Eli5: why was the US the first to make it to the moon despite the USSR being first in nearly everything else in the Space Race?

Question

Eli5: why was the US the first to make it to the moon despite the USSR being first in nearly everything else in the Space Race?

In: 14546

Answer 1

An interesting historical irony is that the Soviet space program shifted to compartmentalized labs who were competing with one another while the US program was collaborative and centralized.