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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. 195 …were consolidated into Detachment G at Edwards Air Force Base, California, 1Detachment G now comprised eight…
  • p. 222 …CIA's U-2 Detachment at Edwards Air Force Base on 11 October, and the CIA…
  • p. 234 …were incorporated into Detachment G at Edwards Air Force Base in California. This detachment was now…
  • p. 269 …s Detachment G at Edwards Air Force Base could deploy air- craft nd begin filming the…
  • p. 308 Chapter 6 295 CO5653421 UNCLASSIFIED these aircraft were hastily flown to Edwards Air Force Base. From…
005653421 UNCLASSIFIED
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Chapter 5
256
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In early August. Kissinger asked the Air Force to provide U-2s
to overfly the Canal, but the Air Force demurred, saying it would take
several weeks to move a U-2 detachment from Del Rio, Texas, to the
Middle East. At this point. DCI Helms told an NSC meeting that the
Agency's Detachment G at Edwards Air Force Base could deploy air-
craft nd begin filming the Suez
area witnin me weex. anu it tnu. in tact. the first U-2 arrived in
1---2nly 71 hours after receiving notification to deploy. Between
T . and 10 November 1970. Agency U-2s flew 29 missions over
the cease-fire zone as part of Project EVEN STEVEN. Most flights
used the B camera, but 12 were equipped with the new, high-resolu-
tion H camera. The EVEN STEVEN U-2s also employed a dozen
electronic-intelligence-collection packages. from System-X to
System-XXIV. After 10 November 1970. Air Force SR-71s took over
the task of photographing the cease-fire zone.6
The Middle East was again the cause of a Detachment G deploy-
ment in October 1973, when another Arab-Israeli war broke out. Two
U-2s deployed on 7
and 8 October /i, to be ready tor possinie coverage or tne conflict.
Detachment G received no such tasking, however, and the last of the
aircraft returned to California on 13 November. The 1973 war did
.4 (hid. pp. 5-6. 10-11 ITS Codeword).
Ibid.. pp. 15-20 ITS Codeword).
UNCLASSIFIED

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FOIA release, from the cia-readingroom collection. The PDF is mirrored here; the original link is above. 406 pages are in the text index: search them above, or from the library's search.