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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…
Appendix B
329
005653421 UNCLASSIFIED
program when he saw how much intelligence it could gather on the
Soviet Union. Because his own interests lay more in the area of hu-
man intelligence, he left the management of the reconnaissance pro-
gram in the hands of DDCI CabeII and project director Richard
Bissell.
GARDNER, Trevor
During World War II, Gardner worked on the Manhattan Project, and
later he headed the General Tire and Rubber Company before starting
his own research and development firm, the Hycon Company, which
built aerial cameras. Gardner served as the Secretary of the Air
Force's Special Assistant for Research and Development and then as
the Assistant Secretary for Research and Development during
Eisenhower's first term of office. Gardner's concern about the danger
of a surprise attack helped lead to the establishment of the
Technological Capabilities Panel. Gardner also urged the building of
Lockheed's CL-282 aircraft.
GEARY, Leo P.
Air Force colonel (later brigadier general) who was James
Cunningham's Air Force counterpart in the U-2 program. He was in-
strumental in diverting engines from other Air Force projects for use
in the U-2, and his 10 years with the U-2 project provided a high de-
gree of continuity.
GOODPASTER, Andrew J.
An Army colonel who served as President Eisenhower's Staff
Secretary from 1954 to 1961. During this period, he was the CIA's
point of contact in the White House for arranging meetings with the
President on the subject of overhead reconnaissance. Goodpaster's
later career included service as the supreme commander of NATO and
then commandant of the US Military Academy at West Point.
HELMS, Richard M.
DCI from 1966 to 1973. During his tenure as DCI, the CIA's manned
reconnaissance program came under heavy pressure because of com-
petition from the Air Force's reconnaissance program.
JOHNSON, Clarence L. (Kelly)
One of the nation's foremost aeronautical designers, Kelly Johnson
graduated from the University of Michigan's School of Aeronautics
in 1933 and began working for the Lockheed Aircraft Corporation.
During World War II he designed the P-38 fighter, and after the war
his design successes continued with the F-104 jet fighter, the
Constellation airliner, and the CIA's two strategic reconnaissance air-
craft, the U-2 and the OXCART A-12.
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.