Download or read book Spyplane written by Norman Polmar and published by Zenith Press. This book was released on 2001 with total page 406 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Book discusses the requirement for and the design, development, and operation of the U-2, from 1954 when the design began, to the current overflights of the Balkans and Iraq. Includes extensive discussions of U-2 overflights of hostile countries (USSR, China, North Korea, North Vietnam) and NASA's use of the U-2.

Download or read book The CIA and the U 2 Program 1954 1974 written by Gregory W. Pedlow and published by DIANE Publishing. This book was released on 1998 with total page 272 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A comprehensive & authoritative history of the CIA's manned overhead reconnaissance program (MORP), which from 1954 to 1974 developed & operated 2 extraordinary aircraft, the U-2 & the A-12 OXCART. Describes not only the program's technological & bureaucratic aspects, but also its political & international context. The MORP, along with other overhead systems that emerged from it, changed the CIA's work & structure in ways that were both revolutionary & permanent. The formation of the Directorate of S&T in the 1960s, principally to develop & direct reconnaissance programs, is the most obvious legacy of the events in this study.

Download or read book Dragon Lady Today written by Chris Pocock and published by . This book was released on 2014-08-27 with total page 102 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The remarkable Lockheed Martin U-2 high-flying spyplane celebrates its 60th birthday in 2015. But today's U-2 is a fully modernized reconnaissance aircraft, capable of serving the U.S. and its allies for many years to come. Chris Pocock has followed the Dragon Lady for 30 years. He has flown in the jet, and talked to hundreds of U-2 pilots, maintainers, managers and commanders. His previous book, "50 Years of the U-2", is the standard reference on the aircraft's history. Now he updates the story, in a richly-illustrated book with 190 charts and photos, most of them previously unpublished.

Download or read book Spy Pilot written by Francis Gary Powers (Jr.) and published by . This book was released on 2019 with total page 314 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: One of the most talked-about events of the Cold War was the downing of the American U-2 spy plane piloted by Francis Gary Powers over the Soviet Union on May 1, 1960. The event was recently depicted in the Steven Spielberg movie Bridge of Spies. Powers was captured by the KGB, subjected to a televised show trial, and imprisoned, all of which created an international incident. Soviet authorities eventually released him in exchange for captured Soviet spy Rudolf Abel. On his return to the United States, Powers was exonerated of any wrongdoing while imprisoned in Russia, yet a cloud of controversy lingered until his untimely death in 1977. Now his son, Francis Gary Powers Jr., has written this new account of his father's life based on personal files that have never been previously available. Delving into old audio tapes, the transcript of his father's debriefing by the CIA, other recently declassified documents about the U-2 program, and interviews with his contemporaries, Powers sets the record straight. The result is a fascinating piece of Cold War history. Almost sixty years after the event, this will be the definitive account of a famous Cold War incident, one proving that Francis Gary Powers acted honorably through a trying ordeal in service to his country.

Download or read book U 2 Spyplane in Action written by Larry Davis and published by . This book was released on 1988-01-01 with total page 50 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Shows and describes the characteristics of the U.S. spyplane, looks at its special features, and discusses the plane's mission

Download or read book 50 Years of the U 2 written by Chris Pocock and published by Schiffer Publishing. This book was released on 2005 with total page 448 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: When the U-2 first took off in 1955, no one involved in its top-secret project dreamt that this unique reconnaissance aircraft would still be flying today. The long story of the Dragon Lady is amazing, and complex; this book tells it all, in unprecedented detail, from the early days overflying the Soviet Union under CIA sponsorship, to the Cuban Missile Crisis, and on to the Vietnam War. The epic missions over Communist China were flown by nationalist pilots from Taiwan. How the U-2 was improved, enlarged and put back into production - twice. It led the real-time recce revolution with data links and high-tech sensors. Then it played a key role in Desert Storm, over Bosnia and Kosovo, and most recently over Afghanistan and Iraq. According to the CIA's own historian, Chris Pocock is the foremost authority on the U-2. To write this book, he flew in the aircraft, conducted 250 interviews, and analysed more than 1,000 declassified documents.

Download or read book Hunt for the U 2 written by Krzysztof Dabrowski and published by Europe@war. This book was released on 2020-03-19 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: 'The Hunt for the U-2' is a succinct operational history of the confrontations between that reconnaissance aircraft and those trying to catch it and the impact these operations had in not so distant history. Richly illustrated with photographs and full colour aircraft profiles.

Download or read book Remembering the Dragon Lady written by Gerald McIlmoyle and published by Severn House Paperbacks. This book was released on 2013 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: With heightened tensions mounting in the Cold War, President Dwight Eisenhower's request for more accurate intelligence information on the Soviet Union was the spark that ignited the U-2 project. Modified USAF bombers began overflights of the Soviet Union in 1951, but existing lower flying aircraft in the US inventory were vulnerable to anti-aircraft fire and a number of cross-border flights were shot down. To meet the challenge and improve the survivability, the Lockheed Corporation received approval for their revolutionary design of a new recon aircraft on December 9, 1954. The company began work under a heavy veil of secrecy with only 81 people, including 25 engineers. A test pilot flew the first flight on August 1, 1955, after only eight months of production, a record-breaking result for rollout of a new project, especially one this complex and innovative. A dedicated and inventive group of contractors came together to support the project with partial pressure suits for pilots, high-resolution cameras, and an engine that could carry the aircraft to altitudes of 70,000 feet and higher. Nicknamed the Dragon Lady, the U-2 has flown over Cuba, Alaska, North and South poles, Vietnam, Australia, Sweden, New Zealand, and Afghanistan. The U-2 is as relevant today as it was 50 years ago. More recently it flew over the hurricane ravaged US Gulf Coast to collect imagery of the destruction over a 90,000 square mile area. First-person memoirs of many of the men who supported the early US spy plane project are included in this book. They include pilots, maintenance specialists, a flight surgeon, photographic specialists and some family members. The US also trained U-2 pilots from Taiwan and the UK and some of their photos and memoirs are in this collection. An example of the entries in the book include one pilot's experience on a flight over the North Pole when he discovered his instrumentation was inaccurate due to the magnetic fields and realized almost too late that he was flying directly toward the Soviet Union. Maintenance technicians recalled working long hours to prepare aircraft for historic flights over Cuba. Photographic specialists remembered the difficult conditions in Vietnam, and the care required to download the exposed film of North Vietnamese targets from the cameras in the aircraft. All of these experiences were achieved under Top Secret security conditions and on a "need to know" basis.

Download or read book The Central Intelligence Agency and Overhead Reconnaissance written by Gregory Pedlow and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2016-03-15 with total page 310 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The CIA’s 2013 release of its book The Central Intelligence Agency and Overhead Reconnaissance 1954–1974 is a fascinating and important historical document. It contains a significant amount of newly declassified material with respect to the U-2 and Oxcart programs, including names of pilots; codenames and cryptonyms; locations, funding, and cover arrangements; electronic countermeasures equipment; cooperation with foreign governments; and overflights of the Soviet Union, Cuba, China, and other countries. Originally published with a Secret/No Foreign Dissemination classification, this detailed study describes not only the program’s technological and bureaucratic aspects, but also its political and international context, including the difficult choices faced by President Eisenhower in authorizing overflights of the Soviet Union and the controversy surrounding the shoot down there of U-2 pilot Francis Gary Powers in 1960. The authors discuss the origins of the U-2, its top-secret testing, its specially designed high-altitude cameras and complex life-support systems, and even the possible use of poison capsules by its pilots, if captured. They call attention to the crucial importance of the U-2 in the gathering of strategic and tactical intelligence, as well as the controversies that the program unleashed. Finally, they discuss the CIA’s development of a successor to the U-2, the Oxcart, which became the world’s most technologically advanced aircraft. For the first time, the more complete 2013 release of this historical text is available in a professionally typeset format, supplemented with higher quality photographs that will bring alive these incredible aircraft and the story of their development and use by the CIA. This edition also includes a new preface by author Gregory W. Pedlow and a foreword by Chris Pocock. Skyhorse Publishing, as well as our Arcade imprint, are proud to publish a broad range of books for readers interested in history--books about World War II, the Third Reich, Hitler and his henchmen, the JFK assassination, conspiracies, the American Civil War, the American Revolution, gladiators, Vikings, ancient Rome, medieval times, the old West, and much more. While not every title we publish becomes a New York Times bestseller or a national bestseller, we are committed to books on subjects that are sometimes overlooked and to authors whose work might not otherwise find a home.

Download or read book Operation Overflight written by Francis Gary Powers and published by Potomac Books, Inc.. This book was released on 2011-03 with total page 409 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this new edition of his classic 1970 memoir about the notorious U-2 incident, pilot Francis Gary Powers reveals the full story of what actually happened in the most sensational espionage case in Cold War history. After surviving the shoot-down of his reconnaissance plane and his capture on May 1, 1960, Powers endured sixty-one days of rigorous interrogation by the KGB, a public trial, a conviction for espionage, and the start of a ten-year sentence. After nearly two years, the U.S. government obtained his release from prison in a dramatic exchange for convicted Soviet spy Rudolph Abel. The narrative is a tremendously exciting suspense story about a man who was labeled a traitor by many of his countrymen but who emerged a Cold War hero.

Download or read book The U 2 Spyplane written by Chris Pocock and published by Schiffer Publishing. This book was released on 2000 with total page 288 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The full story of the development and early use of the U-2 has never been properly told until now. This book describes in vivid detail how the high-flying spyplane was conceived, designed, built, and deployed in record time. It explains why the CIA, and not the U.S. Air Force, controlled the project. It traces how the Iron Curtain was pried apart by the epic overflights of denied territory from 1956 to 1960. It discusses why these flights were needed, what they were looking for, and how the intelligence they returned was processed and analyzed. Readers are taken inside the Soviet Unions military machine, as it developed new strategic weapons and (eventually) the means to shoot the U-2 down. The book also explores the political dimension, telling how President Eisenhower and Premier Khrushchev each faced the challenge of the U-2 flights albeit from very different perspectives. Toward the Unknown will appeal to students of aviation and intelligence history, and to anyone wishing to learn more about a key episode in the Cold War.

Download or read book A Brotherhood of Spies written by Monte Reel and published by Anchor. This book was released on 2019-05-21 with total page 370 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A thrilling dramatic narrative of the top-secret Cold War-era spy plane operation that transformed the CIA and brought the U.S. and the Soviet Union to the brink of disaster On May 1, 1960, an American U-2 spy plane was shot down over the Soviet Union just weeks before a peace summit between the two nations. The CIA concocted a cover story for President Eisenhower to deliver, assuring him that no one could have survived a fall from that altitude. And even if pilot Francis Gary Powers had survived, he had been supplied with a poison pin with which to commit suicide. But against all odds, Powers emerged from the wreckage and was seized by the KGB. He confessed to espionage charges, revealing to the world that Eisenhower had just lied to the American people--and to the Soviet Premier. Infuriated, Nikita Khrushchev slammed the door on a rare opening in Cold War relations. In A Brotherhood of Spies, award-winning journalist Monte Reel reveals how the U-2 spy program, principally devised by four men working in secret, upended the Cold War and carved a new mission for the CIA. This secret fraternity, made up of Edwin Land, best known as the inventor of instant photography and the head of Polaroid Corporation; Kelly Johnson, a hard-charging taskmaster from Lockheed; Richard Bissell, the secretive and ambitious spymaster; and ace Air Force flyer Powers, set out to replace yesterday's fallible human spies with tomorrow's undetectable eye in the sky. Their clandestine successes and all-too-public failures make this brilliantly reported account a true-life thriller with the highest stakes and tragic repercussions.

Download or read book Above and Beyond written by Casey Sherman and published by PublicAffairs. This book was released on 2018-04-17 with total page 352 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From the authors of the bestselling The Finest Hours comes the riveting, deeply human story of President John F. Kennedy and two U-2 pilots, Rudy Anderson and Chuck Maultsby, who risked their lives to save America during the Cuban Missile Crisis During the ominous two weeks of the Cold War's terrifying peak, two things saved humanity: the strategic wisdom of John F. Kennedy and the U-2 aerial spy program. On October 27, 1962, Kennedy, strained from back pain, sleeplessness, and days of impossible tension, was briefed about a missing spy plane. Its pilot, Chuck Maultsby, was on a surveillance mission over the North Pole, but had become disoriented and steered his plane into Soviet airspace. If detected, its presence there could be considered an act of war. As the president and his advisers wrestled with this information, more bad news came: another U-2 had gone missing, this one belonging to Rudy Anderson. His mission: to photograph missile sites over Cuba. For the president, any wrong move could turn the Cold War nuclear. Above and Beyond is the intimate, gripping account of the lives of these three war heroes, brought together on a day that changed history.

Download or read book Mayday written by Michael Beschloss and published by Open Road Media. This book was released on 2016-08-16 with total page 493 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The “definitive” book on the U-2 episode and its disastrous impact on the future of the Cold War (Kirkus Reviews). On May Day 1960, Soviet forces downed a CIA spy plane flown deep into Soviet territory by Francis Gary Powers two weeks before a crucial summit. This forced President Dwight Eisenhower to decide whether, in an effort to save the meeting, to admit to Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev—and the world—that he had secretly ordered Powers’s flight, or to claim that the CIA could take such a significant step without his approval. In rich and fascinating detail, Mayday explores the years of U-2 flights, which Eisenhower deemed “an act of war,” the US government’s misconceived attempt to cover up the true purpose of the flight, Khrushchev’s dramatic revelation that Powers was alive and in Soviet custody, and the show trial that sentenced the pilot to prison and hard labor. From a U-2’s cramped cockpit to tense meetings in the Oval Office, the Kremlin, Camp David, CIA headquarters, the Élysée Palace, and Number Ten Downing Street, historian Michael Beschloss draws on previously unavailable CIA documents, diaries, and letters, as well as the recollections of Eisenhower’s aides, to reveal the full high-stakes drama and bring to life its key figures, which also include Richard Nixon, Allen Dulles, and Charles de Gaulle. An impressive work of scholarship with the dramatic pacing a spy thriller, Mayday “may be one of the best stories yet written about just how those grand men of diplomacy and intrigue conducted our business” (Time).

Download or read book Black Magic written by Michael D. O'Leary and published by . This book was released on 1989 with total page 150 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Bogen beskriver Blackbird og U-2 flyenes udvikling og operationer.

Download or read book The U 2 Affair written by David Wise and published by . This book was released on 1962 with total page 312 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Traces the background and international ramifications of the 1960 U-2 fiasco.

Download or read book We Were Never There written by Kevin Wright and published by Europe@War. This book was released on 2021-09-30 with total page 80 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book examines early CIA U-2 operations looking at the missions flown and the sensors carried and describes how the imagery and electronic intelligence captured produced thousands of images and tape recordings that were used to produce high quality intelligence on the USSR's most secret military and scientific activities.