Documents / Official release
This is a Secret History Staff monograph by Gregory W. Pedlow and Donald E. Welzenbach of the Central Intelligence Agency, published in 1992. It gives a history of the CIA's manned overhead reconnaissance program from 1954 to 1974, covering the development and operation of the U-2 and the A-12 OXCART aircraft. It covers overflights of the Soviet Union, the 1960 downing of Francis Gary Powers, and later operations. One section is titled "U-2s, UFOs, and Operation BLUE BOOK."
From the source:Release of 2026-06-12 This CIA History Staff document chronicles the complete history of the U-2 and OXCART (A-12) high-altitude reconnaissance aircraft programs from 1954 to 1974, detailing their development, operations over the Soviet Union and other targets worldwide, the famous downing of Francis Gary Powers in 1960, organizational reforms following that incident, and the eventual transfer of operations from CIA to Air Force control. A more redacted version of this document has been available on CIA's public website.
“Headquarters”22 pages
124 Sec, et NOf6ftN Chapter 3 surgery). JCS Chairman Adm. Arthur Radford. DCI Allen Dulles, and Richard Bissell, Eisenhower explained why he refused to allow over flights of the Soviet Union: "Everyone in the world says that, in the last six weeks, the United States has gained a place it hasn't held since World War fl. To make trips now would cost more than we would gain in form of solid information." Hoover agreed and rnoted, "If we lost a plane at this stage, it would be almost catastrophic." Tom between his desire to maintain a "correct and moral" position and his wish to know what the Soviet Union was up to. the Pres.idem finally authorized several overflights of Eastern Europe and the Soviet border, "but not the deep one," adding that the aircraft should "stay as close to the border as possible." (>I The first of these fl ights, mission 4016 on 20 November 1956, was the first overflight of Soviet territory since IO July. This mission left Adana and flew east over Iran, then reversed and flew west along the Soviet-Iranian border to Soviet Armenia. where it crossed into the Soviet Union and photographed Yerevan. An electrical malfunction then forced the pilot, Francis Gary Powers, to return to Adana. Soviet interceptor aircraft made sev.eral unsuccessful attempts to reach this U-2, and the Soviet Government sent a secret protest note to h. 6' Was ington. - On IO December. Bulgaria was the target of two U-2 missions. one (40 I 8) from Detachment B at Adana and another (2029) from Detachment A at Giebelstadt. Bulgarian fighter aircraft made lO dif ferent attempts to intercept the first mission. but the flight proceeded without difficulty.6 J The second flight came close to crashing but not through the ef forts of interceptors. The pilot of mission 2029 was Carmine Vito, who had flown the first U-2 mission over Moscow on 5 July. He was known co his colleagues as the Lemon-Drop Kid because he always carried these hard candies in the knee pocket of his flight suit. Despite •• Andrew J. Goodpaster. Memorandum of Conference with the President. ~ovember IS. 1956. WHOSS. Alpha. DDEL (TS): Ambrose. Eisenhower: The President. p. 374. •' M ission folder 40 16. 20 November 1956. OSA records. job 67-8 -972. bo)( 7 (TS Codeword). • ·' Mission folders 1019 (IO December 1956) and 4018 (10 December 1956). OSA re cords. job 67 -B-328. box 7 and job 67-B-972. box 7 (TS Codeword). _secret
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Official release, from the pursue 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.