La CIA et l'avion espion U-2

Radar Tracking and Flying Saucer Sightings

The high-altitude training flights made by the CIA pilots permitted an assessment of radar's ability to detect the U-2. Edwin Land's support of the CL-282 design, as well as Eisenhower's approval of the program, was based on the belief that Soviet radar could not detect an airplane flying at more than 70,000 feet. The logic was that Soviet radar was based on U.S. technology supplied during World War II. Because U.S. radar had difficulty spotting targets at more than 40,000 feet, it was assumed that Soviet radar would have similar shortcomings.

This belief seemed to be confirmed by a 1952 study of Soviet World War II radar, as well as tests in 1955 that used U.S. radar. As a result, it was believed within the CIA that the best the Soviets could hope to do was pick up the aircraft sporadically. They would not be able to track the aircraft, direct fighters against it, or even be sure what was going on. The training flights over the United States also supported the theory that the U-2 was hard to detect on radar. On each flight, the aircraft was spotted only one or two times.

Based on this, the CIA estimated that it would take the Soviets a year or two before they could develop a radar network able to track the U-2 with sufficient precision to allow them to lodge a diplomatic protest. It was assumed that with detailed supporting evidence, any Soviet protest would generate sufficient political pressure to force the United States to halt the overflights. As a result, it was expected that the U-2's operational lifetime would be limited. Until the Soviets did have such a radar network, however, the U-2 would have free run.

Although the radar data from the training overflights indicated that the U-2 was nearly "invisible" to radar, there were visual sightings of the aircraft at altitude. Most of these came from airliner pilots and usually occurred in the early evening on flights going east to west. One of the most heavily traveled air routes, Chicago to Los Angeles, passes close to Las Vegas and the ranch. The piston-engine airliners of the mid-1950s, such as the DC-3, DC-6, and Constellation, flew at 20,000 feet. At twilight, a low-flying airliner would be in darkness whereas a U-2 at 70,000 feet would still be illuminated by the sun. Its bare metal wings reflected the sunlight, and it appeared as a fast-moving, fiery object far higher than the airliner and many miles distant.

Most airliner pilots were ex-military pilots, and they knew of no aircraft that flew higher than 45,000 feet. Because the object was obviously much higher than that, they assumed that it could only be a flying saucer. The pilots would report the sighting to air-traffic controllers. Under ideal conditions, it was also possible to spot a U-2 in full daylight from the air and even from the ground. The aircraft would appear as a flash or glint. Ground observers and airline pilots wrote letters reporting the sightings to Project Blue Book, the air force investigation unit.

Blue Book staff members who had been briefed on the U-2 established procedures to handle such reports. If a sighting report came in that might have been caused by a U-2, the project staff would be contacted with the time, date, and location of the sighting. The staff would then have to check the flight logs. This was a laborious process, because an individual route flown by a U-2 would have to be matched with the location and other details of the sighting. With the training and test operations underway, there were numerous flight logs to go through, which involved considerable work for the project staff.

Once a match was found, Blue Book had a problem. They knew what had caused the sighting, but it was a closely guarded secret. Rather then tell a witness that he had seen a secret ultra-high-flying airplane, the sighting was explained away as some natural phenomenon, such as ice crystals or temperature inversions. The exact number of flying saucer sightings caused by U-2s is unknown. Many years later, Cunningham made an off-the-cuff comment: "Hell, they were half of them." This referred to the reports that Blue Book sent to the project staff as possible U-2 sightings rather than the more than 13,000 total sightings reported.

I asked Friend whether the project had ever received a sighting which he recognized as caused by a U-2 (or other secret aircraft). He said, to his recollection, no.

Almost the first words he said were that it is "absolutely not true" that he or his Blue Book team were covering up spy flights as alleged by Haines. He found the whole idea laughable, and he knew Blue Book did not receive more reports from pilots and air traffic controllers after the U-2 began flying.

nablator a écrit:
Selon l'article de Gerald K. Haines (historien du NRO [1]) CIA's Role in the Study of UFOs, 1947-90 : A Die-Hard Issue [2] les rapports d'ovnis par les pilotes civils et les contrôleurs aériens auraient beaucoup augmenté depuis le début des vols de U-2 [3], et le nombre de cas de Blue Book qui s'expliqueraient par des vols d'avions espions à la fin des années 50 et durant les années 60, s'élèverait à plus de la moitié [4]. Cette affirmation a été beaucoup commentée, mais il n'en existe pas d'exégèse définitive à ma connaissance. Quelle est sa source, sa validité, comment s'explique-t-elle ?

Gilles F. a écrit:Il me semble que j'avais déjà lu aussi (où ? Peebles aussi ?)

On pourrait le trouver où ?

Bob Rekin a écrit:L'argument "Les U2 expliquent la moitié des cas d'OVNI aux Etats-Unis a até repris dans le documentaire sur la zone 51 qui a été multi diffusé sur Direct 8
https://ufo-scepticisme.forumactif.com/t3004p30-emissions-tele-en-pagaille-sur-les-ovni#52119

The U-2 part of the program was very interesting but added very little to what was already known about the testing that was involved. They repeated the story about U-2 flights being mistaken for UFOs. I am sure that the U-2 was reported as a UFO on occasion but it probably was not very often as claimed. They simply accepted the CIA’s history about U-2s written by Gregory Pedlow and Donald Welzenbach, where the claim was first made (Haines would later site this history in his article on the subject). It really is an anecdote and it would be interesting to see how many UFO reports made were actually U-2/Oxcart flights. I wonder how hard it would be to acquire a catalogue of all the U-2 flights in the 1950s?

nablator a écrit:Il faut que je re-voie le reportage. C'était accepté sans discussion ni éclaircissement si je me rappelle bien.

High-altitude testing of the U-2 soon led to an unexpected side effect--a tremendous increase in reports of unidentified flying objects (UFOs). In the mid-1950s, most commercial airliners flew at altitudes between 10,000 and 20,000 feet and military aircraft like the B-47s operated at altitudes below 40,000 feet. Consequently, once U-2s started flying at altitudes above 60,000 feet, air- traffic controllers began receiving increasing numbers of UFO reports.

Such reports were most prevalent in the early evening hours from pilots of airliners flying from east to west. When the sun dropped below the horizon of an airliner flying at 20,000 feet, the plane was in darkness. But, if a U-2 was airborne in the vicinity of the airliner at the same time, its horizon from an altitude of 60,000 feet was considerably more distant, and, being so high in the sky, its silver wings would catch and reflect the rays of the sun and appear to the airliner pilot, 40,000 feet below, to be fiery objects. Even during daylight hours, the silver bodies of the high- flying U-2s could catch the sun and cause reflections or glints that could be seen at lower altitudes and even on the ground. At this time, no one believed manned flight was possible above 60,000 feet, so no one expected to see an object so high in the sky.

Not only did the airline pilots report their sightings to air-traffic controllers, but they and ground- based observers also wrote letters to the Air Force unit at Wright Air Development Command in Dayton charged with investigating such phenomena. This, in turn, led to the Air Force's Operation BLUE BOOK. Based at Wright-Patterson, the operation collected all reports of UFO sightings. Air Force investigators then attempted to explain such sightings by linking them to natural phenomena. BLUE BOOK investigators regularly called on the [Central Intelligence] Agency's Project staff in Washington to check reported UFO sightings against U-2 flight logs. This enable the investigators to eliminate the majority of the UFO reports, although they could not reveal to the letter writers the true cause of the UFO sightings. U-2 and later OXCART flights accounted for more than one-half of all UFO reports during the late 1950s and most of the 1960s. [49]

[49] Information supplied by James Cunningham to Donald E. Welzenbach (U).

By late 1957, Johnson agreed that something had to be done. After a series of tests over Edwards AFB, Lockheed began coating the U-2s with a standard blue-black military specificationon paint on top and a lighter cloud-blue paint below. Subsequent tests revealed that the U-2s were less conspicuous when painted over with a matte-finish blue-black color, which helped them blend with the dark canopy of space.

Jeansériel a écrit:A-t-on les infos permettant d'affirmer ou d'infirmer cette hypothèse?

Jeansériel a écrit:
A-t-on les infos permettant d'affirmer ou d'infirmer cette hypothèse?

PhD Smith a écrit:Le documentaire qu'Arte avait diffusé sur la zone 51 indiquait que les observations d'ovni correspondaient aux essais de l'U2 ou du Lockheed Oxcart .

lhommealacigarette a écrit:Bonsoir nablator sa me fait penser à la
page consacré du national geographic sur la zone 51 et l'avion a12 que tu dois connaitre je pense.

Le U2 c'est un GROS avion, bien visible, un planeur propulsé, difficile de l'imaginer en soucoupe volante ou en disque volant à la K.Arnold's mais bon c'est un autre débat d'interprétation ...

Not everyone is convinced, however, of the explanation.