Documents / FOIA release
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 GLM-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.
“Hill”14 pages
- p. 4 …17
The BEACON HILL Report... 17
Concern About the Danger of a Soviet Surprise Attack... 19…
- p. 13 Helen Hill Kleyla and Robert D. O'Hern. This 16-volume Top Secret Codeword study of…
- p. 14 …view of the "other side of the hill." With the advent of dry film, it became…
- p. 30 …this new advisory body. $ ^{29} $
## The BEACON HILL Report
In 1951 the Air Force sought even…
- p. 31 …Their headquarters was located over a secretarial school on Beacon Hill, which soon became the codename…
- p. 32 Secret NOFORN
Chapter 1
document on 15 June 1952, the BEACON HILL Report advocated radical approaches…
- p. 34 …Created in July 1953, the Intelligence Systems Panel (ISP) included several experts from the BEACON HILL…
- p. 37 …the reconnaissance needs expressed in the BEACON HILL Report. Theoretically, he explained to the panel, any…
- p. 44 …members had been discussing since the BEACON HILL and Intelligence Systems Panel meetings. James Baker was…
- p. 45 …Having participated in the BEACON HILL Study and the Intelligence Systems Panel, several Project Three members…
- p. 344 …He headed the Beacon Hill Panel in 1952 and later became director of Lincoln Laboratories.
## PARANGOSKY…
- p. 345 …of several advisory panels, including the BEACON HILL project. He helped Baker decide what cameras to…
- p. 364 …BEACON HILL Report: Problems of Air Force Intelligence and Reconnaissance. Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 15 June…
- p. 371 …137
Beacon Hill 17-19,21,24,31-32,331-332
BEACON HILL Report 17,19…
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or more of the aircraft was always being repaired, and eventually three of the five AQUILINE prototypes were destroyed in testing.
At this point the project was turned over to the Office of Special Activities for operational testing Flight tests showed the aircraft to be successful by the standards originally set for the project in 1967, as it flew 130 miles and obtained very high resolution photography of a target before returning successfully to the original launchsite. However, improving AQUILINE sufficiently to make it a practical long-range reconnaissance system was estimated to cost another $35 million and take two to three years. On the recommendation of DDS&T Carl Duckett on 1 November 1971, Project AQUILINE was canceled.
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FOIA release, from the cia-readingroom collection. The PDF is mirrored here; the original link is above. The text was read from the page images by GLM-OCR; expect the odd misread word. 406 pages are in the text index: search them above, or from the library's search.