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CIA/CSI/ History Staff Monograph, The Central Intelligence Agency and Overhead Reconnaissance: The U-2 and Oxcart Programs, 16 July 2002.

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, written in 1992 and approved for release in 2011. It covers the CIA's manned overhead reconnaissance program from 1954 to 1974 and its two aircraft, the U-2 and the A-12 OXCART. It follows their development, the overflights of the Soviet Union, the downing of Francis Gary Powers in 1960, and later operations. One section is titled "U-2s, UFOs, and Operation BLUE BOOK."

  • p. 13 …Without their help a good deal of this story could never have become known. The assistance…
  • p. 44 …the CL-282; in fact, there may never have been a formal decision as such. In…
  • p. 74 …fly, Lockheed engineers had to solve problems never before encountered. Among these problems was the need…
  • p. 84 …Flight tests continued, with the U-2 ascending to alti- tudes never before attained in sustained…
  • p. 102 …put aside for further thought (which it never received), and Bissell's weather research cover re…
  • p. 138 …Then in January 1960, the commander of Detachment B, raised an important question that had never…
  • p. 147 …Peninsula, because of bad weather and, therefore, never entered Soviet airspace. A second attempt to photograph…
  • p. 159 …Six of the men on board were killed and the remaining 11 were never heard from…
  • p. 160 …Although this new Berlin crisis never became as threatening as the blockade of 1948-49, President…
  • p. 165 …The Air Force never equipped its orig- inal U-2s with the J75 engines." Detachment C…
  • p. 189 …Powers never made it past Sverdlovsk. Four and a half hours into the mission, an SA…
  • p. 208 …very good reason, and such a situation never developed, in part because satellite photography gradually began…
  • p. 210 …Since this never happened, Francis Gary Powers' flight on I May 1960 proved to be the…
  • p. 223 …Responsibility for photo- graphic coverage of Cuba remained with the Air Force; Agency pilots never flew…
  • p. 264 Sratrt.11/Qt2.1....31■1 Chapter 5 251 005653421 UNCLASSIFIED There was never another Agency…
  • p. 290 …the OXCART aircraft for its own use. never adopted the laminated vertical stabilizers.'4 THE OXCART…
  • p. 294 …Scott employed concepts never be- fore used in camera systems. These included the use of a…
  • p. 298 …As it turned out, the J58 was never used in a Navy aircraft. OSA History. chap…
  • p. 299 …This new delay was caused by leaking fuel tanks, a problem that would never be solved…
  • p. 313 …even though the SKYLARK contingency plan was never put into effect. Since U-2s continued to…
  • p. 316 …Moreover, the Soviets never operated the radars in the tracking and locktin modes, a fact that…
  • p. 326 …collector of strategic intelligence, the OXCART was never used for this purpose. Its brief deployment was…
  • p. 328 …Yet, the President never went so far as to eliminate the overflight program. As Commander in…
  • p. 333 …its speed and altitude have never been equaled. The development of this aircraft also led to…
Equipment from a WS-461L
balloon on display in Moscow,
11 October 1958
CO5653421 UNCLASSIFIED
Streret-NerreallL.
Chapter 3
146
Goodpaster on 29 July 1958 to tell the Air Force that "the project is
to be discontinued at once and every cent that has been made avail-
able as part of any project involving crossing the Iron Curtain is to be
impounded and no further expenditures are to be made."
Two days later Eisenhower followed up this order with a formal
memorandum to Secretary of Defense Neil McElroy telling him that
"there is disturbing evidence of a deterioration in the processes of
discipline and responsibility within the armed forces." He cited, in
particular, "unauthorized decisions which have apparently resulted in
certain balloons falling within the territory of the Communist Bloc"
and overflights over routes "that contravened my standing orders." 99
On 2 September 1958, there was another violation of Soviet air-
space when an unarmed Air Force EC-130 on an electronic intelligence
collection mission crossed from Turkey into Soviet Armenia and was
shot down by Soviet fighter aircraft. Six of the men on board were
killed and the remaining 11 were never heard from again, despite State
Department attempts to get the Soviet Union to reveal their fate.""
" Andrew J. Goodpaster, Memorandum for the Record. 29 July 1958, WHOSS, Alpha,
DDEL (S); Goodpaster interview (S).
" Quoted in Ambrose, Eisenhower: The President, pp. 475-476.
"US Representations to the Soviet Government on C-130 Transport Shot Down by
Soviet Fighter Aircraft," US Department of State Bulletin, 23 February 1959, pp. 262-271;
Beschloss, Mayday. p. 159.
UNCLASSIFIED

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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.