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.
“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
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mission 2029
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mission 3086
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mission 3088
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mission 3089
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mission…
Read from the scan by GLM-OCR; expect the odd misread word.
## Secret NOFORN
Hiring U-2 Pilots ... 73
Pilot Training ... 75
Final Tests of the U-2 ... 76
Three Fatal Crashes in 1956 ... 79
Coordination of Collection Requirements ... 80
Preparations To Handle the Product of U-2 Missions ... 82
The Impact of the Air Force Project GENETRIX Balloons ... 84
AQUATONE Briefings for Selected Members of Congress ... 88
The U-2 Cover Story ... 89
Chapter 3
U-2 Operations in the Soviet Bloc and Middle East, 1956-1958
The Deployment of Detachment A to Lakenheath ... 94
The Move to Wiesbaden ... 95
President Eisenhower’s Attitude Toward Overflights ... 96
First Overflights of Eastern Europe ... 100
First U-2 Flights Over the Soviet Union ... 104
Soviet Protest Note ... 109
The End of the Bomber Gap ... 111
Tactical Intelligence From U-2s During the Suez Crisis ... 112
Renewed Overflights of the Soviet Union ... 122
Radar-Deceptive “Dirty Birds” ... 128
The New Detachment C ... 133
Detachment B Flights From Pakistan ... 135
The Decline of Detachment A ... 139
... 142
Declining Overflight Activity ... 143
Concerns About Soviet Countermeasures Against the U-2 ... 147
More Powerful Engines for the U-2 ... 149
Intervention in Lebanon, 1958 ... 152
British Participation in the U-2 Project ... 153
The U-2 Project at the Beginning of 1959 ... 157
# Chapter 4
The Final Overflights of the Soviet Union, 1959-1960
The U-2 and the “Missile-Gap” Debate... 159
The Last Overflight: Operation GRAND SLAM... 170
The Aftermath of the U-2 Downing... 177
The Withdrawal of the Overseas Detachments... 181
The Fate of Francis Gary Powers... 183
Changes in Overflight Procedures After May 1960... 187
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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.