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The Central Intelligence Agency and Overhead Reconnaissance; the U-2 and Oxcart Programs, 1954-1974

Central Intelligence Agency · 1900-01-01 · 406 pages · text by OCR

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.

Open the PDF at page 261 Original source ↗

“Mission Control”28 pages

  • p. 9 …The struggle between the CIA and the US Air Force to control the U-2 and…
  • p. 72 …2 missions. Access to the photographs taken by the U-2 would be strictly controlled, which…
  • p. 73 …This pact gave the Air Force responsibility for pilot selection and training, weather information, mission plotting…
  • p. 81 …Before the start of a mission, the ground crew set the counters to indicate the total…
  • p. 96 …All of the products from this project would be placed in the new control system. By…
  • p. 100 …This was an S-band radar used by Soviet forces for early warning and ground-controlled…
  • p. 113 …The President nevertheless maintained tight control over the program and authorized only 10 days of overflights…
  • p. 128 …personnel controlling overseas photo processing and interpretation centers, which were normally under Air Force control. Further…
  • p. 140 …Although the President would not allow U-2s to fly their primary mission of reconnaissance of…
  • p. 142 …of the first series of U-2 missions. The CIA proprietary firm Scientific Engineering Institute was…
  • p. 147 …To take advantage of these weaknesses, Detachment C staged three missions from Alaska into the Soviet…
  • p. 156 …After these missions, penetration overflights became a rarity. There would be only six more during the…
  • p. 167 …U-2 missions. To handle U-2 material, the British created a new control system, which…
  • p. 168 …The British missions would be operationally controlled by CIA project headquarters. Soon afterward four British pilots…
  • p. 169 …of authority for the joint program: "British missions are carried out on your authority and are…
  • p. 170 Secret NOFORN Chapter 3 May 1959, and used to fly weather missions on 7 and 8…
  • p. 180 …As in December, the pilot was British, and the mission had been ordered by Prime Minister…
  • p. 188 …some Soviet airborne-missile fire-control systems. Operation GRAND SLAM, mission 4154 and the 24th deep…
  • p. 191 …This revised cover story, along with a mission flight plan consistent with it, was sent to…
  • p. 193 …the impression that he was not in control of his administration. On Wednesday, 11 May, the…
  • p. 196 …with Abel's "wife" (probably his Soviet control) in East Germany. In November 1961, Acting DCI…
  • p. 204 …in the DDP in order to maintain control of his overhead reconnaissance projects (the U-2…
  • p. 220 …Strongly favoring Air Force control of the U-2 missions over Cuba, the DOD representatives called…
  • p. 237 …In reality, however, the United States would maintain strict control over the missions to be flown…
  • p. 335 …The flood of information that the U-2 missions gathered led to a major expansion of…
  • p. 340 …In 1959 Bissell became Deputy Director for Plans but kept the reconnaissance projects under his control…
  • p. 348 …System-I used S- and X-band ELINT receivers to collect ground-controlled intercept and air…
  • p. 400 mission 2023 108 mission 2029 124 mission 3086 200 mission 3088 200 mission 3089 201 mission…
Secret NOFORN

Chapter 5

U-2 on the USS Kitty Hawk, 5 August 1963

involved in seeking permission to base U-2s in other nations. Kelly Johnson began working on changes to the aircraft, and Office of Special Activities Deputy Director James A. Cunningham, Jr., a former Marine Corps aviator, asked the Navy for assistance.

The first test of the U-2's capability for carrier operations took place in August 1963 from the USS Kitty Hawk operating in the Pacific Ocean off San Diego, California. A U-2C, which had been loaded aboard the carrier at North Island Naval Base, took off from the flight deck with a full load of fuel and was airborne within 321 feet. No assistance from catapults was necessary. Although the takeoff was very successful, the attempted landing was not. The aircraft bounced, hit hard on one wing tip, and then just barely managed to become airborne again before reaching the end of the deck. Kelly Johnson realized that the airframe would have to be altered in order to make carrier landings possible. These alterations involved strengthening the landing gear, installing an arresting hook at the rear of the fuselage, and fitting "spoilers" on the wings to cancel the aerodynamic lift once the aircraft was over the flight deck. Aircraft thus modified were designated U-2G. While several aircraft

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About this file

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.