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The U2 airplane was developed by
Clarence "Kelly" Johnson at the Lockheed "Skunk Works" in Burbank
starting Dec. 1, 1954. Project Staff was budgeted at $35 million to
develop 30 planes and sophisticated cameras developed by Edwin Land.
Johnson's old boss Jimmy Doolittle at the Shell Oil Co. provided a
special fuel that would not boil off at high altitudes, called
"Kelly's Lighter Fluid No. 1." Johnson built the first U2 plane in
88 days and the first U2 test flight took place Aug. 6, 1955. In
May 1956 the U2 air wing of 4 planes and 6 civilian pilots was
established by the CIA with Turkey providing an air base at Adana.
The first U2 flight over Russia from Adana to Bodo, Norway, a
distance of 3788 miles at 80,000 feet, took place in June 1956 and
was detected by Russian radar. The Russian spy Selmer Nielsen at the
Bodo air base gave the Russians the time and routes of the U2
flights. In the "Spirit of Camp David" Eisenhower had halted the
U2
flights in September 1959 but they were resumed April 9, 1960, to
prepare for the Paris Summit Conference planned for May 1960. The
U2 flight of Gary Powers was shot down May 1 by a SAM-2 missile.
Eisenhower learned that Powers was alive May 7, and Khrushchev
displayed the recovered parts of his U2 plane Moscow on May 11.
Eisenhower departed for Paris May 14 for the summit conference. On
May 15 Khrushchev made a threat against U2 bases and the U. S. went
on DefCon 3 alert. On May 16, Khrushchev canceled Eisenhower's Moscow visit
and walked out of the Paris summit. On Aug. 19, Powers made his
confession during his trial that he was "deeply repentant and
profoundly sorry" for his actions. He was jailed in Russia until
exchanged for Rudolf Abel in Feb. 1962. The U2 production at Skunk
Works was shut down in 1969 but was revived in 1978 to produce the
updated TR-1 model. |
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