Documents / FOIA release
This is a 1992 CIA History Staff monograph by Gregory W. Pedlow and Donald E. Welzenbach, originally classified Secret NOFORN and approved for release in 2013. It covers the CIA's manned overhead reconnaissance program from 1954 to 1974 and the two aircraft it developed, the U-2 and the A-12 OXCART. The history covers the U-2 overflights of the Soviet Union, the 1960 downing of Francis Gary Powers and later operations in Asia and Latin America. It also includes a section on U-2s, UFOs and Operation BLUE BOOK.
“F-104”5 pages
Secret NOFORN Chapter 1 6 RAF Canberra Mark-PR3 division in Baltimore, headed by Lt. Col. Joseph J. Pellegrini, had to approve all new reconnaissance aircraft designs. Pellegrini's unit reviewed Leghorn's design and ordered extensive modifications. According to Leghorn, Pellegrini was not interested in a special-purpose aircraft that was only suitable for covert peacetime reconnaissance missions, for he believed that all Air Force reconnaissance aircraft should be capable of operating under wartime conditions. Pellegrini therefore insisted that Leghorn's design meet the specifications for combat aircraft, which required heavily stressed airframes, armor plate, and other apparatus that made an aircraft too heavy to reach the higher altitudes necessary for safe overflights of the Soviet Bloc. The final result of Leghorn's concept after its alteration by Pellegrini's staff was the RB-57D in 1955, whose maximum altitude
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FOIA release, from the cia-readingroom collection. The PDF is mirrored here; the original link is under it. The text was read from the page images by an OCR model; expect the odd misread word. 406 pages are in the text index: search them above, or from the library's search.