't given. ITTL there's been a unified Vietnam under Ho Chi Min since 1954. So no offer of aid in the first place. But, I repeat, the aid wasn't actually given, so it's a non-thing.

IIUC Wilson inherited a structural deficit and a political imperative to not be the 'party of devaluation', so had a requirement to at least have aid available. Without Vietnam such aid might be more available, or have less strings attached and might have gone ahead.

 

[NOMISYRRUC]

Australia had advisors in Vietnam from 1962 and sent a sqn of Sabres to Thailand to assist with the communist insurgency in 1962. In addition, Australia was confronting Indonesia from 1962, firstly over West Papua and then over the Federation of Malaysia. It was in this environment that Australia did a big buy of military gear in 1963: DDGs, F111s, M113s, UH1s. In addition, Australia was trying to expand the Army size with little success in the booming economy, this included expanding the situations where the CMF could be mobilised, leading to conscription in November 1964 (6 months before we sent a btn to Sth Vietnam)

A unified Vietnam won't have advisors, but there still might be a communist insurgency in Thailand requiring an Australian deployment, so I suspect the big military buy in 1963 would still happen more or less as it was most likely bought to deter Indonesia long before Vietnam escalated. Conscription is a different kettle of fish, as it was the result of failed attempts over a couple of years to expand the Army, but that it was passed a couple of months after the Gulf of Tonkin incident and the Australian commitment to Vietnam had expanded to a flight of Caribou, some engineers and medical personnel doesn't strike me as a coincidence.

The POD's the unification of Vietnam under a communist government in 1954 instead of 1975 and although it's not in the OP my guess is that Laos and Cambodia will go communist in the middle 1950s too.

Therefore, and FWIW, it's rather likely that there would have been a communist insurgency in Thailand backed by the China, the former French Indo-China and the USSR. Furthermore, China & the USSR will be able to give more support to the communists in Malaya from 1954 and (last but not least) to Sukarno's Indonesia from 1954.

The result may well be Australia spending more on defence from the middle 1950s to the early 1960s too. If I'm right Australian National Service may be continuously from 1951 to 1972. That is no break between the last intake in 1960 and its reintroduction in 1964.

IIUC Wilson inherited a structural deficit and a political imperative to not be the 'party of devaluation', so had a requirement to at least have aid available. Without Vietnam such aid might be more available, or have less strings attached and might have gone ahead.

The economic aid offered IOTL was a means to an end. That is to bribe Britain into joining the Vietnam War. No Vietnam War ITTL = no offer of economic aid ITTL because there's nothing it it for the US Government. That is, no end, so no means.

OTOH (1) if the OTL Vietnam War is replaced by a Siamese War, America would want British help to fight it. However, Wilson may intervene without America offering economic aid, as the next stop after Thailand is Malaysia.

OTOH (2) if I'm right about the intensification of the Indonesian Confrontation the UK will will have nothing to spare for Thailand and Australia (apart from the Sabre squadron and advisors that you suggested) may have nothing to spare for Thailand either as everything sent to Vietnam IOTL is sent to Malaysia instead.

OTOH (3) Sukarno was playing one side off against the other and ITTL the stronger presence of the Soviet bloc in South East Asia after 1954 may result in him being less aggressive towards his neighbours.

I wonder if the stronger external threat means that Singapore doesn't leave Malaysia ITTL and that Brunei joins.

 

[NOMISYRRUC]

Does anyone know if the full March 1966 proposal for AAP is on the internet, and if it is, where can it be found?

 

[Pioneer]

Well, although not immediately related to this Alternative History thread in regards to weapons and hardware, I found it both intriguing and depressingly disturbing:

View: https://youtu.be/B81ElItOzbo?si=Kd-DKZJPZiPJ_O4M


Regards
Pioneer