exploded on October 30, 1958, was the last nuclear bomb fired at the Nevada Test Site for a period of nearly three years. In August of 1961, the Russians announced they were resuming testing and conducted thirty-one nuclear tests over the next three months, including the fifty-eightmegaton Tsar Bomba, the largest bomb ever exploded. In response, Kennedy had the AEC resume testing at the Nevada Test Site; interview with Al O’Donnell.
2. The incident has never been declassified: Interview with Collins.
3. the less you knew, the better: A sentiment unanimously shared by all CIA and USAF pilots interviewed.
4. No radio, almost no TV: Interviews with Slater, Murray, Collins. 5. “like an incubus”: Helms, A Look Over My Shoulder, 309.
6. “The only sin in espionage is getting caught”: David Robarge, “Richard Helms.”
7. Helms would be recruited by the Office of Strategic Services: Helms, A Look Over My Shoulder, 31.
8. a seafood run to Westover Air Force Base: Interview with Colonel Slater.
9. MKULTRA files destroyed: The authority on this subject is John Marks, a former State Department analyst and staff assistant to the intelligence director. In June of 1977, Marks obtained access to part of seven boxes of MKULTRA, the only ones allegedly not lost and consisting mostly of financial records. In his book The Search for the
Manchurian Candidate, Marks wrote that shortly before leaving the CIA, “Helms presided over a wholesale destruction of documents and tapes — presumably to minimize information that might later be used against him,” 219.
10. front page of the New York Times: According to Colonel Slater.
11. Slater and General Ledford would be asked: No. 303 National Security Action Memorandum, June 2, 1964; Top Secret, From the Director of Central Intelligence, Memorandum for the 303 Committee, 22 March 1966.
12. “McNamara was delaying finding a mission”: Interview with Dr. Wheelon.
13. if a CIA spy plane were to get shot down: CIA Memorandum, “Reactions to a possible US Course of Action,” 17 March 1966; “OXCART Development Summary and Progress,” 1 October 1966-31 December 1966.
14. The majority voted against deployment: Robarge, Archangel,
33.
15. Slater now wanted it reduced by nearly 30 percent: Interview with Colonel Slater.
16. Park had flown over all four corners of America: John Parangosky, deputy for technology, OSA, wrote in summation of Park’s flight: “An impressive demonstration of the OXCART capability occurred on 21 December 1966 when Lockheed test pilot Bill Park flew 10,198 statute miles in six hours. The aircraft left the test area in Nevada and flew northward over Yellowstone National Park, thence eastward to Bismarck, North Dakota, and on to Duluth, Minnesota. It then turned south and passed Atlanta en route to Tampa, Florida, then northwest to Portland, Oregon, then southwest to Nevada. Again the flight turned eastward, passing Denver and St. Louis. Turning around at Knoxville, Tennessee, it passed Memphis in the home stretch back to Nevada. This flight established a record unapproachable by any
other aircraft; it began at about the same time a typical government employee starts his work day and ended two hours before his quitting time.” Full text at Roadrunners Internationale official Web site.
17. Walt Ray was, by all accounts, a terrific pilot: Interviews with Colonel Slater, Walt Murray, Ken Collins, Roger Andersen, Charlie Trapp.
18. “flew down to Cabo San Lucas”: Interview with Ken Collins.
19. fuel gauge move suddenly: Briefing Memorandum for Acting Deputy Director for Science and Technology, Subject Loss of Oxcart A-12 Aircraft, 6 January 1967.
20. Walt Ray told Colonel Slater through his headset: Interview with Colonel Slater.
21. “I’m ejecting”: Interview with Colonel Slater. Immediately after the crash Air Force channels reported that an SR-71 flying on a routine flight out of Edwards Air Force Base had gone missing and was presumed down in Nevada.
22. unable to separate from his seat: Memorandum for Acting Deputy Director for Science and Technology, Subject Loss of Article 125 (Oxcart Aircraft), 25 January 1967, 2.
23. Roger Andersen flew in low, in a T-33: Interview with Roger Andersen.
24. Charlie Trapp found the aircraft first: Interview with Charlie Trapp.
25. “‘How’d you like to fly the plane?’”: Interview with Frank Murray.
26. eight-page letter to the president: Top Secret Idealist/Oxcart, Central Intelligence Agency Office of the Director, BYE-2915-66 Alternative A, 14 December 1966.
27. a scandalous waste of an asset: DRAFT, Director of Special Activities, Comments to W.R. Thomas III Memorandum to the Director, BOB, 27 July 1966, 11.
28. Gary Powers incident had actually strengthened: Ibid., 3.
29. the CIA “controls no nuclear weapons”: Top Secret Idealist/Oxcart, Central Intelligence Agency Office of the Director, BYE2915-66 Alternative A, 14 December 1966, 4.
30. But would the president see things his way: Memorandum for the President, Subject: Advanced Reconnaissance Aircraft, December 26, 1966, Top Secret. Participants included Cyrus Vance (deputy secretary of defense), Donald Hornig (the president’s science adviser), C.W. Fischer (bureau of the budget), and Helms. All except Helms recommended mothballing Oxcart. On December 28, the president approved this memo recommendation and ordered the phaseout of the A-12 fleet by January 1968.
31. Slater was instructed to return to Area 51: Interview with Colonel Slater.
32. ahead of a two-star general: Ibid. 33. Slater went to visit Werner Weiss: Ibid.
Interviews: Colonel Slater, Ken Collins, Roger Andersen, Hervey Stockman, Peter Stockman, Frank Murray, Ronald L. “Jack” Layton, Eunice Layton, Charlie Trapp
1. “never found have much use for intelligence”: Hathaway and Smith, Richard Helms, 2. The most telling comment comes from Helms (ibid., 7): “With President Johnson… I finally came to the conclusion that what I had to say I should get into the first 60, or at least 120 seconds, that I had on my feet. Because after that he was pushing buttons for coffee or Fresca, or talking to Rusk, or talking to McNamara, or whispering here or whispering there. I had lost my principal audience.”
2. Target Tuesday lunch: Barrett, “Doing ‘Tuesday Lunch,’” 676-
77.
3. Helms told the president: John Parangosky, Deputy for Technology, OSA, wrote in summation, “Director of Central Intelligence, Richard Helms, submitted to the 303 Committee another formal proposal to deploy the OXCART. In addition, he raised the matter at President Johnson’s ‘Tuesday Lunch’ on 16 May, and received the Presidents approval to ‘go.’ Walt Rostow later in the day formally conveyed the President’s decision, and the BLACK SHIELD deployment plan was forthwith put into effect.”
4. A million pounds of matйriel, 260 support crew: Johnson, History of the Oxcart Program, 1. The three A- 12s that were deployed to Kadena flew nonstop from Groom Lake across the Pacific. They refueled twice en route and got to Kadena in a little less than six hours; interview with Colonel Slater, Ken Collins, Frank Murray, Roger Andersen.
5. “the bird should leave the nest”: CIA Director of Special Activities to CIA Director of Reconnaissance, “Operation readiness of the OXCART System,” 12 November 1965.
6. nearly 40 percent of all islanders’ income: CIA NLE MR Case No. 2000-69, Ryukyu Islands (Okinawa) June 1960, 2. “The military economy employs 13 % of the working population and generates 36 % of the national income.”
7. to keep an extremely low profile: Interview with Ken Collins. 8. “no plausible cover story”: Interview with Colonel Slater.
9. the first Oxcart mission: Photographic Interpretation Report: Black Shield Mission X-001, 31 May 1967. NPIC/R-112/67, June 1967.
10. by the time the photographic intelligence got back: John Parangosky, Deputy for Technology, OSA, wrote: “Film from earlier missions was developed at the Eastman Kodak plant in Rochester, New York. By late summer an Air Force Center in Japan carried out the processing in order to place the photointelligence in the hands of American commanders in Vietnam within 24 hours of completion of a BLACK SHIELD mission.”
11. four were “detected and tracked”: CHESS RUFF TRINE OXCART, BYE-44232/67, Black Shield
