This New Ocean - (Modern Library (Paperback)) by William E Burrows (Paperback)

Book Synopsis

It was all part of man's greatest adventure--landing men on the Moon and sending a rover to Mars, finally seeing the edge of the universe and the birth of stars, and launching planetary explorers across the solar system to Neptune and beyond.

The ancient dream of breaking gravity's hold and taking to space became a reality only because of the intense cold-war rivalry between the superpowers, with towering geniuses like Wernher von Braun and Sergei Korolyov shelving dreams of space travel and instead developing rockets for ballistic missiles and space spectaculars. Now that Russian archives are open and thousands of formerly top-secret U.S. documents are declassified, an often startling new picture of the space age emerges:

the frantic effort by the Soviet Union to beat the United States to the Moon was doomed from the beginning by gross inefficiency and by infighting so treacherous that Winston Churchill likened it to "dogs fighting under a carpet";

there was more than science behind the United States' suggestion that satellites be launched during the International Geophysical Year, and in one crucial respect, Sputnik was a godsend to Washington;

the hundred-odd German V-2s that provided the vital start to the U.S. missile and space programs legally belonged to the Soviet Union and were spirited to the United States in a derring-do operation worthy of a spy thriller;

despite NASA's claim that it was a civilian agency, it had an intimate relationship with the military at the outset and still does--a distinction the Soviet Union never pretended to make;

constant efforts to portray astronauts and cosmonauts as "Boy Scouts" were often contradicted by reality;

the Apollo missions to the Moon may have been an unexcelled political triumph and feat of exploration, but they also created a headache for the space agency that lingers to this day.

This New Ocean is based on 175 interviews with Russian and American scientists and engineers; on archival documents, including formerly top-secret National Intelligence Estimates and spy satellite pictures; and on nearly three decades of reporting. The impressive result is this fascinating story--the first comprehensive account--of the space age. Here are the strategists and war planners; engineers and scientists; politicians and industrialists; astronauts and cosmonauts; science fiction writers and journalists; and plain, ordinary, unabashed dreamers who wanted to transcend gravity's shackles for the ultimate ride. The story is written from the perspective of a witness who was present at the beginning and who has seen the conclusion of the first space age and the start of the second.

Review Quotes

"The most successful general survey of space history yet to appear."
--The New York Times

"The most comprehensive history of humanity's efforts to explore space ever to be crammed into a single volume."
--The Washington Post

Leaving Earth for the first time was the single greatest achievement of the twentieth century. It was also an adventure of Homeric proportions. This is the story, vividly told, of how it happened. Here are American and Soviet politicians, scientists, engineers, generals, and astronauts, dueling for prestige and supremacy from within Earth's orbit to the Sea of Tranquility to the beautiful but deadly plateaus of Venus. This New Ocean is the first full account of how the Soviet space program really worked, revealing why it was doomed to fall short of the Moon; why NASA has always been driven by public relations; how science fiction provided the blueprint for reality; what the military really has in store for space; and how the migration of humans to Mars and beyond has already begun.

A Notable Book of the Year --St. Louis Post-Dispatch
A Best Sci-Tech Book of the Year --Library Journal

"Burrows offers a complete, authoritative history of the technology that allowed us to explore space and the people who created and managed that technology. . . . For those who struggle to understand the nature of humanity, it offers new insights into old paradoxes. For those who ask where we are going, it offers hope."
--Publishers Weekly (starred review)

"[An] all-encompassing and splendidly written account."
--St. Louis Post-Dispatch

About the Author

William E. Burrows has reported on aviation and space for The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, and the Richmond Times-Dispatch. He has had articles in The New York Times Magazine, Foreign Affairs, The Sciences, and other publications and is a contributing editor for Air & Space/Smithsonian. He is also the author of seven previous books, including Deep Black, the award-winning classic work on spying from space.

Mr. Burrows is a professor of journalism at New York University and the founder and director of its graduate
Science and Environmental Reporting Program.