"Let's go!" With that, the boyish, grinning Yuri Gagarin launched into space on April 12, 1961, becoming the first human being to exit Earth's orbit. The twenty

V. 1. [no special title] -- v. 2. Creating a rocket industry -- v. 3 Hot days of the Cold War -- v. 4. The moon race.

During the Second World War, as the Soviet Red Army was locked in brutal combat against the Nazis, Joseph Stalin ended the state's violent, decades-long persecu