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.
“Hill”15 pages
236 6eeFet AJOl=OSN Chapter 5 were normal when the pilot made this report. Project managers pre sumed that the U-2 was downed by a direct hit or near miss by an SA-2 missile. 55 President Johnson ordered a standdown of overflights of the PRC. This standdown was welcomed by the Nationalist Chinese Government, which told the Taiwan Chief of Station that it wanted ··to let some time go by" before more overflights were scheduled. The Nationalists pointed out that the only remaining qualified U-2 pi lot had "disqualified" himself because of nervous tension. No new pilots could be qualified for U-2 flights before mid-August. The Nationalists then demanded faster and higher flying aircraft as well as better antimissile equipment for the planes. This request led some CIA personnel to suspect that Nationalist China had learned about Project OXCART, the successor to the U-2 that was still under going testing. Despite the Nationalists' request for better ECM equip ment, the Defense Department remained reluctant to authorize the use of the System-XIII false-angle radar jammer on Project TACKLE U-2s. The Defense Department feared that the loss of this device with its highly advanced traveling-wave tube (TWT) would enable Communist Bloc technicians to devise countermeasures and also learn how to produce the highly efficient TWT themselves. As an in centive for the Nationalist Chinese to agree to more overflights. the CIA agreed to permit them to process the U-2 film on Taiwan and to use their own photointerpreters to exploit the film along with US photointerpreters. To counter the shortage of pilots in Detachment H, DCI McCone suggested to the Special Group on 6 August 1964 that civilian CIA pilots be used to fly missions over mainland China. The group agreed that the matter should be taken up with President Johnson. On the fol lowing day, however, Presidential National Security Assistant McGeorge Bundy informed McCone that, because Secretary of State Rusk and Secretary of Defense McNamara opposed the idea. he would not take it up with the President.5~ " OS,\ History. chap. 17, pp. 53-55 (TS Codeword): Mission folder Cl 74C (7 July I 964), OSA records, job 66-8-664, box 7 (TS Codeword). Note: beginning in 1964 Nationalist Chinese mission numbers began with "C" instead of "'GRC. •• '' OSA History. chap. 17, pp. 58-59 (TS Codeword). See,et
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Official release, from the pursue 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.