Approved for Release: 2013/06/25
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Secret NOFORN
Chapter 5
226
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1961 PFIAB recommended the initiation of a limited number of U-2 photographic missions over the Chinese mainland. The President approved the board’s recommendation.
Because the US–Nationalist Chinese overflight program (Project TACKLE) was a joint effort, both countries participated in the approval process and also shared in the results of the missions. The USIB COMOR established the requirements for Detachment H’s overflights, which had to be approved by the NSC’s Special Group (5412 Committee) and the President. The Nationalist Chinese Government also approved all missions flown by its pilots. Under the terms of an agreement reached with the Nationalist Chinese Government, film from the overflights of the mainland would be processed in the United States, with a duplicate positive copy returned to Nationalist China within 10 days. NPIC was responsible for the initial reporting on these missions.³⁸
Project TACKLE overflights began early in 1962. Following a 5 January Special Group decision to approve three missions, a Detachment H U-2 with a Nationalist Chinese pilot flew its first mission over the PRC’s missile-testing range at Shuangchengzi on 12 January 1962. Unfortunately, because of faulty navigation or faulty maps, the aircraft was poorly positioned and obtained only oblique, rather than vertical, photography of the range. En route to and from Shuangchengzi, the U-2 overflew Fukien and Chekiang Provinces looking for suspected deployed missiles, but none could be found in the mission photography.³⁹
The second Project TACKLE mission took place on 23 February 1962, when a U-2 overflew the PRC’s nuclear weapons establishment at Lan-chou. Photography from this mission revealed that the installation was at least two years away from operational capacity. Two more missions on 13 and 26 March flew over K’un-ming and central China covering numerous airfields that had been discovered in satellite photography. The U-2 photographs showed more detail than the satellite pictures, thereby, providing additional intelligence data, particularly
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³⁸ *OSA History*, chap. 17, pp. 18-19, annex 107 (TS Codeword).
³⁹ Ibid., chap. 17, p. 45 (TS Codeword); Mission folder GRC100 (12 January 1962), OSA records, job 67-B-972, box 19 (TS Codeword). Note: The numbers for missions flown by Nationalist Chinese pilots began with GRC (Government of the Republic of China).
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Secret
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Approved for Release: 2013/06/25