Surveyor program in the Space Race with the Soviet Union. Thus, the Surveyor 1 landing in June 1966, only four months after the Soviet Luna 9 probe landed in February, was an indication the programs were at similar stages. Surveyor program The Surveyor program was a NASA program that, from June 1966 through January 1968, sent seven robotic spacecraft to the surface of the Moon. Its primary goal was to demonstrate the feasibility of soft landings on the Moon. The Surveyor craft were the first American spacecraft to achieve soft landing on an extraterrestrial body. The missions called for the craft to
Russia (USSR) vs Rest of the World at first that this would facilitate an unstoppable World team, but on closer inspection, it was not so clear. Russian world champions (and 1984 USSR team survivors) Garry Kasparov and Anatoly Karpov were to be joined by two more exclusive "K" club members—world champions Vladimir Kramnik and Alexander Khalifman. With the further addition of three former champions of Russia (Alexander Morozevich, Peter Svidler and Alexander Motylev) and two more players with Elo ratings in excess of 2700 (Evgeny Bareev and Alexander Grischuk), things were looking decidedly brighter than might have been expected. Indeed, the average Elo ratings of the two