[Alpha Kodiak]

Originally posted by Andr&eacutes Lescano:
FX weren't that good back then, a fake wouldn't have been believable.
But it's quite plausible it wasn't live, and the astronauts were secretly safe back home before they dared to make it public.

The only reason that I would disagree with that is, again, that the Russians would have known, as would many other nations, because they would have been able to track when the spacecraft left earth orbit, and I doubt they would have cooperated. For that matter, it would have been hard to sneak an early lift off past the American public since the launch of a Saturn V was a fairly spectacular thing that was visible over a wide area.