Approved for Release: 2013/06/25
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Secret NOFORN
Chapter 3
101
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Following the success of this first mission, Bissell was eager to begin overflights of the Soviet Union. But even after the President granted his approval on 21 June, such missions could not yet take place for two reasons. First, President Eisenhower had agreed with a CIA and State Department recommendation that West German Chancellor Konrad Adenauer be informed in advance of US plans to overfly the Soviet Union from bases in Germany (in keeping with existing policies Adenauer was not informed about overflights of Eastern Europe). Second, Soviet party chief Nikita Khrushchev had invited representatives of the US Air Force to the Moscow Air Show, which opened on 23 June 1956. Led by Air Force Chief of Staff Nathan F. Twining, the delegation would be in the Soviet Union for a week, and General Twining requested that no overflights of the Soviet Union be staged until the Air Force delegation had left.²¹
Both of these restrictions on overflights of the Soviet Union were cleared up by the end of June.
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A few days later the Air Force delegation returned from Moscow, but now unfavorable weather prevented the start of operations against the Soviet Union.
While waiting for the clouds over the Soviet Union to clear, Detachment A carried out two more overflights of Eastern Europe on 2 July 1956: mission 2009 over Czechoslovakia, Hungary, and Bulgaria; and mission 2010 over East Germany, Poland, Hungary, and Romania. That afternoon Bissell and DDCI Cabell gave President Eisenhower a detailed briefing on the first U-2 overflight, which the President found “very interesting, very positive.” Eisenhower was anxious to know, however, whether radars had tracked the aircraft. Bissell replied that, although East European radars had picked up the 20 June flight, radar operators had misread the altitude as only 42,000 feet. He added that the Agency was awaiting reports on that morning’s flights to see if they, too, had been detected. Noting that the U-2
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²¹ Nathan F. Twining, *Neither Liberty nor Safety* (New York: Holt, Rinehart & Winston, 1966), pp. 259-260; *OSA History*, chap. 11, p. 27 (TS Codeword).
²² *OSA History*, chap. 11, p. 28 (TS Codeword).
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Secret
Approved for Release: 2013/06/25