USA HISTORY

Detailed explanation-1: -The world’s first artificial satellite, Sputnik 1, was launched by the Soviet Union in 1957, marking the start of the space race.

Detailed explanation-2: -Officially, Sputnik was launched to correspond with the International Geophysical Year, a solar period that the International Council of Scientific Unions declared would be ideal for the launching of artificial satellites to study Earth and the solar system.

Detailed explanation-3: -The USSR rocketed to the lead in the Cold War’s “Space Race” with the launch of Sputnik, a basketball-sized satellite that became the first manmade object to orbit the Earth. On October 4, 1957, the USSR launched Sputnik, the first artificial satellite to orbit Earth.

Detailed explanation-4: -The satellite’s unanticipated success precipitated the American Sputnik crisis and triggered the Space Race, part of the Cold War. The launch was the beginning of a new era of political, military, technological and scientific developments.

Detailed explanation-5: -The Space Race was a 20th-century competition between two Cold War rivals, the United States and the Soviet Union, to achieve superior spaceflight capability. It had its origins in the ballistic missile-based nuclear arms race between the two nations following World War II.