I don't understand what you are saying. They had a moon landing program.
Also, do you really think that if the Soviets had the opportunity to embarrass the Americans by proving the landing was fake, they wouldn't take it? Of course they would. Instead they were able to track the Apollo mission all the way and knew it was real.
No they didn't. They had their own moon program and announced their intentions to land in 1961 before the Americans announced in 1962
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soviet_crewed_lunar_programs
What point was that? If you don't join Threads, they don't have your data. They do have everything you publish to the Fediverse though, no matter what you do.
They can already harvest the data. Nothing on the ActivityPub is private
How is Threads going to breach your privacy by federating with your instance? How is de federating from Threads going to protect your privacy?
It's not the last book. It's how the seventh book, Persepolis Rising, starts.
Even if the Soviets had given up on the space race, they still had a vested interest in embarrassing America. They had every motivation to prove that America faked it, but they didn't do it, because they had all the evidence that it was real. They could track the space craft and listen in on the same signals everyone else did.
All documentation against the moon landing has been thoroughly debunked many times. But you don't care about that.
You don't have to trust the Americans, there is plenty of independent third party evidence from multiple sources
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third-party_evidence_for_Apollo_Moon_landings