Documents / FOIA release

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. 18 …Leghorn persuaded his superiors to submit his suggestion to the . Pentagon for funding. He had not…
  • p. 20 …Meanwhile Leghorn, frustrated by the rejection of his original concept, had transferred to the Pentagon in…
  • p. 22 …become the assistant director of Lockheed's Advanced Development Program, was in the Pentagon on business…
  • p. 24 …for the construction and maintenance of 30 aircraft to a group of senior Pentagon officials that…
  • p. 26 …He had been present at Kelly Johnson's presentation on the CL-282 at the Pentagon…
  • p. 27 …with Strong in the Pentagon on 12 May 1954. six days before the Wright Air Development…
  • p. 52 …Late on the morning of 2 December 1954, Dulles told Bissell to go to the Pentagon…
  • p. 91 …1-le then briefed a high-level Pentagon panel that included the Secretary of the Air…
  • p. 92 …After a half hour passed, the base commander called the Pentagon to ask where the crippled…
CO 5653421 UNCLASSIFIED
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One reason why
the steady increase in
evidenced by its success in
along
activirY
overflights were stopped was
ability to track and engage U-2s, as
owning five U-2s. By 1968
were keeping a close watch on
and actively tracked U-2s as soon as
they became airborne. me u-hs then had to face a growing PRC air
defense system that not only consisted of SA-2 missiles but also the
r"----1fast and high-flying MiG-21. MiG-21 pilots had become
adept at the power-zoom technique and w re threatening almost every
U-2 mission. The risks to U-2s now seemed too great.°
The decision to end Asian overflights was also rooted in the
Johnson administration's change in its whole approach to the war in
Indochina in the spring of 1968. On 31 March 1968, the President
limited the bombing of North Vietnam in order to improve the
chances for peace talks. The end of flights over
T-lwas viewed as another way to improve me peace process.
---"--9ereeat„
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.