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.
“Hill”14 pages
Secret NOFORN
Chapter 6
these aircraft were hastily flown to Edwards Air Force Base. From this point on, the Air Force versions of the OXCART were based at Edwards and provided a diversion so that the faster and higher flying A-12s at the Nevada site could continue testing out of the public eye.
The President's announcement did not mention the CIA's involvement in the project, which remained classified, but keeping the Agency's extensive role in the OXCART a secret was not an easy task. The first step had been to separate the Air Force's versions of the A-12 from the Agency's by moving the Air Force aircraft to California. Next, those firms that were to be given the new technology had to be briefed on the program and agree to abide by the same secrecy agreements then in force with Lockheed. Moreover, everyone witting of OXCART (including those no longer associated with the program, such as Allen Dulles, Richard Bissell, and General Cabell) had been briefed about the impending Presidential announcement, so that they would not think that the need for secrecy about OXCART had ended.
The process of surfacing versions of the OXCART continued on 25 July 1964, when President Johnson revealed the existence of a new Air Force reconnaissance aircraft, which he called the SR-71. Actually, the President was supposed to say RS-71 (for "reconnaissance-strike"). Deciding that renaming the aircraft was easier than correcting President Johnson, the Air Force invented a new category- "strategic reconnaissance"—to explain the SR-71's designation.
## ADDITIONAL PROBLEMS DURING FINAL TESTING
The first A-12 crash occurred on 24 May 1963, when a detachment pilot, realizing the airspeed indication was confusing and erroneous, decided to eject. The pilot was unhurt, but the plane was destroyed when it crashed near Wendover, Utah. A cover story for the press described the plane as an F-105. All A-12s were grounded for a week while the accident was investigated. The malfunction was found to be caused by ice that had plugged up a pitot-static tube used to determine airspeed. $ ^{45} $ Not linked to a story yet.
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.