Ok.....

got the second page............don't see the first........perhap's that's the page that answers the points I made earlier........ any chance of reposting it?

Agreed about the reasons for Soviets being first into space...............primitive technologies are often better then more advanced ones............that's something "green" "Sustainable technology" groups have been saying for a long time.

(Yep... my tongue is firmly in cheek........and I know that wasn't your point.....interesting if tangential thought though:) )

Still, considering that less then seventy years earlier they were a society of illiterate serfs, then lost fifty million people and thousands of thier most advanced towns, cities, factories, universities etc. in between.... and had to live with an unremitting economic, political and technological blockade........they managed to achieve something like full employment, houseing, education to university level and a comprehensive health system available to alll, regardless of ability to pay...........AND they were first into space.

So I say again.......point out to me any capitilist free market nation, or group of nations, that had anything remotely like such a low quality starting base, encountered such horrendous conditions along the way, yet achieved so much in just seventy years.

PS Singapore, Korea, Japan etc doesn't count.... they were largely command-led economies right up till 15 or so years ago