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.

Open the PDF at page 400 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…

Read from the scan by GLM-OCR; expect the odd misread word.

mission 2023

108

mission 2029

124

mission 3086

200

mission 3088

200

mission 3089

201

mission 3091

205

mission 3093

205

mission 3095

205

mission 3098

206

mission 3100

206

mission 4016

124

mission 4018

124

mission 4019

126

mission 4030

133

mission 4154

175

mission 4155

168

mission 6011

144

mission length

199

mission plotting

60

mission programmers

78

missions

59, 75, 82, 87, 106, 114

129, 154, 164, 167, 179

210, 224, 237, 245, 254

322, 336

Nationalist Chinese cre

222

oleostrut

47, 69

operational altitude

77

outrigger wheels

79

overflights

6, 32, 62, 74, 76-77, 84-86, 88-89,

94-98, 100-101, 104-106, 108-111,

114, 116, 122-128, 135, 138-140,

142-143, 146, 148, 152, 154-157,

159, 161-165, 167-168, 170, 172,

180-181, 195-198, 200-201, 205-206,

208, 210-211, 219, 222-226, 228-237,

239-240, 242-244, 249, 253, 257, 259,

294, 297-301, 310, 315-317, 318-320,

322

paint penalty

149

payload

262, 8, 11, 50, 54, 340, 87, 145, 152

peripheral missions

189, 206, 244, 246

phaseout

257, 310

pilot fatigue

199

pilot hypoxia

80

pilot life-support system

64

pilot selection

60, 283

pilot-survival gear

62

pilot training program

75

pilot urination

64

pilots

42, 299, 47, 56, 59-60,62-66, 68-69,

71-77, 79-80, 94, 109, 113-114, 116,

125, 127, 132-135, 140, 148-149, 153-

156, 164, 175-176, 179, 181-183, 186-187

198-199, 207-212, 214, 221, 223-226,

229-230, 233-236, 238-240, 243, 246-248,

250-253, 256, 283, 319, 321, 332, 340

pilots dessicated

65

pitch-control servo device

296

pogos

47, 79, 108

Not linked to a story yet.

About this file

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.