Operation Overflight (7 page)

Even so, there were a few close calls. About one hundred miles from Adana was what must be one of the greatest trout streams in the world. On one trip—which I'm happy to say I missed—the men awoke to find that during the night they had been visited by Kurds, the nomadic tribesmen who wander the crescent from the Persian Gulf up into Turkey. Great thieves, they had taken not only fishing gear, cameras, food, and clothing, but also the blankets off my friends' backs. Fortunately no one woke during the raid, the Kurds having a rather cavalier attitude toward human life.

Late one afternoon I saw, not more than a mile or two away from the base, one of their caravans, a string of some hundred camels traveling along a ridge silhouetted against the sunset. Ancient Persia come to life, it provided a vivid contrast to our twentieth-century electronic gadgetry.

As transportation, most of us bought small motorcycles, which we used for excursions through the countryside. Not far from Adana, there were crusader castles, mostly in ruins—shepherds used them as pens; Roman aqueducts; the remains of a sunken Roman bath; and a huge area of old tombs, which we spent much time exploring. The beaches along the Mediterranean were beautifully virgin, much like those in Southern California once were, before the days of population explosion and oil slicks. During the long warm season, which stretched from spring well into fall, we swam, skin-dived,
snorkled. As for hunting, there were ducks on the lakes and on occasion an expedition in search of wild boar, the latter less than successful, at least from our point of view. The Turks, who acted as guides, were highly excitable; as soon as they saw a boar they began firing. Most of us never got a shot.

But, except for these occasional activities, the social life was decidedly limited. The poker games frequently lasted three days. Leave was set up on a military basis, thirty days per year. With little to do in Turkey itself, R&R (rest-and-recuperation leave) was established. For each weekend spent in Turkey, compensatory time was accrued that could be spent in Greece or Germany. Since planes frequently landed at Incirlik for refueling, there was little trouble catching a hop. We saved up the time, to make the trips worthwhile.

In the interim, we had to create our own diversions.

In an attempt to provide a touch of much needed domesticity, one of the pilots bought a box of cake mix at the PX and invited us all over for coffee and cake.

Not wanting to be remiss socially, I decided to bake some cakes too.

I baked one, but extended no invitations. As a cook, I decided, I made an excellent pilot.

We were restless, for several reasons. One was that none of us was flying as much as he wanted to.

Among pilots it is proverbial that the more you fly, the more you enjoy it. But when you lay off awhile and then go up again, you approach it with hesitation; everything a little strange, you're not as sure of yourself as you should be.

We were flying the bare minimum to preserve the plane. The U-2 was too fragile to last, the engineering experts reiterated; its life span was limited; it wouldn't stand up under prolonged stress and strain.

Although we saw little evidence of this ourselves, a tragedy occurred not long after our arrival overseas which seemed to bear this out most graphically.

In September, 1956, Howard Carey, a contract pilot I had known at Watertown, was killed in a U-2 crash in Germany. There was some confusion as to what actually happened, initial speculation ranging all the way to sabotage. It was later determined, however, that while in flight Carey had been buzzed by two curious Canadian
Air Force interceptors. Caught in their wake turbulence as they passed him, his U-2 had apparently simply disintegrated.

With sad irony, Carey had not started with the first class at Watertown but had come in late, to replace the pilot killed in the first crash.

Not considering that this might be a freak accident, the experts cited it as further proof of the U-2's fragility. As a result, we were flying the bare minimum; so far as most of us were concerned, it wasn't nearly enough.

Nor was it the flying we had been told we would do.

By November we still hadn't made our first overflight.

Although the 10-10 detachment had its own section of the base, closed to all except authorized personnel, within those boundaries some sections were even more tightly restricted. The photo lab was one. By far the most secret, however, was the communication section, which housed not only the radio apparatus but also the cryptographic unit. It was through here that the orders would come, when they came. After a while we began, almost unconsciously, to study the faces of the personnel who worked there, as if expecting clues.

When the order came, it was a surprise. Stopping me as I was walking through the area one day, the detachment commander, Colonel Ed Perry, said simply, “You're it, Powers.”

“When?”

“If the weather holds, a couple of days.”

I'd been picked for the first overflight out of Turkey.

This was to be the pattern.

Target priorities were established in Washington. It was our understanding that the White House then approved “packages,” or series, of flights. Once approval was given, the orders were relayed to Incirlik in code via radio. With one later, and quite important, exception, which will be mentioned.

Weather usually determined when the flight occurred. Almost always we would be briefed several days in advance of the actual flight in order to have time to study maps of the various routes and work out the navigation. Alternate targets were provided on each flight so that if we went up and found clouds covering one area, we could switch to another without sacrificing the mission. Approval, it was reiterated over and over, was difficult to obtain. When it came, we were to make the best of it.

At times intelligence would tell us what they were looking for: an airfield here that isn't on the map; a complex of new buildings there to watch out for. Usually, however, we weren't told anything, our only instructions being when and where to switch on what equipment. The equipment itself, however, was sometimes a clue. A camera with a telescopic lens pinpointing a tiny area, for example, meant an entirely different type objective than one which photographed a strip 100 to 150 miles wide.

We were aware that when we returned, the photographs would undergo intensive scrutiny by experts, the pictures providing information on things we knew nothing about. While we might be instructed to photograph a missile-launching site and the area around it, thinking intelligence was most interested in the missile on the pad, their real interest might lie in the railroad tracks leading away from the site, which, if followed, might lead to factories where the missiles were assembled.

We didn't try to second-guess. We followed instructions.

Briefings were concerned primarily with navigation, and little else. I had anticipated that once overseas the question we had been avoiding would be asked and answered. It wasn't. Nor did the pilots discuss it among themselves. Perhaps, almost unconsciously, we thought that to do so would bring bad luck.

The intelligence officer did mention in one briefing session that cyanide capsules would be available if we wanted them. Whether we did or did not choose to carry them was up to us, but, in the event of capture we might find this alternative preferable to torture.

The lessons of Korea were still fresh in mind.

The last item put on the plane before each overflight and the first taken off on its return was the destruct unit.

Easily the most enduring myth about the U-2 flights concerns this mechanism, which has engendered an apocrypha so vast it seems a shame to blow it up.

First advanced by the Russians, and later picked up and made much of by certain American writers, was the claim that U-2 pilots were worried that if the device had to be used the CIA had rigged it in such a way that it would explode prematurely, thus eliminating, in one great blast,
all
incriminating evidence, plane
and
pilot.

One simple fact quite thoroughly dispels this imaginative fiction. Prior to each and every overflight, maintenance personnel tested the timer. It was a standard part of the preflight check.

Pilots could supervise the testing if they wished to; usually we
didn't bother. We knew and trusted our ground crews. More often than not, these men were close friends (some remain so today). Had such a thing as rigging of the device even been suggested, they were not the type of people to remain quiet about it.

That the device was tested was not because of any suspicion that our employers intended to do us in, but because, as previously noted, there was a slight variance in the allotted time on some units. We were never sure which unit would be used. In a situation where a few seconds could mean life or death, it was imperative not only that we be sure that the timer was working properly but also that we know the exact seconds' leeway between flipping the switches and the actual explosion.

As for the pilots being nervous about the device, this was quite true. We had also been nervous in the Air Force when flying with payloads. In each case there were a number of safeguards to forestall accidental detonation. But in both we were still flying with a bomb, and there was always the possibility—whether real or imagined, the fear existed—that a small electrical spark might accidentally bypass the most carefully planned circuitry. Neither was especially conducive to peace of mind.

The evening before the flight, I went to bed early. Although it was November, Turkey, being situated on the Mediterranean, had a warm climate almost year round. Made uncomfortable by both the temperature and the unusual hour, I tossed and turned.

The only difference between this and other flights I had already flown, I told myself, was that this would take a little longer and I'd be seeing a different country.

I wasn't fooling myself. Sleep came hard, even with a couple of sleeping pills.

At five
A.M.
I was awakened and went to breakfast, after which I reported to Prebreathing to “get on the hose” and suit up. Because of the bulkiness and tightness of the suit, the latter required assistance. During the next two hours I restudied my maps. The routes were color-coded, in blue, red, and brown. Blue indicated the general route, along which some deviation from course was permitted. Red lines marked target areas and were to be flown exactly on course if possible. Alongside were marks indicating where specific photographic and electronic equipment was to be switched on and off. Brown lines denoted routes to alternate bases, if for some reason I couldn't return to Incirlik.

Following a last-minute briefing on the weather, the intelligence officer asked me if I wanted to carry a cyanide capsule.

I shook my head. Not for any profound reason, rather one that in retrospect sounds a trifle silly. I was afraid the capsule might break in my pocket, and I wanted to avoid the risk of accidental contact.

The plane was already on the runway.

The suit was so cumbersome I had to be helped up the ladder into the cockpit. Once in, it was as snug as always. There was little room for movement.

After the ladder was pulled away, I started the engine. The U-2 has a whine all its own; no matter how many times heard, it thrilled me. This time the feeling was not unmixed with nervousness.

Checking the oil, fuel, hydraulic pressures, the EGT, the RPM, I closed the canopy, locking it from the inside, and turned on the pressurization system.

On signal, I began moving down the runway, pogos falling away the instant the plane left the ground. The ascent, sharp, rapid, started moments later and continued until the base was a tiny speck on the landscape below.

Reaching assigned altitude for this particular flight (it varied), I leveled off.

Periodically I checked the instruments, warning lights and gauges, the clock on the instrument panel.

Exactly thirty minutes after takeoff I reached for the radio call button.

Too close to Russia for voice contact, we had devised a code.

If everything was going well and I planned to continue the flight, I was to give two clicks on the radio.

Since I was still within radio range, this would be picked up back at base.

As acknowledgment, they would click once, indicating message received, proceed as planned. Or they would click three times, indicating that the flight had been scrubbed and I was to turn around and return to base immediately.

This would be the last radio contact until my return.

I clicked twice.

After a moment there was a single click in acknowledgment.

I continued the flight, crossing the Turkish border between Black and Caspian seas and penetrated Russian air space.

Two

T
here was no abrupt change in the topography, yet the moment you crossed the border you sensed the difference. Much of it was imagination, but that made it no less real. Knowing there were people who would shoot you down if they could created a strange tension. I'd never flown combat; perhaps the feeling was the same. But I thought not. In combat you knew what you were up against. Here you were apprehensive of the unknown. It was the not knowing that got to you.

Were they even aware that I was up here? At this altitude the U-2 couldn't be seen from the ground, and, above ninety percent of the earth's atmosphere, conditions were such that jet contrails usually did not form. As for Russian radar, we were, at this time, skeptical of its capabilities, doubtful that it could even pick us up at this height.

Were they, at this very moment, trying to bring me down? The view from the U-2 is restricted. Although you can see miles in front and to the sides, to look down, immediately below, you have to use a view sight, similar to an inverted periscope. From what I could see of the air and ground below, there were no clues. No signs of rockets. No jet condensation trails. Nothing that resembled unusual activity.

Fortunately, just piloting the aircraft and fulfilling the requirements of the mission was a full-time job. Checking the RPM, the EGT, the compass, the fire warning lights, the artificial horizon; watching the ever-critical air speed; homing in on Soviet radio stations; compensating for drift; flipping switches on and off: these were clear and sharply defined things. This was the reality. But the uneasiness remained, like the overlay on a map.