Cancelled Russian Missions...

Vostok cancelled missions (1964/66)

After the first six successful Vostok manned missions, another seven flights (Vostok 7 to 13) were originally planned, going through to April of 1966, but these were canceled cancelled in favor of the multi-manned Voskhod in February 1964, intended to achieve more Soviet "firsts" in space.

Volynov, Khrunov, Belyaev and Leonov were originally assigned for a Vostok mission, but these were cancelled in 1964.

Voskhod cancelled missions (1966/67)

 The Voskhod program, aimed at making Soviet "firsts" in space exploration, also had some missions cancelled to allow a quicker development of the Soyuz spacecraft:

Ponomaryova (left) and Solovyova (right) should have made an all-women Voskhod flight in 1966.

Zond Lunar Program (1966/72)

Since the first successful Vostok manned flights, the russians started to prepare a manned lunar landing. The success of the first crew of 3 (Voskhod 1 mission, in 1965) opened the skies for an actual lunar program and possible lunar landing around 1967 (to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the October Revolution). However, like the 1967 Apollo fire, the russians also had some setbacks, namely the Soyuz 1 mission that killed Komarov in 1967 and also the failures of the N1 rocket launches (the equivalent to the Apollo Saturn V rocket).

This photo shows the transport of a 7K-L1 circumlunar spacecraft on its Proton booster on the way from the assembly building to the launch pad at Tyura-Tam. Note the cluster of solid-propellant rocket engines at the top of the launch escape tower. The hatch on the external fairing for cosmonaut entry into the actual spacecraft can be seen in the foreground as a dark oblong shape

Although a few of the early russian manned missions had objectives linked to a future lunar program, the first (and only) group of cosmonauts assigned to the Zond lunar program was only officially created in January 1968. It is said that moon preparations were made as early as Valery Bikosvky's Vostok 5 flight, when the mission break a record of 5 days in space. The "Lunar Group" of 18 cosmonauts had the following names (three cosmonauts are yet to be identified):

With the failure of the large N1 rocket, it is speculative to determine the actual mission assignments of each cosmonaut, however, from the information revealed by missions directors and the cosmonauts, the first early group, prepared for a circum-lunar mission in 1967/68 consisted of:

On a later stage, after the success of the Apollo 8 mission, the russian prepared for the actual moon landing, adjusting the crews for the following missions:

See the complete Zond Lunar  program >>>