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N1 or N-1 or 11A52 (Н1, Н-1, 11А52 in Russian) was a secret Soviet rocket intended to send Soviet...

N1 or N-1 or 11A52 (Н1, Н-1, 11А52 in Russian) was a secret Soviet rocket intended to send Soviet cosmonauts to the Moon. It is also known in the West as the G-1e or SL-15. The Soviet classified technical name N1 was an abbreviation from the Russian word носитель (nositel', "carrier"). 11A52 was an alphanumeric designation for the N1 on its design and production documents. No official public name for the N1, had it succeeded, was ever adopted. N1 was underfunded, undertested, and started several years after the Saturn V; all four launch attempts failed catastrophically, and the project was cancelled in 1974 de-facto and in 1976 officially. The N1 program (along with the rest of the Soviet manned moon programs) was kept intensely secret until the arrival of glasnost. Information about the N1 was published in 1990. Development of the N1 began in 1959 under the direction of Sergey Korolyov at his OKB-1 Design Bureau. The original design proposed a 50 ton payload intended as a launcher for military space stations and a manned Mars flyby using a nuclear engine upper stage. The N1 was the largest of three proposed designs; the N2 was somewhat smaller and intended to compete with Vladimir