Korolev's next attempt to win military support for development of the N-I was his fantastic 'Orbitalniy Poyas' (OP -Orbital Belt) scheme of 20 April 1962. Anticipating Ronald Reagan's Strategic Defense Initiative by 25 years, he painted a picture of an invincible Soviet space force patrolling the heavens. Two to three large N-I launched military manned stations would control a constellation of strategic assets. Geosynchronous nuclear-powered satellites would provide secure communications.

Piloted reconnaissance spacecraft would surprise the enemy, observing military preparations without warning. The orbital stations would provide continuous observations of the territory of the imperialist block. They would control combat sputniks, maneuverable anti-satellites that would control the heavens from altitudes of 300 to 2,000 km. Using docking methods, the stations would be remanned, providing fresh crews to control anti-ballistic missile interceptors in 150 to 100 km orbits and to deploy separately targetable warheads at a variety of altitudes.

There was no evidence the military was any more impressed with this justification than those previously put forth.

Crew Size: 3. Mass: 50,000 kg (110,000 lb). Associated Launch Vehicle: N1.

• 1962 April 20 - OP -Orbital Belt - Launch Vehicle: N1.

  Korolev’s fantastic ‘Orbitalniy Poyas’ (OP -Orbital Belt) scheme anticipated Ronald Reagan’s Strategic Defence Initiative by 25 years. Two to three large N-I launched military manned stations would control a constellation of strategic assets. Geosynchronous nuclear-powered satellites would provide secure communications. Piloted reconnaissance spacecraft would surprise the enemy, observing military preparations without warning. The orbital stations would provide continuous observations of the territory of the imperialist block.

• Vetrov, G S, S. P. Korolev i evo delo, Nauka, Moscow, 1998. ISBN: 5020036846. The collected papers of Soviet Chief Designer Korolev. A tremendous source of new information and insight on the Soviet space program. Russian language. More at amazon.com...