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
Sec, et NOFOAN Chapter 5 Nothing came of the proposal to resume overflights in the fall of 1961, as both the USIB and the Special Group came out against it, but, as long as U-2 photography remained clearly superior to satellite photography, the thought of obtaining U-2 coverage of the Soviet Union remained tempting. In February 1962, the USIB seriously con sidered a COMOR proposal to send a U-2 over Kamchatka to photo graph Soviet antiballistic-missile facilities but finally decided to wait for the results of an Air Force peripheral mission. The board later ac cepted DCI McCone's recommendation to seek satellite rather than U-2 coverage of the area.4 With both the CIA and the State Department strongly opposed to sending the highly vulnerable U-2 over the Soviet Union, prospects for resuming flights remained slight unless the international situation 197 worsened to such a degree that overflights would be worth the risks involved. Since this never happened, Francis Gary Powers' flight on l May 1960 proved to be the last CIA overflight of the Soviet Bloc. Yet, the U-2 remained useful, for it could operate successfully in other areas with less developed radar and air defense systems. After May 1960, the main focus of U-2 activity shifted to two new areas: Latin America, where U-2s would play an extremely important role during the early 1960s, and the Far East, where CIA U-2s were active from 1958 until 1974, when the Agency's involvement in manned re connaissance finally ended. U-2 OPERATIONS IN LATIN AMERICA U-2 Support to the Bay of Pigs Invasion During late summer 1960, the Directorate of Plans was planning a counterrevolutionary invasion of Cuba for the following year. To sup port this effort, the Agency asked the National Security Council's ' Memorandum for the Special Group from COMOR, "Illustrations of Policy Restraints on the Collection of Information through Overflight of Denied Areas during 1962," 14 December 1962, IC Staff, COMIREX records, job 33-8-1 I9A, box 1 (TS Codeword); James S. Lay, "The United States Intelligence Board, 1958- I965," (draft) CIA History Staff MS-2, 1974, p. 385 (TS Codeword). One year later Saryshagan was the topic of US Intelligence Board deliberations. In October 1963 the board asked COMOR to prepare recommendations on the need for an electronic intelligence-gathering mission against the Soviet ABM installations at Saryshagan. The proposed mission would not, however, vio late Soviet airspace; instead, the U-2 would fly over the portion of the People's Republic of China closest to Saryshagan. Lay, "USIB History," pp. 393-94 (TS Codeword). SHret -
Not linked to a story yet.
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.