REVEALED: US made secret Cold War manned space station to SPY on Russia – Express.co.uk

GETTY

From December 1963 to June 1969, the US Air Force spent upwards of $1.5billion on a project known as the Manned Orbiting Laboratory (MOL) which was eventually cancelled.

Due to the sensitive and classified nature of the project in the height of the Cold War, it is difficult to understand exactly what the US was trying to achieve at the time.

One of the declassified documents, which were released by the US National Reconnaissance Office (NRO), goes so far as to ask: "Is the MOL a laboratory? Or is it an operational reconnaissance spacecraft? (Or a bomber?)"

However, other documents show that one of the goals was to spy on the Soviet Union.

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NRO

Michael Yarymovych, who was at the time technical director of the MOL project, said: "We were doing something that was exciting and important.

"We're going to also do something very important for national security. We are going to go look behind the Iron Curtain defend the nation while doing the exciting things of manned spaceflight.

NRO

Despite spending over six years and the best part of $2billion on the project, the MOL never actually came to fruition as it was plagued by overspending on perpetual delays.

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However, there were positives that came out of it, such as the remodelling of NASA's two-seat Gemini spacecraft and the development of the Titan-3C launch vehicle.

The research that went into it also helped America become the first nation to land people on the moon in 1969 when Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin, with Michael Collins piloting the module, stepping foot on the lunar satellite.

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REVEALED: US made secret Cold War manned space station to SPY on Russia - Express.co.uk