May 1, 1960: American U-2 spy plane shot down On May 1, 1960, a U-2 flight piloted by Francis Gary Powers disappeared while on a flight over Russia. The CIA reassured the president that, even if the plane had been shot down --which the Agency contended was impossible -- it was equipped with self-destruct mechanisms that would render any wreckage unrecognizable and the pilot was instructed to kill himself in such a situation. Based on this information, the U.S. government issued a cover statement indicating that a weather plane had veered off course and supposedly crashed somewhere in the Soviet Union. With no small degree of pleasure, Khrushchev pulled off one of the most dramatic moments of the Cold War by producing not only the mostly-intact wreckage of the U-2, but also the captured pilot-very much alive. A chagrined Eisenhower had to publicly admit that it was indeed a U.S. spy plane. Powers was then subjected to a show trial, described by the US Embassy consular officer Vladimir Toumanoff: adst.org/2013/01/the-show-trial-of-u-2-pilot-francis-gary-powers/
Posted on: Thu, 01 May 2014 13:49:11 +0000
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