Documents / FOIA release

/specialCollection/MissileGap/1992/1992-04-01.pdf

Central Intelligence Agency · 406 pages · text from the file's own layer

This is a CIA History Staff monograph by Gregory W. Pedlow and Donald E. Welzenbach, published in Washington in 1992 and approved for release in 2011. It covers the CIA's manned overhead reconnaissance program from 1954 to 1974, which developed and flew the U-2 and the A-12 OXCART. It traces the U-2's development, the overflights of the Soviet Union, the downing of Francis Gary Powers on 1 May 1960, and later operations. One section is titled U-2s, UFOs, and Operation BLUE BOOK.

  • p. 24 …Instead of a conventional landing gear, Johnson proposed using two skis and a reinforced belly rib…
  • p. 25 …a perceived shortcoming of the Lockheed design."' Another factor in the rejection of Kelly Johnson's…
  • p. 26 …interview by Donald E. Welzenbach, Corona del Mar. California. 20 May 1985 (S). Johnson, "Log for…
  • p. 27 …Gardner described Kelly Johnson's proposal and showed the drawings to Strong. After this meeting. Strong…
  • p. 30 …To make Kelly Johnson's revolutionary design a reality, one additional source of support was necessary…
  • p. 42 …When James Killian asked Land to head Project Three, Land had to make a major decision…
  • p. 48 …do the job in Johnson's airplane. And further, 1 overlaid a curve showing that with…
  • p. 57 …demanding, and Kelly Johnson agreed that such a move would save a lot of money. Lockheed…
  • p. 58 …a week after he had been authorized to begin the project, Kelly Johnson wrote a 23…
  • p. 69 …project staff) flew LIZ with Kelly Johnson in a small Beechcraft plane piloted by eed's…
  • p. 72 …This responsibility has placed a heavy burden on the Office of Security for establishing procedures to…
  • p. 79 …Batlin suggested the method used by Nazi war criminal Hermann Goering, a thin glass ampule containing…
  • p. 81 …Kelly Johnson used a "wet-wing" design for the U-2, which meant that fuel was…
  • p. 89 …Airspeed was such a critical factor that Kelly Johnson added a vernier adjustment to the throttle…
  • p. 162 …By late 1957, Johnson agreed that something had to be done. After a series of tests…
  • p. 276 RN Chapter 6 263 Johnson, "Archangel log," 17-24 CO5653421 UNCLASSIFIED Lockheed design for a hydrogen…
  • p. 324 …OXCART did win a temporary reprieve in late November 1967. The Johnson administration decided to keep…
Pilot undergoing prebreathing
****.ttoece<
CO5653421 UNCLASSIFIED
Chapter 2
65
To prevent pilots from becoming dessicated during the long
missions—a condition aggravated by their having to breathe pure
oxygen—provision was made for them to drink sweetened water. This
was accomplished by providing a small self-sealing hole in the face
mask through which the pilot could push a strawlike tube attached to
the water supply. Project personnel also pioneered in the development
of ready-to-eat foods in squeezable containers. These were primarily
bacon- or cheese-flavored mixtures that the pilot could squeeze into
his mouth using the self-sealing hole in the face mask. Despite all
these precautions, U-2 pilots normally lost 3 to 6 pounds of body
weight during an eight-hour mission.'
Food and water were not the only items provided to pilots on
overflight missions: they also received a suicide pill. During the early
1950s, tales of Soviet secret police torture of captured foreign agents
Ell 129581.6fillt1M0<25Yrs
(S1
Information supplied by James Cunningham and former U-2 pilots74
to
7:h \7
y
1
1986.
I Donald E. We zen ac May
UNCLASSIFIED

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 under it. 406 pages are in the text index: search them above, or from the library's search.