Тяжелая Ракета-носитель Протон

Initially, this heavy-class launch vehicle was called Hercules, but over time, another name took root - Proton. It was conceived as a combat ICBM with a super-powerful warhead (150 megatons) "to hit especially important targets anywhere on the planet", but Proton became famous as a means of launching heavy satellites and manned space stations into near-Earth orbit, and interplanetary research probes - on departure trajectories to Moon, Venus, Mars, Halley's comet. The first launch of this carrier rocket took place more than half a century ago (July 16, 1965), and in total over 400 launches of all its modifications were made - UR-500, Proton-K, Proton-M. What was the percentage of completely successful missions in the Soviet era and what caused the increase in accidents in recent years? How much do commercial launches of the Proton cost and how much does the rocket cost the federal budget? Can Proton compete with launch vehicles from other countries - the American Atlas-5, Delta-4 and Falcon 9, the European Ariane-5, the Japanese H-IIB, the Chinese Long March 3B? A new book by a leading space historian answers all these questions. The COLOR Collector's Edition is illustrated with hundreds of exclusive drawings and photographs.