Originally Posted by
SASless
"...first successful over-flight of the Soviet Union"....so easy to say....and the full significance of the statement is so elusive as was the aircraft itself.
Originally Posted by
Saint Jack
VIProds; Prior to reading the book I too thought that the SR-71 would almost have certainly flown over the USSR, Russia and China during its service (..."flew the fist successful overflight of the USSR from Mildenhall."). However the author, on Page 86, states quite categorically that "....One of the biggest myths surrounding the SR-71 reconnaissance program is that the plane has overflown the USSR and China. In truth, neither the A-12 nor the SR-71 has ever overflown the landmass of the USSR or China. after Gary Powers was shot down on 1st May 1960 over Russia, no US President would authorize direct overflights of the two superpowers...."
Colonel Walter Boyne writes about the early Soviet overflights in this 2001
Air Force Magazine article:
Truly vital intelligence concerning what was going on deep inside the territory of a potential adversary could be acquired only by overflying the Soviet Union and its allies. This was serious business, essentially an act of war, for during peacetime such an overflight violated Soviet national sovereignty.
Deja Vu All Over Again
The Soviet Union was especially sensitive to such overflights because it had experienced roughly similar operations just prior to Germany's invasion on June 22, 1941. Luftwaffe Col. Theo Rowehl's special reconnaissance unit had conducted almost 500 long-range overflights, pinpointing most of the major Soviet airfields. At that time, Stalin was trying desperately to avoid war with Hitler and so he failed to object or take action. Moscow would not make the same mistake again.
Such was the gravity of the Cold War overflights, however, that they could be authorized only by the President. At a recent Defense Intelligence Agency symposium on the early overflights, several speakers went to some lengths to establish the difference between a Presidentially authorized overflight and the more common PARPRO missions.
At this symposium, held at Bolling AFB, Washington, D.C., each speaker emphasized that USAF Gen. Curtis E. LeMay, the commander in chief of Strategic Air Command, never, under any circumstances, ordered such a flight without Presidential authorization. They were adamant on this point because some journalists have portrayed LeMay as a stubborn warmonger out to start World War III on his own. According to those who were there, LeMay was dedicated to having SAC ready for war and was prepared to take the war into the heart of enemy territory, but he was first and foremost an airman who obeyed his Commander in Chief. He knew there was a line, and he never crossed it.
National Reconnaissance Office Historian Cargill Hall offered a definition of an "overflight" that fits the facts. He stated, "In using the term 'overflight,' I mean a flight by a government aircraft that, expressly on the direction of the head of state, traverses the territory of another state in peacetime without that other state's permission."
The distinction is important because it highlights just how critical and dangerous the highly classified overflight mission was. All of the flights were conducted in great secrecy, at a level of security which was maintained until very recently, when, at last, the missions and imagery were declassified and the men who flew the missions could finally talk about them. Curiously, this secrecy was enhanced indirectly by the Soviet Union. It never blew the whistle on the flights, for it refused to admit to its people and to the world that it could not prevent US aircraft from overflying its national territory.
The military overflights employed the unsophisticated reconnaissance aircraft then available for use. These ranged from piston-engine aircraft like the RB-50 to the early jets. The latter category included RF-80As, slowed by huge tip tanks necessary for range, an F-84, RF-86s, RF-100s, and RB-45s, RB-57s, and B- and RB-47s. All of these aircraft led the way to the later specialized U-2 and SR-71 aircraft and ultimately to satellites.
Air Force Magazine