Documents / FOIA release
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."
“The Advance”26 pages
CO5653421 UNCLASSIFIED rerNQ.QNRN Chapter 6 312 Initial storage arrangements for A-12s at Palmdale or, , _,--,..-,_-_:-.. :,....... - Asrl '''.11.1....11...._,_...___ .21-- OP •11111---- -,." - ''. . - r..------... _ _ ‘7„..... '4144%. ,- ,- , .v. '''..--....,,_ .., ;;:.,,..,... ...,- ,......-■INT-g007:g • S "'- ,...., . , ..."*.`4 ■11 "..- ...-..,iitil %.---- - ,,,-,,;:t. ...' - . .... - "...'Z _.,:.,:o., ....--.......-- *.. ■."°61-11r ve4 J, ■ . - 111Pir,-.\ 1.4‘ qrt • ---"" ..111.••••• POSSIBLE SUCCESSORS TO THE OXCART The OXCART was the last high-altitude reconnaissance aircraft pro- duced for the CIA, although the Office of Special Activities did briefly consider several possible successors to the OXCART during the mid-1960s. The first of these, known as Project ISINGLASS, was prepared by General Dynamics to utilize technology developed for its Convair Division's earlier FISH proposal and its new F-11 l fighter in order to create an aircraft capable of Mach 4-5 at 100,000 feet. General Dynamics completed its feasibility study in the fall of 1964, and OSA took no further action because the proposed aircraft would still be vulnerable to existing Soviet countermeasures. In 1965 a more ambitious design from McDonnell Aircraft came under consideration as Project RHEINBERRY (although some of the work seems to have come under the ISINGLASS desi g nation as well). This proposal fea- tured a rocket-powered aircraft that would be launched from a B-52 mother ship and ultimately reach speeds as high as Mach 20 and alti- tudes of up to 200,000 feet. Because buildin g this aircraft would have involved tremendous technical challen ges and correspondingly high costs, the Agency was not willing to embark on such a program at a time when the main emphasis in overhead reconnaissance had shifted from aircraft to satellites. As a result. when the OXCART program ended in the summer of 1968, no more advanced successor was wait- ing in the wings—only the veteran U-2. Secr 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.