I know that I shall meet my fate

Somewhere among the clouds above...

I balanced all, brought all to mind,

The years to come seemed waste of breath,

A waste of breath the years behind

In balance with this life, this death.

William Keats

For the United States, 1946 was, to paraphrase Dickens, the best of times and the worst of 

times. The fascist powers had been vanquished, but 

the Soviet Union, one of the critical partners in that 

effort, had almost overnight become a dangerous 

adversary. Even worse, the USSR was a closed society. 

This made it exceedingly difficult to obtain the critical 

information U.S. leaders needed to understand the 

true Soviet threat. 

In order to meet this challenge the United States 

was required to conduct a wide variety of bold 

intelligence operations. At times the so-called Cold 

War would turn hot in places like Korea and Vietnam. 

But because nuclear weapons were present, both 

Soviet and American leaders were averse to risking 

total war. Instead, for the duration of the conflict, 

both sides worked attentively to probe each other’s 

capabilities and weaknesses. In this arena it was not 

only military superiority that mattered, but political 

and diplomatic as well. In short, in our nation's 

efforts to defeat the USSR, information was power. 

Aerial reconnaissance was one of the more valuable 

programs used to gather the critical data required to 

ascertain Soviet capabilities.

This dangerous work employed a wide 

variety of aircraft to skirt the borders of the 

USSR to gather both photographic and signals 

intelligence. The planes had to get close enough 

get the job done while also taking great care 

to avoid entering Soviet airspace. The aircraft 

carried no weapons and Soviet fighters often 

took every opportunity to shoot the planes 

from the skies. Under these conditions, the 

aircrews and cryptologists needed to be not only 

competent, but also courageous. 

In the early morning hours of September 2, 

1958 just such a group was preparing for what 

they considered a routine C-130 reconnaissance 

flight along the Turkish Armenian border. The 

7406th Support Squadron was formally stationed 

at Rhein-Main Air Base in Germany, but the group 

had been ordered to temporary duty at Incirlik, 

Turkey. The crew of flight 60528, like so many 

U.S. military units, was a cross section of America. 

Master Sergeant Petrochilos had served with 

distinction in WWII while Airmen Bourg and 

Moore were just starting their military careers 

and had spent far less time "off in the Wild Blue."

C-130 50th Anniversary Commemoration 2 September 2008
The original plan was for the aircraft to fly 

a racetrack pattern between Van and Trabzon, 

Turkey. At no time was the plane supposed to be 

within 100 miles of Soviet airspace. Flight 60528 

left the runway at 11:21 a.m. Incirlik time, at 

12:42 p.m., the co-pilot; Captain John Simpson 

radioed Ankara control to inform 

them that the plane had reached 

Trabzon. That transmission 

would be the last word heard 

from the flight. 

What happened next will 

forever remain a mystery. It is 

possible the aircrew, because 

Soviet navigational beacons in 

Armenia and Georgia were on similar frequencies 

to those in Trabzon and Van, became confused. 

What is known is that shortly after 1:00 pm, 

the aircraft crossed the Soviet border and was 

attacked by a squadron of Soviet MIGs from the 

236th Fighter Air Division. To quote Larry Tart, 

author of The Price of Vigilance, “without even 

time for a Mayday call, 17 men, the majority of 

them in their late teens or early twenties were 

blasted out of the sky...”

At the time of the incident, Soviet authorities 

denied any involvement in the shoot-down. Even 

when President Eisenhower, in an unprecedented 

move, released the intercepted conversations of 

the Soviet pilots the leaders of the USSR refused 

to take any responsibility for the attack. It would 

not be until decades later, during the tenure of 

Boris Yeltsin, that declassified Soviet documents 

would finally make it clear that 

all crewmembers had perished 

during the crash. 

In the post Cold War period 

it is common for individuals 

to perceive the former Soviet 

Union as a lumbering nation 

state that contained the 

seeds of its own destruction. 

History demonstrates however that the “Free 

World’s” triumph over the specter of worldwide 

communism did not come easily. It is instructive, 

however, to remember that while the Cold War 

was indeed a victory for the United States and its 

allies, it was a conflict that for the most part was 

not won on the battlefield. Instead, victory was 

secured by the countless groups of dedicated 

men and women who took it upon themselves, 

sometimes at the cost of their lives, to get the 

information our nation’s policy makers and war 

fighters needed to not only prepare for war, but 

more importantly to keep the peace.n

Narrative - Patrick Weadon, Curator, National Cryptologic Museum

Graphics/Layout - John Honeyblue, NSA Creative Imaging