The ultimate ideological standoff is no longer on Earth, but in the cosmos. Just three days ago, on April 12, 1961, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics announced the launch of Vostok 1, which propelled pilot Yuri Gagarin into orbit and the Soviets into the driver’s seat of astronautical dominance. However, unbeknownst to the world that continues to celebrate this triumph, the Soviet Council of Ministers and chief aerospace directors are facing challenges that could spell complete ruin for the famed space program. 
Our early lead toward the skies can be traced to the R-7 Semyorka Breakthrough of August, 1957, in which Soviet Chief Designer Sergei Korolev developed the world’s first functioning Intercontinental Ballistic Missile (ICBM). This means that the USSR can deliver thermonuclear warheads to the U.S. in under 30 minutes. We can also launch something like…Sputnik, the world’s first artificial satellite, which was done in October of the same year. Soviet technological leads followed this up with yet another success in the Luna program of 1959, but also a devastating failure; the highly confidential Nedelin Catastrophe recently killed over 100 of the country’s top engineers during a rushed military missile test, exposing the dangerous friction between scientific prestige and atomic warfare. Internal strain has arrived in force.
Now, U.S. astronaut Alan Shepard appears to be on the cusp of launching America’s first human spaceflight with Project Mercury, meaning the Soviet cabinet has to make immediate, high-risk decisions to ensure a keeping of pace. Tensions fly over whether future space crafts should be automated as they’ve historically been for fear of a lack of human control in zero-gravity, or manual to maximize orbital weapon use. An internal struggle for finite state funding among designers is flaring, and millions of Soviet citizens are starving amidst billion-ruble space budgets. How long can our fragile balance last? Can we continue to inspire the decolonized world beneath a fracturing base? The path to the stars requires relentless strategizing to permanently overcome capitalist forces and infighting; delegates, you must defend the revolution and conquer the horizon, or crumble and watch the capitalist West seize control of the cosmos.