The Central Intelligence Agency and Overhead Reconnaissance; The U-2 and OXCART Programs, 1954-1974

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Sec.et rdOFOAN
Chapter 4
code letters JGOHB, JGOHB as they tuned from one prearranged fre­
quency to the other. Then one of the Peshawar operators decided to
tune in the guard frequency where the Morse transmission was stron­
gest. He was able to discern a break in the letters, making the mes­
sage read "HBJGO HBJGO." The Peshawar operators realized this
stood for "HBJARGON Go." The detachment chief, Col. William
Shelton, who had been waiting anxiously inside the radio van for a
"Go" or "No Go" message, leaped from the van and ran across the
field to give the signal for takeoff to Powers, who was sitting in the
U-2C at the end of the runway. 28
Powers started his takeoff roll at Ol 59Z on l May 1960. Once
airborne, Powers guided his aircraft toward Afghanistan. Following
standard operating procedure, Powers clicked his radio switch when
he reached penetration altitude of 66,000 feet, which signaled the op­
erations unit at Peshawar that everything aboard the aircraft was
working and the mission would proceed as planned. Aside from this
simple signal, Powers and all U-2 pilots maintained strict radio si­
lence during penetration missions.
Powers' first target was- the Tyuratam Missile Test Range after
which he headed for Chelyabinsk, just south of Sverdlovsk. The
planned route would take him over Kyshtym, Sverdlovsk, northwest
to Kirov. north over Yur'ya and Plesetsk, then to Severodvinsk. north­
west to Kandalaksha, north to Murmansk, and, finally, west to Bodo,
Norway.
May Day turned out to be a bad time to overfly the Soviet
Union. On this major holiday, there was much less Soviet military air
traffic than usual, so Soviet radars could easily identify and track
Powers' U-2. In addition, the Soviets responded to the intrusion by
ordering a ban on civilian air traffic in a large portion of the Soviet
Union. Soviet radar began tracking the U-2 when it was still 15 miles
south of the Soviet-Afghan border and continued to do so as the air­
craft flew across the Central Asian republics. When Powers reached
the Tashkent area, as many as 13 Soviet interceptor aircraft scrambled
in an unsuccessful attempt to intercept his plane.
Powers never made it past Sverdlovsk. Four and a half hours into
the mission, an SA-2 surface-to-air missile detonated close to and just
behind his aircraft and disabled it 70,500 feet above the Sverdlovsk
'·' Richard K. Pero, "Message Received-Unfortunately," Studies in Intelligence 27
(Winter 1983):29 (S).
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