The landings of instrumented probes and astronauts on the Moon and the short glimpses at Venus and Mars that distinguished the spaceflight program of the last decade yielded such an impressive wealth of new knowledge that the President, in his programmatic speech of 1970, mentioned the continuing exploration of the solar system as one of the national goals during the decade of the seventies.

This exploration will be accomplished with unmanned spacecraft, except for the remaining three Apollo flights in 1971 and 1972 and Skylab in 1973. Planetary exploration will include photographic coverage of the surfaces of the celestial bodies; closeup pictures of specific surface features; magnetic and gravitational measurements; observations of atmospheres, ionospheres, and radiation belts; analysis of surface material in situ; and, as far as possible, the return of surface samples for careful chemical and mineralogical analyses and for age determinations.