Question: What program included the 8th of the series of missions that Project Gemini helped recruit experienced people for?

full_context: Document 1: Space Race: The first landing was followed by another, precision landing on Apollo 12 in November 1969. NASA had achieved its first landing goal with enough Apollo spacecraft and Saturn V launchers left for eight follow-on lunar landings through Apollo 20, conducting extended-endurance missions and transporting the landing crews in Lunar Roving Vehicles on the last five. They also planned an Apollo Applications Program to develop a longer-duration Earth orbital workshop (later named Skylab) to be constructed in orbit from a spent S-IVB upper stage, using several launches of the smaller Saturn IB launch vehicle. But planners soon decided this could be done more efficiently by using the two live stages of a Saturn V to launch the workshop pre-fabricated from an S-IVB (which was also the Saturn V third stage), which immediately removed Apollo 20. Belt-tightening budget cuts soon led NASA to cut Apollo 18 and 19 as well, but keep three extended/Lunar Rover missions. Apollo 13 encountered an in-flight spacecraft failure and had to abort its lunar landing in April 1970, returning its crew safely but temporarily grounding the program again. It resumed with four successful landings on Apollo 14 (February 1971), Apollo 15 (July 1971), Apollo 16 (April 1972), and Apollo 17 (December 1972).
Document 2: Space Race: Focused by the commitment to a Moon landing, in January 1962 the US announced Project Gemini, a two-man spacecraft that would support the later three-man Apollo by developing the key spaceflight technologies of space rendezvous and docking of two craft, flight durations of sufficient length to simulate going to the Moon and back, and extra-vehicular activity to accomplish useful work outside the spacecraft.
Document 3: Moon landing: Mission name Lunar lander Lunar landing date Lunar liftoff date Lunar landing site Duration on lunar surface Crew Number of EVAs Total EVA Time (HH: MM) Apollo 11 Eagle 20 July 1969 21 July 1969 Sea of Tranquility 21: 31 Neil Armstrong, Edwin ``Buzz ''Aldrin 2: 31 Apollo 12 Intrepid 19 November 1969 21 November 1969 Ocean of Storms 1 - day, 7: 31 Charles`` Pete'' Conrad, Alan Bean 7: 45 Apollo 14 Antares 5 February 1971 6 February 1971 Fra Mauro 1 - day, 9: 30 Alan B. Shepard, Edgar Mitchell 9: 21 Apollo 15 Falcon 30 July 1971 2 August 1971 Hadley Rille 2 days, 18: 55 David Scott, James Irwin 18: 33 Apollo 16 Orion 21 April 1972 24 April 1972 Descartes Highlands 2 days, 23: 02 John Young, Charles Duke 20: 14 Apollo 17 Challenger 11 December 1972 14 December 1972 Taurus -- Littrow 3 days, 2: 59 Eugene Cernan, Harrison ``Jack ''Schmitt 22: 04
Document 4: Moon: The Moon was first reached in September 1959 by the Soviet Union's Luna 2, an unmanned spacecraft. The United States' NASA Apollo program achieved the only manned lunar missions to date, beginning with the first manned orbital mission by Apollo 8 in 1968, and six manned landings between 1969 and 1972, with the first being Apollo 11 in July 1969. These missions returned lunar rocks which have been used to develop a geological understanding of the Moon's origin, internal structure, and the Moon's later history. Since the 1972 Apollo 17 mission the Moon has been visited only by unmanned spacecraft.
Document 5: Moon landing: The United States' Apollo 11 was the first manned mission to land on the Moon, on 20 July 1969. There have been six manned U.S. landings (between 1969 and 1972) and numerous unmanned landings, with no soft landings happening from 22 August 1976 until 14 December 2013.
Document 6: Apollo 11: Apollo 11 was the spaceflight that landed the first two people on the Moon. Mission commander Neil Armstrong and pilot Buzz Aldrin, both American, landed the lunar module Eagle on July 20, 1969, at 20: 17 UTC. Armstrong became the first person to step onto the lunar surface six hours after landing on July 21 at 02: 56: 15 UTC; Aldrin joined him about 20 minutes later. They spent about two and a quarter hours together outside the spacecraft, and collected 47.5 pounds (21.5 kg) of lunar material to bring back to Earth. Michael Collins piloted the command module Columbia alone in lunar orbit while they were on the Moon's surface. Armstrong and Aldrin spent 21.5 hours on the lunar surface before rejoining Columbia in lunar orbit.
Document 7: Space Race: During the summer of 1968, the Apollo program hit another snag: the first pilot-rated Lunar Module (LM) was not ready for orbital tests in time for a December 1968 launch. NASA planners overcame this challenge by changing the mission flight order, delaying the first LM flight until March 1969, and sending Apollo 8 into lunar orbit without the LM in December. This mission was in part motivated by intelligence rumors the Soviet Union might be ready for a piloted Zond flight during late 1968. In September 1968, Zond 5 made a circumlunar flight with tortoises on board and returned to Earth, accomplishing the first successful water landing of the Soviet space program in the Indian Ocean. It also scared NASA planners, as it took them several days to figure out that it was only an automated flight, not piloted, because voice recordings were transmitted from the craft en route to the Moon. On November 10, 1968 another automated test flight, Zond 6 was launched, but this time encountered difficulties in its Earth reentry, and depressurized and deployed its parachute too early, causing it to crash-land only 16 kilometers (9.9 mi) from where it had been launched six days earlier. It turned out there was no chance of a piloted Soviet circumlunar flight during 1968, due to the unreliability of the Zonds.
Document 8: Space Race: Apollo 11 left lunar orbit and returned to Earth, landing safely in the Pacific Ocean on July 24, 1969. When the spacecraft splashed down, 2,982 days had passed since Kennedy's commitment to landing a man on the Moon and returning him safely to the Earth before the end of the decade; the mission was completed with 161 days to spare. With the safe completion of the Apollo 11 mission, the Americans won the race to the Moon.
Document 9: Apollo 11: Apollo 11 was the spaceflight that landed the first two humans on the Moon. Mission commander Neil Armstrong and pilot Buzz Aldrin, both American, landed the lunar module Eagle on July 20, 1969, at 20: 18 UTC. Armstrong became the first to step onto the lunar surface six hours after landing on July 21 at 02: 56: 15 UTC; Aldrin joined him about 20 minutes later. They spent about two and a quarter hours together outside the spacecraft, and collected 47.5 pounds (21.5 kg) of lunar material to bring back to Earth. Michael Collins piloted the command module Columbia alone in lunar orbit while they were on the Moon's surface. Armstrong and Aldrin spent just under a day on the lunar surface before rejoining Columbia in lunar orbit.
Document 10: Space Race: Most of the novice pilots on the early missions would command the later missions. In this way, Project Gemini built up spaceflight experience for the pool of astronauts who would be chosen to fly the Apollo lunar missions.
Document 11: Blue Gemini: Blue Gemini was a United States Air Force (USAF) project first proposed in August 1962 for a series of seven flights of Gemini spacecraft to enable the Air Force to gain manned spaceflight experience prior to the launch of the Manned Orbital Development System, or MODS. The plan was to use off-the-shelf Gemini spacecraft.
Document 12: Apollo 16: Apollo 16 was the tenth crewed mission in the United States Apollo space program, the fifth and second-to-last to land on the Moon, and the second to land in the lunar highlands. The second of the so-called "J missions," it was crewed by Commander John Young, Lunar Module Pilot Charles Duke and Command Module Pilot Ken Mattingly. Launched from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida at 12:54 PM EST on April 16, 1972, the mission lasted 11 days, 1 hour, and 51 minutes, and concluded at 2:45 PM EST on April 27.
Document 13: Space Race: The United States recovered from the Apollo 1 fire, fixing the fatal flaws in an improved version of the Block II command module. The US proceeded with unpiloted test launches of the Saturn V launch vehicle (Apollo 4 and Apollo 6) and the Lunar Module (Apollo 5) during the latter half of 1967 and early 1968. Apollo 1's mission to check out the Apollo Command/Service Module in Earth orbit was accomplished by Grissom's backup crew commanded by Walter Schirra on Apollo 7, launched on October 11, 1968. The eleven-day mission was a total success, as the spacecraft performed a virtually flawless mission, paving the way for the United States to continue with its lunar mission schedule.
Document 14: Apollo 10: Apollo 10 was a May 1969 human spaceflight, the fourth crewed mission in the United States Apollo program, and the second (after Apollo 8) to orbit the Moon. It was the F mission: a "dress rehearsal" for the first Moon landing, testing all of the components and procedures, just short of actually landing. The Apollo Lunar Module (LM) was flown to a descent orbit within of the lunar surface, at the point where powered descent for landing would normally begin. After orbiting the Moon 31 times Apollo 10 returned safely to Earth, and its success enabled the first landing to be attempted on the Apollo 11 mission two months later.
Document 15: Space Race: The United States launched three more Mercury flights after Glenn's: Aurora 7 on May 24, 1962 duplicated Glenn's three orbits; Sigma 7 on October 3, 1962, six orbits; and Faith 7 on May 15, 1963, 22 orbits (32.4 hours), the maximum capability of the spacecraft. NASA at first intended to launch one more mission, extending the spacecraft's endurance to three days, but since this would not beat the Soviet record, it was decided instead to concentrate on developing Project Gemini.
ground_truth: Apollo program
sub_queries: Project Gemini helped recruit experienced people for which upcoming lunar missions? Answer: Apollo
Apollo 8 >> part of Answer: Apollo program