A brotherhood of spies
Subtitle: the U-2 and the CIA's secret war
By: Monte Reel
Edition: First edition.
Publisher: Doubleday
Published: 2018
Language: eng
Number of pages: 342
ISBN-13: 9780385540209
Subjects: Intelligence service; United States; U-2 Incident, 1960; United States. Central Intelligence Agency; U-2 (Reconnaissance aircraft); History; Biography; Spies
Description: On May 1, 1960, an American U-2 spy plane was shot down over the Soviet Union just weeks before a peace summit between the two nations. The CIA concocted a cover story for President Eisenhower to deliver, assuring him that no one could have survived a fall from that altitude. And even if pilot Francis Gary Powers had survived, he had been supplied with a poison pin with which to commit suicide. But against all odds, Powers emerged from the wreckage and was seized by the KGB. He confessed to espionage charges, revealing to the world that Eisenhower had just lied to the American people--and to the Soviet Premier. Infuriated, Nikita Khrushchev slammed the door on a rare opening in Cold War relations. In A Brotherhood of Spies, award-winning journalist Monte Reel reveals how the U-2 spy program, principally devised by four men working in secret, upended the Cold War and carved a new mission for the CIA. This secret fraternity, made up of Edwin Land, best known as the inventor of instant photography and the head of Polaroid Corporation; Kelly Johnson, a hard-charging taskmaster from Lockheed; Richard Bissell, the secretive and ambitious spymaster; and ace Air Force flyer Powers, set out to replace yesterday's fallible human spies with tomorrow's undetectable eye in the sky. Their clandestine successes and all-too-public failures make this brilliantly reported account a true-life thriller with the highest stakes and tragic repercussions.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references (pages 303-332) and index.
Table of contents: title: Book one. Icarus rising; title: The idealist; title: The man who could see air; title: The mysterious Mr B; title: The human element; title: Book two. Icarus soaring; title: In plain sight; title: Rocket men; title: To the sun; title: Part three. Icarus falling; title: Fallen angel; title: Secrets and lies; title: The verdict; title: New frontiers; title: Book four. Icarus reborn; title: Trade-offs; title: Together and apart; title: Endgame; title: Epilogue: Landings.