Hi Dalhousie,
You clearly have a point. Saying it was done because of aesthetics does make little sense. Shoemaker et al had this mapped out well in advance for the real thing or for faking it
.
BTW, speaking of Shoemaker, does anybody find Shoemaker's death suspicious? If the moon landings were faked, it would almost be certain that Shoemaker would have to have had a hand in constructing the set. (he was also Cronkite's color commentator on tv). In all likelihood his death was most likely a tragic accident. He died in a remote part of Australia outside of Alice Springs. He was hit head on by a transport truck. The only thing I find odd about it, it came just a couple years after Armstrong name checked him in his now famous "Truth's protective layer's" speech at the WhiteHouse. He could of talked about anybody reminiscing about the moon landings but Shoemaker's name was the only one. And the speech wasn't really about reminiscing about the landings at all. It almost reads as a confession they didn't go. He starts by comparing himself to a parrot. Parrots don't fly well and they repeat what they are told. He then literally says the country had asked them to "do the impossible". But he doesn't follow that up by saying we accomplished it anyways. Instead, he rationalizes that the space age has increased our knowledge of the universe "a thousand fold" to the point we have a space shuttle flying overhead. (so wait, we went to the moon in '69 but the shuttle is now our crowning achievement?) He then cryptically talks about "removing one of truth's protective layer's". While it is debatable what he meant, many point to the fact he is talking about the firmament. Truth is God. And one of God's protective layers was the firmament in the bible that that is a protective layer over earth that can't be penetrated. While I personally don't believe there is a firmament, Neil was a very religious man. So if he is referring to the firmament he is suggesting that we cannot go the moon.
(And while all this may seem crazy, Wernher Von Braun, the man behind the Saturn program, also bizarrely on his own tomb stone puts only one thing on it, Psalms 19:1 ... "the firmament sheweth its handywork". Of the 4 or 5 billion people on earth at the time, Von Braun, given he sent a manned rocket to the moon, he should have been the very, very, very, very, very, very last one on earth to put something like this on his tombstone but he did. Completely bizarre)
In short, Armstrong's 25th Anniversary speech had little to do with 'the good old days of being on the moon' but rather the whole speech was about obstacles too great to overcome, he likens himself to a parrot asked to do the impossible and overcome insurmountable layers/barriers. This wasn't some off the cuff speech, it was a well thought out statement. What he truly meant by this statement, we may never know. But he was being cryptic for some reason. And it makes no sense why he is being cryptic. And that's why I question why he named checked Shoemaker in the speech. Was he calling him out for some specific reason apart from using him to illustrate that space with its "celestial fireworks etc" is a very dangerous place? (ie too dangerous for man) or was calling him out for another unknown reason?