The unexpected success of Sputnik sent the space ambitions of the Communist Party into overdrive. In 1958, the Soviets conceived of an astonishing show of power: to detonate an atom bomb on the Moon. It was hoped that the blast could be captured on film by astronomers, according to Chertok, as well as ensuring that “no one would have doubted the Soviet Union was capable of landing on the surface of the Moon.” The plan was scrapped only when it was decided the explosion’s flash would be too short-lived to be caught on film.