Brothers in Arms: The CIA and the American Civilian Space Program, 1958-1968

The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) represented two different bureaucratic weapons in the U.S. arsenal during the space race with the Soviet Union. They had to cooperate in order to further U.S. national interests. The CIA provided information to NASA, and NASA occasionally provided expertise and other services to the CIA. The degree of their interaction is becoming apparent only now that the Cold War has ended. Newly declassified documents reveal that NASA was not simply a consumer of intelligence information, but also supplied it to the CIA. But there is no firm evidence to indicate that intelligence information played a significant role in the Apollo schedule, which was dictated far more by other factors. However, intelligence information apparently did have a powerful effect on the thinking of NASA Administrator James Webb and was a major factor in his fight to preserve NASA's budget in order to counter Soviet space capabilities.