Tal Shiar wrote:
What would happened if woman was chosen by Soviet leadership as first human in space? I know that some Eastern cultures can be biased against women or Sergei Korolev could disagree with that but what if Khrushchev decided that if Soviet Union is making milestone - placing man in orbit it would be woman? This could be excellent propaganda for communist states ("In the Soviet Union women are first in space!") but how would other countries react?
You already opened that can of worms in "Red Universe" I see
First of all let me preface this with the fact I'm struggling to achieve similar circumstances if/when the tenativly titled "Vangaurd to the Stars" short TL ever manages to move from notes to an actual time-line. As a basic justification I am going with the same rational "riggerbob" used above (which was also used to effect by Robert Heinlien's script for "Project Moonbase"

) because in-TL the Navy is using less powerful rockets with smaller 'sub-scale' vehicles than the Air Force who are getting the lions share of the funding. Due to this they have to pretty much use pilots how "fit-in-the-capsule" rather than whom they might otherwise choose.
(I also want to make her Negro as I'm having a really hard time resisting having a reporter taken down by several notches by the commanding Admiral for commenting the US had just sent another 'monkey' into space) BTW I recommend seeing "Project Moonbase" if you get the chance. It has been often used as an example of how "far-ahead" RH's thinking was but once you actually watch the movie you see the reality of the scripting and situations tells a HUGE amount of what was and was not accetable culturally in America at the time for women.
To your question though, after being shown up by Sputnik and the failures of the American Vanguard project Vostok 1 was like being hit with an even bigger hammer. America was 'racing' to put a man into space on a suborbital trajectory at the time, we would have to wait on the Atlas to put a man into orbit, but again the Soviet's had "beaten" us despite what looked like an all-out effort. The gender of the cosmonaut is going to be noted in passing at first but will then be used to show how "inhuman" the Soviets/Communists are by exposing and untrained, unskilled WOMAN to the dangers of space flight with NO regard for human decency! They probably ordered her into the capsule because she was handy and they didn't have another dog available so "obviously" they grabbed some hapless woman, who being the good, brainwashed, Communist she was agreed blissfully unaware of the dangers and risk involved. Why those godless Commie's kidnapped and strapped someones daughter/mother/wife into a missile simply to test it before they dared risk a MAN in the contraption! How dare they...
(Continue on as required of course to sooth the outraged ego, if would be 'nice' if she were actually a test pilot or something though

)
You can assume that a lot of western aligned countries will hop on the bandwagon, (imagine the outrage in France for example

) you need only look at the press around Sally Ride's first trip into space and the op-eds and cartoon that showed she was just along to provide coffee and sandwhiches while the "men" did the work, and that's the 80s!
The key aspect will be the follow through as no ones noted that the Soviets didn't fly another woman until the 80s themselves by which time the US had already included woman astronauts. If, as per OTL it's a one-off stunt it will be MORE noticable due to one being first and therefore the PR liability is much higher than OTL. As noted it would take an early decision to pull this off but in doing that it would also require the inclusion of women in the program earlier which may not be that bad as it is then LESS likely to be a 'stunt'. But you also have to look at the program progress and the cultural backgrounds involved. The Soviet astronaut corps was, (like its Amercan counterpart) built on a core of military MALE test pilots because it was seen a high-risk program. Having a political decision to advance a woman over the more qualifed men is in and of itself a 'high-risk' ploy due to the egos involed and the effect on morale. (The 'glory' was stolen from both Gagarin and his back-up after all and how many more times are poltics going to override?)
Keep in mind that along with the "Mercury 7" male astonauts there had been both offical and unoffical pressure to allow continued testing and eventual down-select of the "Mercury 13" female canidates to 7 as well but given the very limited nature of the Mercury program itself this was obviously not going to happen OTL. (To do so requires a much more extensivly planned and supported program as well as a much more capable Mercury vehicle, both of which were not intended in OTL) Vostok on the other hand was a bit more of a 'flexible' vehicle/program as demonstrated by later flights. IF there is evidence of inclusion of woman in the Soviet program then one could assume that the Americans would follow suit, but it's not a given.
At this point in time, (Vostok 1) the US still does not have the Atlas booster available and the planned Mercury vehicle run is In work but it is well known it is a very limited vehicle, (the 'long-duration' flight of Gordon Cooper saw the removal of a lot of equipment and systems to make room for the needed support equipment and it STILL was mostly 'broken' by the time it came down. Compare the 34 hours there with Vostok5 at 119 hours...
And Vostok evolved into Voskhod which Mercury couldn't obviously do, instead needing the new Gemini, (orginally Mercury Mark II) vehicle to be designed and built and the more powerful Titan-II launch vehicle to loft. It's not until the premiere of the Saturn-1 launch vehicle the US has the capacity to launch larger vehicles into orbit.
So for a time the Soviets if they so choose have a small window to continue racking up records and PR propaganda. BUT! Recall that Korolev is already pushing for Soyuz and there are only a few Vostok's left in assembly to convert to Voskhods AND if more are planned/built then this pushes Soyuz back even further. And along in here they need to consider rendevous and docking which will be essential for future space operations and which the American Gemini is going to be specifially designed to explore whereas Voskhod is a modification.
These are the background factors for the inclusion of woman in the program(s) so need to be kept in mind. In context while it won't effect the Mercury program I'd suppose, (to far along and to limited) by the end of 1961 we can assume Kennedy will still commit the US to a Moon landing and all that implies for Apollo. This means Gemini will still be a rather limited profram both due to budget/support and efforts to get Apollo up and running and while I can see it argued that a few more vehicles/flights might be added to the program to alllow the inclusion of female astronauts my "gut" feeling is the US will continue to consider it a very much male oriented program and require only male pilots which was done OTL until very late in the program. And as per OTL I don't see them going outside of the inclusion of male scientists.
If the Soviets continue to fly women on a semi-regular basis, (there would be some serious questions on the need due to the requirments and skills needed for such) as the program was being largly based on "military utility of humans" rather than more general goals and here there are no clear 'advantages' for using woman over men and given the obviouse male orientation of the miltary...
So again we're looking at clear 'political intervention' cases or a clearly justifiable 'need' to use women over men which are questionable at best.
So... The initial reaction will most likely be some outrage, a lot of regretable reactionary rhetoric, (especially from America which will later have to live it down or justify it) some calls for more 'inclusion' as time goes on but in general I don't think it will significantly effect the "Space Race" at the point and time it happens. Assuming there is no significant change in American post-Vostok-1 policy, (and by this point America is really up against a wall with very few choices available to them so the Moon and Apollo are pretty much inevitable) or really Soviet space policy, (it's a one off stunt) then I don't see any real butterflies until much further down the road. In general you MIGHT have one or two Gemini missions added with female crews and tenative "plans" for an all woman Lunar mission somewhere between Apollo-15 and Apollo-20 but I'd expect them to be the ones cut first as the budget and support dries up in the late 60s. (NASA-et-al are GOING to favor the long term MALE astronauts just like they did OTL so barring politial interferance, which will NOT go over well, they will push female/new-astonauts to later missions and ground them once those missions are cancled)
Randy