WASHINGTON — On Oct. 4, 1957, at the height of the Cold War, the Soviet Union put the first man-made satellite into space.
It was unmanned, weighed only 184 pounds, was no bigger than a beach ball and could do little more than orbit the Earth transmitting radio blips. Nonetheless, Sputnik had immediate and long-term effects on both our nation and individual lives.
Though America was initially awed at the Soviet feat, almost immediately our awe turned to anxiety and fear. Just before Sputnik went up, the Soviets test-fired the first intercontinental ballistic missile and three days later had their first successful hydrogen-bomb test.
Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev proclaimed in the wake of Sputnik that his country would soon turn out intercontinental nuclear-tipped missiles "like sausages."
As Sputnik orbited the Earth, passing over the United States several times a day, Americans came to fear that a rocket capable of propelling a satellite into orbit could also carry a nuclear warhead into the American heartland. As 1957 wore on, the news only got worse with the additional Soviet space success of Sputnik II and the launch-pad disaster of America's first attempt to orbit its own satellite.
It is easy, with hindsight, to dismiss the deep fear of nuclear annihilation provoked by Sputnik, but it was very real.
In the aftermath of the tragedy of Sept. 11, it can be useful to look back to the Sputnik crisis noting the parallels, reminding ourselves that the fear and vulnerability we are now feeling are not new and seeing if America's response to that crisis provides a roadmap for our continuing response to this one.
While Sputnik was merely a scientific event with political and military overtones far different from the terrorist acts of mass murder of Sept. 11, the threat posed by each of those events forced, or will force, America to respond in ways that changed the country forever.
Pre-Sputnik and before Sept. 11 our national climate and mood were similar. Our success in winning World War II and emerging victorious from the Cold War had, in each case, left us optimistic about the future and confident of our superior place in the world.
At both times, America's concerns and politics were largely domestic and sometimes trivial. Each event sounded a wake-up call to a nation that had become materialistic, insular and overconfident.
For example, the Soviets made no secret of the fact they were going to launch a satellite, but we dismissed the idea as preposterous for a country that couldn't even produce a decent car; just as most of us never imagined, even after the attack on the African embassies and the USS Cole, that those who committed those terrible acts were capable of executing such massive acts of terror on our own soil.
After the shock of Sputnik, the United States quickly committed itself to winning the space race sparked by Sputnik by initiating the greatest partnership of the private and public sectors ever attempted.
We initiated reforms in education aimed at enhancing America's technical competence, which helped to create an intellectually competitive environment that produced monumental advances central to modern science and technology — including the wired, wireless and satellite-linked technologies of everyday life in the 21st century.
Science, technology and engineering were totally reworked and massively funded in the shadow of Sputnik. The re-arming that took place in the wake of Sputnik was as much cerebral as it was military.
America got stronger as it got smarter and educated more of its citizens in new ways. Dick and Jane were replaced with Dr. Seuss, living languages spelled doom for Latin and Greek in the nation's high schools, and rote learning was displaced in favor of theoretical learning and creative thinking.
In the wake of Sept. 11, winning the war against terrorists is essential but our response should not be solely a military and diplomatic one.
Winning the war of ideas, our ultimate goal, may once again require a re-arming that is as much cerebral as it is military and be measured in terms of how much smarter and thus stronger we become.
We can start by taking a page from the Sputnik crisis and looking to education for ways to increase our understanding of those people around the world who wish us harm as well as increasing their understanding of us so that we can live peacefully — or at least co-exist — in an ever-shrinking and increasingly dangerous world.
Paul Dickson is a Washington-based journalist whose book "Sputnik: The Shock of the Century" has just been published by Walker and Co. Readers may write to him at P.O. Box 80, Garrett Park, Md. 20896, or e-mail him via newdefiner@aol.com