Kennedy played a vital role in the development of the U.S. space program. He claimed that a major goal of the country was to place a man on the moon before the end of the decade (an objective that was accomplished in 1969). Under Kennedy’s watch, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) launched Project Mercury with a goal of putting American astronauts in space. Kennedy did not want to lag behind the Soviet Union, which was aggressively pursuing its own space program.