1960 U-2 incident

The 1960 U-2 incident was precipitated during the Cold War on 1 May 1960, during the presidency of Dwight Eisenhower and during the leadership of Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev, when a United States U-2 spy plane was shot down over the airspace of the Soviet Union.

The United States government at first denied the plane's purpose and mission, but then was forced to admit its role as a covert surveillance aircraft when the Soviet government produced its intact remains and surviving pilot, Francis Gary Powers, as well as photos of military bases in Russia taken by Powers. Coming roughly two weeks before the scheduled opening of an East–West summit in Paris, the incident was a great embarrassment to the United States and prompted a marked deterioration in its relations with the Soviet Union. Powers was convicted of espionage and sentenced to three years of imprisonment plus seven years of hard labor, but he was released on 10 February 1962 during a prisoner-exchange with Soviet officer Rudolf Abel.

Background
In July 1957, U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower requested permission from Pakistan's Prime Minister Huseyn Suhrawardy for the U.S. to establish a secret intelligence facility in Pakistan and for the U-2 spyplane to fly from Pakistan. The U-2 flew at altitudes that could not be reached by Soviet fighter jets of the era; it was believed to be beyond the reach of Soviet missiles as well. A facility established in Badaber (Peshawar Air Station), 10 mi from Peshawar, was a cover for a major communications intercept operation run by the United States National Security Agency (NSA). Badaber was an excellent location because of its proximity to Soviet central Asia. This enabled the monitoring of missile test sites, key infrastructure and communications. The U-2 "spy-in-the-sky" was allowed to use the Pakistan Air Force portion of Peshawar Airport to gain vital photo intelligence in an era before satellite observation.

President Eisenhower did not want to fly American U-2 pilots over the Soviet Union because he felt that if one of these pilots were to be shot down or captured that it could be seen as an act of aggression. At a time like the Cold War any act of aggression could spark the start of open conflict between the two countries. In order to ease the burden of flying Americans into Soviet airspace the idea developed to have British Pilots from the Royal Air Force fly these missions in place of the American Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) pilots. The British pilots allowed president Eisenhower to be able to use the U-2 plane to see what the Soviet Union was hiding, while still being able to deny any affiliation if a mission became compromised. After the success of the first two British pilots and because of pressure to determine a more accurate number of Soviet intercontinental ballistic missiles, president Eisenhower allowed the flying of two more missions before the Four Power Paris Summit that was scheduled for 16 May. The difference this time was that the final two missions before the summit were to be flown by American pilots.

On 9 April 1960, a U-2C spyplane of the special CIA unit "10-10," piloted by Bob Ericson, crossed the southern national boundary of the Soviet Union in the area of Pamir Mountains and flew over four Soviet top secret military objects: the Semipalatinsk Test Site, the Dolon Air Base where Tu-95 strategic bombers were stationed, the Surface-to-Air Missile (SAM) test site of the Soviet Air Defence Forces near Saryshagan, and the Tyuratam missile range (Baikonur Cosmodrome).

The plane was detected by the Soviet Air Defense Forces when it had flown more than 250 km over the Soviet national boundary and avoided several attempts at interception by a MiG-19 and a Su-9 during the flight. The U-2 left Soviet air space and landed at an Iranian airstrip at Zahedan. It was clear that the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency had successfully performed an extraordinary intelligence operation. The next flight of the U-2 spyplane from Peshawar airport was planned for late April.

The event
On 28 April, a U.S. Lockheed U-2C spy plane, Article 358, was ferried from Incirlik Air Base in Turkey to the US base at Peshawar airport by pilot Glen Dunaway. Fuel for the aircraft had been ferried to Peshawar the previous day in a US Air Force C-124 transport. A US Air Force C-130 followed, carrying the ground crew, mission pilot Francis Gary Powers, and the back up pilot, Bob Ericson. On the morning of 29 April, the crew in Badaber was informed that the mission had been delayed one day. As a result, Bob Ericson flew Article 358 back to Incirlik and John Shinn ferried another U-2C, Article 360, from Incirlik to Peshawar. On 30 April, the mission was delayed one day further because of bad weather over the Soviet Union.

The weather improved and on 1 May, fifteen days before the scheduled opening of an East–West summit conference in Paris, Captain Francis Gary Powers, flying Article 360, 56–6693 left the US base in Peshawar on a mission with the operations code word GRAND SLAM to overfly the Soviet Union, photographing targets including the ICBM sites at the Baikonur Cosmodrome and Plesetsk Cosmodrome, then land at Bodø in Norway. At the time, the USSR had six ICBM launch pads, two at Baikonur and four at Plesetsk. Mayak, then named Chelyabinsk-65, an important industrial center of plutonium processing, was another of the targets that Powers was to photograph. A close study of Powers's account of the flight shows that one of the last targets he overflew, before being shot down, was the Chelyabinsk-65 plutonium production facility.

All units of the Soviet Air Defence Forces in the Central Asia, Kazakhstan, Siberia, Ural, and later in the U.S.S.R. European Region and Extreme North were on red alert, and the U-2 flight was expected. Soon after the plane was detected, Lieutenant General of the Air Force Yevgeniy Savitskiy ordered the air-unit commanders "to attack the violator by all alert flights located in the area of foreign plane's course, and to ram if necessary".

Because of the U-2's extreme operating altitude, Soviet attempts to intercept the plane using fighter aircraft failed. The U-2's course was out of range of several of the nearest SAM sites, and one SAM site even failed to engage the aircraft since it was not on duty that day. The U-2 was eventually brought down near Kusulino, Ural Region, by the first of three SA-2 Guideline (S-75 Dvina) surface-to-air missiles fired by a battery commanded by Mikhail Voronov. The SA-2 site had been previously identified by the CIA, using photos taken during Vice President Richard Nixon's visit to Sverdlovsk the previous summer.

Powers bailed out but neglected to disconnect his oxygen hose first and struggled with it until it broke, enabling him to separate from the aircraft. Powers was captured soon after parachuting safely down onto Russian soil. Powers carried with him a modified silver dollar which contained a lethal, shellfish-derived saxitoxin-tipped needle, but he did not use it.

The SAM command center was unaware that the plane was destroyed for more than 30 minutes. One of the Soviet MiG-19 fighters pursuing Powers, piloted by Sergei Safronov, was also destroyed in the missile salvo. The MiGs' IFF transponders were not yet switched to the new May codes because of the 1 May holiday.

American cover-up and exposure


Four days after Powers disappeared, NASA issued a very detailed press release noting that an aircraft had "gone missing" north of Turkey. The press release speculated that the pilot might have fallen unconscious while the autopilot was still engaged, even falsely claiming that "the pilot reported over the emergency frequency that he was experiencing oxygen difficulties." To bolster this, a U-2 plane was quickly painted in NASA colors and shown to the media. Under the impression that the pilot had died and that the plane had been destroyed, the Americans decided to use the NASA cover up plan.

The Americans were wrong and Nikita Khrushchev used the American mistake to embarrass president Eisenhower and his administration. After Nikita Khrushchev found out about the cover story that the Americans released, he developed a political trap for Eisenhower. His plan began with the release of information to the world that a spy plane had been shot down in Soviet territory, but he did not reveal that the pilot of this plane had also been found and that he was alive. With the information that Nikita Khrushchev released, the Americans believed that they would be able to continue with their cover story that the crashed plane was a weather research aircraft and not a military spy plane. The cover up said that the pilot of the U-2 weather plane had radioed in that he was experiencing oxygen difficulties while flying over Turkey. From there they claimed that the plane could have continued on its path because of auto-pilot,and that this could be the plane that crashed in the Soviet Union. The final attempt to make the cover story seem as real as possible resulted in the grounding of all U-2 planes for mandatory inspection of oxygen systems in order to make sure that no other weather missions would have the same result as the one that was lost and possibly crashed in the Soviet Union.

On 7 May, Khrushchev sprang his trap and announced: ""I must tell you a secret. When I made my first report I deliberately did not say that the pilot was alive and well... and now just look how many silly things the Americans have said.""

As the trap began to come together, it became clear that Gary Powers was alive and that he had told his mission to the Soviets. Also, because of the release of some photographs of the plane, there was evidence that most of the covert U-2 technologies had survived the crash. From this Nikita Khrushchev was able to openly embarrass the Eisenhower administration because he had revealed the lie of their attempted cover up.

Today a large part of the wreck as well as many items from Powers's survival pack are on display at the Central Armed Forces Museum in Moscow. A small piece of the plane was returned to the United States and is on display at the National Cryptologic Museum.

Contemporary reactions to the U-2 incident and effect on the Four Powers Summit
The Summit was attended by then President of the United States Dwight D. Eisenhower, Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev, French President Charles de Gaulle, and Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, Harold Macmillan. It was the first conference to be attended by both Soviet and western leaders in five years. However, prospects for constructive dialogue were dashed by the explosive controversy surrounding the flight of the secret spy American U2 reconnaissance plane over Soviet territory.

Although the Four Powers Summit was the first meeting between Western and Soviet leaders in five years when it was held, the mood was optimistic that there could be an easing of tensions between the Soviet Union and the United States. In an effort to present a less hostile, more cordial Soviet Union Khrushchev publicly advocated a policy of "peaceful coexistence with the United States. The May Day celebrations on 1 May of that year were marked by this newfound cooperative spirit. Absent were the militarized symbols of previous parades, such as artillery and armor. Instead there were children, white doves, and athletes. But the reaction of the Soviet government to the spy plane incident and the response from the United States doomed any potential meaningful peace agreement.

In the days directly leading up to the conference tensions increased dramatically between the United States and the Soviet Union over the U2 Spy plane incident. At this point in the negotiations, the hardliners of the Soviet government were applying heavy pressure to Khrushchev. In the weeks leading up to the Summit there was a revitalization of anti-American sentiment within the Kremlin. Indeed, all in the days leading up to the planned Summit, the Soviets blocked a planned trip to Washington D.C. of a Soviet air Marshal, invited Chinese Communist leader Mao Tse-tung to Moscow, and launched an anti-American press campaign designed to critique "American aggression." At this time the East and West were divided about how to move forward in Berlin, and the American press characterized Khrushchev's decision to emphasize the U-2 incident at the Summit as an attempt to gain leverage on this issue.

The Summit itself did not last long, with talks only beginning on 15 May and ending on 16 May. Both Eisenhower and Khrushchev gave statements on the 16th. Khrushchev blasted the United States on the U2 plane incident. He pointed out that the policy of secret spying is one of mistrust and the incident had doomed the Summit before it even began. He expected the United States and Eisenhower to condemn the spying and pledge to end further reconnaissance missions.

At the summit, after Khrushchev had blown Eisenhower's cover, Eisenhower did not deny that the plane had been spying on Soviet military installations but contended that the action was not aggressive but defensive. He argued that the current state of international relations was not one in which peaceful coexistence was an already established fact. The policy of the United States towards the Soviet Union at that time was defensive and cautionary. Eisenhower also made the point that the dialogue Four Powers Summit was the type of international negotiation that could lead to a relationship between the United States and the Soviet Union where there would be no need to spy on each other. Eisenhower also laid out a plan for an international agreement that authorized the U.N. to "inspect" any nations willing to submit to its authority. The U.N. would inspect the countries for signs of increased militarization and aggressive action. He said the United States would be more than willing to submit to the U.N. for such an inspection and hoped to circumvent the spying controversy with this alternative international surveillance agreement.

The meeting during which both parties made their statements lasted just over three hours. During this time Khrushchev rescinded an invitation he had earlier given to Eisenhower to visit the Soviet Union.

According to Walter Cronkite, Khrushchev would go on to say that this incident was the beginning of his decline in power as party chairman, perhaps because he seemed unable to negotiate the international arena and the communist hardliners at home. The collapse of the Summit also saw an increased tension between the Soviets and the Americans in the years to come. After this debacle the arms race accelerated and any considerations for negotiations were dashed for the immediate future. The Soviet Union apparently also decided to increase agitation against the United States on a worldwide scale. From Latin America (where the Cuban Missile Crisis would happen in less than two and a half years) to Africa to Asia Cold War tensions increased on the ground.

Consequences of the failed Summit
As a result of the spy plane incident and the attempted cover up the Four Power Paris Summit did not occur. The Summit between Dwight Eisenhower, Nikita Khrushchev, Harold Macmillan and Charles de Gaulle was to be an event that could have greatly helped to bring a sooner end to the cold war. At the beginning of the talks on 16 May, there was still hope that the two sides could come together even after the events that took place earlier in May, but Eisenhower refused to apologize and Khrushchev left the summit one day after it had began. Some people said that Khrushchev had overreacted to the event in an attempt to strengthen his own position and for that he was the one to blame for the collapse of the Four Power Paris Summit.

Before the U-2 incident Khrushchev and Eisenhower had been getting along well and the Summit was going to be an opportunity for the two sides to come together. Also, Eisenhower had been looking forward to a visit to the Soviet Union and was very upset when his invitation was retracted. The two sides were going to discuss topics such as nuclear arms reduction and also how to deal with increasing tensions surrounding Berlin. According to Eisenhower, had it not been for the U-2 incident the summit and his visit to the Soviet Union could have greatly helped Soviet and American relations.

The Soviet Union convened a meeting of the United Nations Security Council on 23 May to tell their side of the story. The meetings continued for four days with other allegations of spying being exchanged, as well as recriminations over the Paris Summit, and a US offer of an "open skies" proposal to allow reciprocal flights over one another's territory,  at the end of which the Soviet Union overwhelmingly lost a vote on a concise resolution which would have condemned the incursions and requested the US to prevent their recurrence.

Upon his capture Gary Powers told his Soviet captors what his mission had been and why he had been in Soviet airspace. He did this because of orders that he had received before he went on his mission. Powers pleaded guilty and was convicted of espionage on 19 August and sentenced to three years imprisonment and seven years of hard labor. He served one year and nine months of the sentence before being exchanged for Rudolf Abel on 10 February 1962. The exchange occurred on the Glienicke Bridge connecting Potsdam, East Germany, to West Berlin.

The incident showed that even high-altitude aircraft were vulnerable to missiles. The United States emphasized high-speed, low-level flights for its bombers and began developing the supersonic F-111. The Corona spy satellite project was accelerated. The CIA also accelerated the development of the Lockheed A-12 OXCART supersonic spyplane that first flew in 1962 and later began developing the Lockheed D-21 unmanned drone.

The incident severely compromised Pakistan's security and worsened relations between it and the United States. As an attempt to put up a bold front, General Khalid Mahmud Arif of the Pakistan Army, while commenting on the incident, stated that "Pakistan felt deceived because the US had kept her in the dark about such clandestine spy operations launched from Pakistan's territory." The communications wing at Badaber was formally closed down on 7 January 1970. Further, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee held a lengthy inquiry into the U-2 incident.

Later versions
The original consensus about the cause of the U-2 incident was that the spy plane had been shot down by one of a salvo of fourteen Soviet SA-2 missiles. This story was originated by Oleg Penkovsky, a GRU agent who spied for MI6. In 2010, CIA documents were released indicating that "top US officials never believed Powers's account of his fateful flight because it appeared to be directly contradicted by a report from the National Security Agency" which alleged that the U-2 had descended from 65,000 to 34,000 feet before changing course and disappearing from radar. One contemporary reading of the NSA's story is that they mistakenly tracked the descent of a MiG-19 piloted by Sr. Lt. Sergei Safronov.

Igor Mentyukov
In 1996, Soviet pilot Captain Igor Mentyukov claimed that, at 65,000 feet (19,800 meters) altitude, under orders to ram the intruder, he had caught the U-2 in the slipstream of his unarmed Sukhoi Su-9, causing the U-2 to flip over and break its wings. The salvo of rockets had indeed scored a hit, downing a pursuing MiG-19, not the U-2. Mentyukov said that if a rocket had hit the U-2, its pilot would not have lived.

Though the normal Su-9 service ceiling was 55,000 feet (16,760 meters), Mentyukov's aircraft had been modified to achieve higher altitudes, having its weapons removed. With no weapons, the only attack option open to him was aerial ramming. Mentyukov asserted that Soviet generals concealed these facts to avoid challenging Nikita Khrushchev's faith in the efficacy of Soviet air defenses.

Sergei Khrushchev
In 2000, Sergei Khrushchev wrote about the experience of his father, Nikita Khrushchev, in the incident. He described how Mentyukov attempted to intercept the U-2, but failed to gain visual contact. Major Mikhail Voronov, in control of a battery of anti-aircraft missiles, fired three SA-2s at the radar contact but only one ignited. It quickly rose toward the target and exploded in the air behind the U-2 but near enough to violently shake the aircraft, tearing off its long wings. At a lower altitude, Powers climbed out of the falling fuselage and parachuted to the ground. Uncertainty about the initial shootdown success resulted in thirteen further anti-aircraft missiles being fired by neighboring batteries, but the later rockets only hit a pursuing MiG-19 piloted by Sr. Lt. Sergei Safronov, mortally wounding him. This account of the events that occurred during the mission match the details that were given to the CIA from Gary Powers. According to Gary Powers, a missile exploded behind him and after this occurred his U-2 began to nosedive. It is at this point that Gary Powers began to make all of the preparations to eject. Gary Powers landed safely and tried to intermingle himself within the Russian countryside until he could get help. His attempts to do this failed and he was captured. Sergei Safronov was posthumously awarded the Order of the Red Banner.