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
124
mission 3086
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mission 3088
200
mission 3089
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mission…
Read from the scan by GLM-OCR; expect the odd misread word.
Chapter 5
U-2 Operations After May 1960
U-2 Operations in Latin America...197
U-2 Support to the Bay of Pigs Invasion...197
Aerial Refueling Capability for the U-2...198
U-2 Coverage During the Cuban Missile Crisis...199
U-2s Over South America...211
U-2 Operations in Asia...211
Detachment C and the Indonesian Revolt of 1958...211
China Offshore Islands Dispute of 1958...215
U-2 Support for DDP Operations in Tibet...216
U-2Cs for Detachment C...217
U-2 Crash in Thailand...219
End of Detachment C Operations...219
Detachment G Missions Over Laos and North Vietnam...221
New Detachment on Taiwan...222
Use of Detachment H Aircraft by US Pilots...230
U-2s in India...231
Increasing Responsibilities, Inadequate Resources in Asia...233
Advanced ECM Equipment for Detachment H...237
Use of Infrared Scanner Over PRC Nuclear Plants...238
...240
The End of U-2 Overflights of Mainland China...242
Peripheral Missions by Detachment H...244
Operation SCOPE SHIELD Over North Vietnam...246
Improvements in U-2 Technology...247
Modification of U-2s for Aircraft Carrier Deployment...247
Use of Carrier-Based U-2 To Film a French Nuclear Test Site...249
A New Version of the U-2...251
Replacement of the Original U-2s With U-2Rs...253
The Final Years of the U-2...253
Support to Other Agencies...254
Overseas Deployment Exercises and Missions...255
The Phaseout of the Office of Special Activities...257
Chapter 6
The U-2's Intended Successor: Project OXCART, 1956-1968
The Evaluation of Designs for a Successor to the U-2 ... 260
Competition Between Lockheed and Convair... 267
The Selection of the Lockheed Design... 270
Efforts To Reduce the A-12's Radar Cross Section... 274
The OXCART Contract ... 277
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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.