21. “UFO Section of the All-Union Cosmonautics Committee”: Title: Unidentified flying objects, Source: Soviet Life, no. 2 1968, 2729, 1.
22. “The hypothesis that UFOs originate in other worlds”: Ibid.
Chapter Thirteen: Dull, Dirty, and Dangerous Requires Drones
Interviews: Ken Collins, Charlie Trapp, Colonel Slater, General Hsichun “Mike” Hua, Edward Lovick, Changti “Robin” Yeh (via written correspondence), Hervey Stockman
1. Collins knew the kind: Interview with Ken Collins.
2. simulated jungle survival: Interviews with Ken Collins, Charlie Trapp.
3. CIA pilot named Yeh Changti: Hua, Lost Black Cats, ix. 4. the Black Cats flew: Ibid., viii-x.
5. “no information was released about Yeh Changti”: Interview with General Hua.
6. “His code name was Terry Lee”: Interview with Colonel Slater. Yeh Changti’s American name is Robin Yeh (the Chinese put family names first).
7. getting hard intelligence on China’s nuclear facilities: National Photographic Interpretation Center, Mission [GRC-169], 23 August 1963, 30 pages. The designation for these missions was Operation Church Door. Images of targets photographed by the Black Cats include the Lop Nur nuclear facility, missile launch sites, airfields, ports, and industrial complexes.
8. Yeh Changti was tortured and held prisoner: Interview with General Hua; in Lost Black Cats, Hua, a former CIA Black Cat U-2 pilot, tells the tragic and amazing story of the nineteen years Changti and Chang spent as captives of Communist China, based on personal interviews. The sacrifices made by Changti and Chang have never been acknowledged by the CIA. On September 17, 1998, the CIA held a symposium called “U-2: A Revolution in Intelligence” to honor the declassification of many CIA-controlled U-2 operations and to celebrate its success. But the symposium omitted any mention of the
Black Cat U-2 pilots according to my interview with General Hua.
9. second Black Cat pilot named Major Jack Chang: Ibid., ix. To clarify, General Hua also refers to Major Jack Chang as Chang Liyi— Jack being the pilot’s American nickname and Liyi being his “first name” in Chinese, which is his family name, the reverse of Western usage.
10. dull, dirty, and dangerous: Interview with T. D. Barnes.
11. “and then head back out to sea”: Interview with Lovick. “A colleague named Mike Ash and I designed an electrical circuit into the drone’s pallet to select an antenna to be used to radiate the recovery beacon signal. If the sensor package was not recovered by an aircraft and it fell into the water, an antenna was deployed to allow radio signals to enable recovery.” If the sensor package landed upside down, Lovick and Ash had created a system which allowed the seawater to act like a switch and activate a second antenna.
12. Yuletide: Interviews with Colonel Slater, Frank Murray. 13. “with PJs nearly falling off cliffs”: Interview with Charlie Trapp. 14. flight engineer, Ray Torick: There are many different ideas
about why and how Torick died. I adhere to Colonel Slater’s view of the events. The drone’s first official test launch was on March 5, 1966, and during that flight, the drone launched successfully off the back of the mother ship while traveling at a speed of Mach 3.2. It then flew approximately 120 miles before it ran out of fuel and crashed into the sea, as was planned. A month later, a second launch sent a drone flying for 1,900 miles, at Mach 3.3, until it fell into the sea. It was on the third test launch that disaster struck and Torick died.
15. “He impulsively and emotionally decided”: Rich, Skunk Works, 267.
16. “never again allow a Francis Gary Powers situation”: Ibid. 17. “Ben, do you recognize this?” Ibid., 270.
18. dubbed Operation Aphrodite: Singer, Wired for War, 48.
19. Tesla’s pilotless boat: Tesla, “Inside the Lab-Remote Control,” PBS, http://www.pbs.org/tesla/ins/lab_remotec.html.
20. Goliath carried 132 pounds of explosives: “Rise of the Machines,” ArmyTechnology.com, May 21, 2008, http://www.armytechnology.com/features/feature1951/.
21. mother ship called Marmalade: AFSC History Staff, History of Air Force Atomic Cloud Sampling, 9.
22. Fox, was blasted “sixty feet higher: Ibid., 11.
23. Operation Sandstone: For the Air Force, maintaining a drone wing was expensive. It was also a security risk. In early 1947, that more atomic tests were being planned was a closely guarded national secret because the public was being led to believe that the United States was genuinely considering outlawing the bomb — or at least putting the United Nations in control of atomic energy. In reality, it was during this period of alleged international debate that the drone unit was again called back into action for the next test series in the Pacific. Operation Crossroads was supposed to have been a singular event, and so talk surfaced among the drone pilots. Being reactivated could only mean one thing: more nuclear tests in the pipeline. This security leak made its way up the chain of command.
24. accidentally flew through the Zebra bomb’s mushroom cloud: AFSC History Staff, History of Air Force Atomic Cloud Sampling, 21.
25. “Now pilots, not drones, would be sent”: Ibid., 23–24.
26. fear that the entire world’s atmosphere could catch on fire: Interviews with Al O’Donnell and Jim Freedman.
27. what happened to Oppenheimer sent a strong message: Interview with Al O’Donnell.
28. measurements inside the thermonuclear clouds: Now called Task Group 3.4 and operating out of Eglin Air Force Base in Florida,
these new drones were modified T-33 aircraft, as opposed to the old TF-80s used in earlier tests. The wing fell under the command of Colonel Thomas Gent, who was also in command of the 550th Guided Missile Wing of the Air Proving Ground.
29. crash-landed on a deserted island called Bogallua: AFSC History Staff, History of Air Force Atomic Cloud Sampling, 37.
30. That group included Hervey Stockman: Ibid., 82. Hervey’s name is misspelled as “Harvey.”
31. Stockman, then flew sampling missions: Ibid., 80–85. Interview with Hervey Stockman.
32. “scientists put monkeys in the cockpits”: “Conversations with Colonel Hervey S. Stockman,” edited by Ann Paden and Earl Haney (not published), from a section called “Nuclear testing program.”
33. “not serving as guinea pigs”: AFSC History Staff, History of Air Force Atomic Cloud Sampling, 66.
34. “In those days”: “Conversations with Colonel Hervey S. Stockman,” edited by Ann Paden and Earl Haney (not published), from a section called “Pacific testing ground.”
35. Jimmy P. Robinson was one of the six pilots: The details of Robinson’s story, including where I quote him, can be found in AFSC History Staff, History of Air Force Atomic Cloud Sampling, 69–75. Robinson’s name is redacted from the monograph, the words “privacy act material removed” stamped in their place. In 2009, Mark Wolverton wrote “Into the Mushroom Cloud” for Air and Space magazine and revealed the pilot’s name publicly for the first time. Robinson was posthumously awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross about a year after his death, but his family had no idea how he actually had died. Wolverton wrote that Robinson’s daughter Rebecca, “a baby when her father died, spent years petitioning the government for more information about his last mission, with only limited access.” Rebecca Robinson says most of the information about her father’s death is “still classified.”
36. Atomic-sampling pilots wore lead-lined vests: AFSC History Staff, History of Air Force Atomic Cloud Sampling, 101.
37. “It was one of the ones that was too big”: Interview with Al O’Donnell.
38. In contrast, the bomb dropped on Hiroshima: Rhodes, Dark Sun, photograph #76, “Mike over Manhattan.” Here, the Ivy Mike fireball is shown in comparison with a Nagasaki-scale atomic bomb. Mike’s stem was 20 miles in diameter and its mushroom cap only began at 50,000 feet, approximately twice as high as commercial airplanes fly. The top of the mushroom cloud extended into the troposphere and was approximately 200 miles wide.
Chapte
r Fourteen: Drama in the Desert
Interviews: Colonel Slater, Dr. Wheelon, Ken Collins, Kenneth Swanson, Frank Murray, Charlie Trapp, Frank Murray, Tony Bevacqua, Dr. Robert B. Abernethy
1. air-conditioned hunting blind: Woods, LBJ, 313. 2. “I’ll be dammed”: Brzezinski, Red Moon Rising, 175. 3. “Soon they will be dropping”: Dickson, Sputnik, 117. 4. not a cause for panic: Korda, Ike, 700.
5. “What most actually saw”: Brzezinski, Red Moon Rising, 176.
6. Johnson sat in the Oval Office with CIA director: CIA Memo, Meeting with the President, Secretary Rusk, Secretary McNamara, Mr. Bundy and DCI. Re: Surfacing the OXCART, 29 November, 1963, 1.
7. it would hold aviation records: T. D. Barnes explained, “Officially, the SR-71 Blackbird still holds the world speed record for sustained flight in an oxygen-breathing plane in horizontal flight but it is common knowledge throughout the Blackbird community that the A-12 flew higher and faster because of the sacrifices the SR-71 made to accommodate a second passenger. The reason the SR-71 holds the ‘records’ is because those of the A-12 were not certified. The A-12 Oxcart didn’t exist when the Air Force was setting records.”
8. outing the Oxcart was a terrific idea: If the public knew about Oxcart, there would no longer be a reason to have the Agency in charge of a program that needed secrecy as a cover. The Air Force knew the CIA had done all the work getting Oxcart up and running; now was the time to push the Agency aside. This echoes what happened with Curtis LeMay’s early summation of the U-2 program in 1955: “We’ll let [the CIA] develop it and then we’ll take it from them,” from Brugioni, Eyeball to Eyeball, 24.
9. they could take over Oxcart: Letter, General Bernard Schriever
to Eugene M. Zuckert, July 11, 1963, Top Secret.
10. McCone tried a different approach: CIA Memo, Meeting with the President, Re: Surfacing the OXCART, 29 November, 1963, 1. “The development of the CIA and Air Force reconnaissance planes (15 in number) would cost about $700 million, of which about $400 million have now been spent.” This figure does not include the aircraft’s “extraordinary engines,” made by Pratt and Whitney. Regarding those costs, Lockheed Skunk Works chief (from 1975–1991) Ben Rich wrote, “The CIA unhappily swallowed the enormous development costs of $600 million.”
11. the fictitious name A-11: Parangosky, The Oxcart Story, 4: “The President’s reference to the ‘A-11’ was of course deliberate. ‘A11’ had been the original design designation for the all-metal aircraft first proposed by Lockheed; subsequently it became the design designation for the Air Force YF-12A interceptor which differed from its parent mainly in that it carried a second man for launching air-to-air missiles. To preserve the distinction between the A-11 and the A-12 Security had briefed practically all participating personnel in government and industry on the impending announcement. OXCART secrecy continued in effect. There was considerable speculation about an Agency role in the A-11 development, but it was never acknowledged by the government.”
12. “The world record for aircraft speed”: Public Papers of Presidents of the United States, Lyndon B. Johnson, 1963–1964, 1:322-23.
13. the aircraft were still dripping wet: Interview with Colonel Slater.
14. “without the specific knowledge of the President”: Summary of Meeting with Secretary McNamara and Secretary Gilpatric, General Carter and Mr. McCone on 5 July 1962. DCI Records dated 6 July 1962.
15. approved the Oxcart for Operation Skylark: Carter Memorandum to Wheelon, “SKYLARK,” 22 Aug. 1964.
16. according to Ken Collins: Interview with Ken Collins.
17. specially designed J-58 turbojet engines: Interview with Dr. Robert Abernethy. Robarge, Archangel, 12–13.
18. two men working there were crushed to death: Rich, Skunk Works, 221.
19. tiny black dots began to appear: Ibid., 223, from a story told by Norm Nelson, the CIA-Lockheed Skunk Works liaison during Oxcart.
20. nearly knocking him unconscious: Interview with Ken Collins. 21. he always sat patiently with the project pilots: Ibid. 22. “Fix it,” Park said: Rich, Skunk Works, 221. This story was also
clarified for me by Ken Collins, who provided additional details.
23. “‘Get me out of here!’” Rich later recalled: Rich, Skunk Works, 227.
24. Project Kempster-Lacroix: Interview with Ed Lovick; Pedlow and Welzenbach, Central Intelligence Agency, 42.
25. the government had exploded 286 nuclear bombs: Through Operation Hardtack there were 119 aboveground tests. Testing resumed on September 15, 1961. From then through the end of 1964, there were 167 underground tests at NTS, including 4 at Nellis Air Force Range.
26. “The first jamming system was called Red Dog”: Interview with Kenneth Swanson.
27. Trapp thought it sounded interesting: Interview with Charlie Trapp.
28. General Ledford, the head of the Office of Special Activities: My portrait of General Ledford is based on my interviews with men who knew him well, including Dr. Wheelon, Colonel Slater, and Frank Murray, in addition to his U.S. Air Force biographical information.
29. it was not in Frank Murray’s character: Interview with Colonel Slater.
30. In 2005 NSA admitted: Weiner, Legacy of Ashes, 276-80.
31. Robert McNamara performing an about-face regarding Oxcart: Robarge, Archangel, 31.
32. supplying surface-to-air missile systems: Helms Memorandum to the 303 Committee, OXCART Reconnaissance of North Vietnam, with Attachment, 15 May 1967.
33. set up around Hanoi: Interview with Tony Bevacqua; photographs from Bevacqua’s personal collection.
Chapter Fifteen: The Ultimate Boys’ Club
Interviews: Ken Collins, Colonel Slater, Frank Murray, Fred White, Charlie Trapp, William “Bill” Weaver, Brigadier General Raymond L. Haupt
1. shaken from their beds: Interview with Ken Collins. A moratorium on testing meant that the Titania bomb, exploded on October 30, 1958, was the last nuclear bomb fired at the Nevada Test Site for a period of nearly three years. In August of 1961, the Russians announced they were resuming testing and conducted thirty-one nuclear tests over the next three months, including the fifty-eightmegaton Tsar Bomba, the largest bomb ever exploded. In response, Kennedy had the AEC resume testing at the Nevada Test Site; interview with Al O’Donnell.
2. The incident has never been declassified: Interview with Collins.
3. the less you knew, the better: A sentiment unanimously shared by all CIA and USAF pilots interviewed.
4. No radio, almost no TV: Interviews with Slater, Murray, Collins. 5. “like an incubus”: Helms, A Look Over My Shoulder, 309.
6. “The only sin in espionage is getting caught”: David Robarge, “Richard Helms.”
7. Helms would be recruited by the Office of Strategic Services: Helms, A Look Over My Shoulder, 31.
8. a seafood run to Westover Air Force Base: Interview with Colonel Slater.
9. MKULTRA files destroyed: The authority on this subject is John Marks, a former State Department analyst and staff assistant to the intelligence director. In June of 1977, Marks obtained access to part of seven boxes of MKULTRA, the only ones allegedly not lost and consisting mostly of financial records. In his book The Search for the
Manchurian Candidate, Marks wrote that shortly before leaving the CIA, “Helms presided over a wholesale destruction of documents and tapes — presumably to minimize information that might later be used against him,” 219.
10. front page of the New York Times: According to Colonel Slater.
11. Slater and General Ledford would be asked: No. 303 National Security Action Memorandum, June 2, 1964; Top Secret, From the Director of Central Intelligence, Memorandum for the 303 Committee, 22 March 1966.
12. “McNamara was delaying finding a mission”: Interview with Dr. Wheelon.
13. if a CIA spy plane were to get shot down: CIA Memorandum, “Reactions to a possible US Course of Action,” 17 March 1966; “OXCART Development Summary and Progress,” 1 October 1966-31 Decem
ber 1966.
14. The majority voted against deployment: Robarge, Archangel,
33.
15. Slater now wanted it reduced by nearly 30 percent: Interview with Colonel Slater.
16. Park had flown over all four corners of America: John Parangosky, deputy for technology, OSA, wrote in summation of Park’s flight: “An impressive demonstration of the OXCART capability occurred on 21 December 1966 when Lockheed test pilot Bill Park flew 10,198 statute miles in six hours. The aircraft left the test area in Nevada and flew northward over Yellowstone National Park, thence eastward to Bismarck, North Dakota, and on to Duluth, Minnesota. It then turned south and passed Atlanta en route to Tampa, Florida, then northwest to Portland, Oregon, then southwest to Nevada. Again the flight turned eastward, passing Denver and St. Louis. Turning around at Knoxville, Tennessee, it passed Memphis in the home stretch back to Nevada. This flight established a record unapproachable by any
other aircraft; it began at about the same time a typical government employee starts his work day and ended two hours before his quitting time.” Full text at Roadrunners Internationale official Web site.
17. Walt Ray was, by all accounts, a terrific pilot: Interviews with Colonel Slater, Walt Murray, Ken Collins, Roger Andersen, Charlie Trapp.
18. “flew down to Cabo San Lucas”: Interview with Ken Collins.
19. fuel gauge move suddenly: Briefing Memorandum for Acting Deputy Director for Science and Technology, Subject Loss of Oxcart A-12 Aircraft, 6 January 1967.
Area 51: An Uncensored History of America's Top Secret Military Base Page 49