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A Spy's Story OPERATION OVERFLIGHT Francis Gary Powers with Curt Gentry I NOR

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A Spy's Story OPERATION OVERFLIGHT Francis Gary Powers with Curt Gentry I NOR THE WASHINGTON POST B4 Tuesday, June 9, 1970 BOOKS/LEISUR1 A Spy's Story OPERATION OVERFLIGHT Francis Gary Powers with Curt Gentry i NOR. Rinehart and Winston. 373 OP.. 36.33) Reviewed by David Wise The reviewer is co-author with Thomas B. Ross of The U-2 Affair, The Invisible Government and The Espionage Establishment. Sitting there In his Soviet Khrushchev stormed and prison cell, weaving rugs, broke up the summit meet- making envelopes, reacting ing in Paris. Ike finally an- Pushkin, dreaming of faa- nounced he had called off nana splits, coconut-cream the U-2 flights, but it was a pie and hamburgers, U-2 bit late. And Francis Gary pilot Francis Gary Powers powers was in jail. became reasonably philo- In 10 years, Francis Gary sophical about his predica- Powers has had a good deal ment: "Oh, well," he con- of time to think. He has ma- cluded, "they didn't invite tured, divorced, remarried, me to come . ." moved to California (to test Associated Press The most famous spy of U-2s for Lockheed at Bur- the Cold War waited almost bank), fathered a son, Fran- Pilot Trends Gary Powers holds a model of 10 years to tall his story be- cis Gary Powers II, and built the U-2 plane in an appearance before the cause, he says, John A. Mc- a new life. He has grown. It Senate Armed Forces Committee in 1962. Cone, who was director of comes through; and that, the Central Intelligence more than anything else, is fuzzy. But we do learn a Shunted off to California, Agency, wouldn't let him what makes his book inter- good deal about Francis write it when he wanted to, kept under wraps at Lock- esting. Gary Powers, and how his heed, awarded a secret med- following his exchange for Operation Overflight Soviet master spy Rudolph solves no ultimate mysteries view of life, CIA, and the al by CIA in 1965 to help Abel in 1962. —we learn little that is game of nations has keep him happy, Powers had A decade after the flight, clear about the workings changed. Powers was raised more time to reflect. De- it is difficult to recapture of the destructor unit, which in the grinding poverty of a spite everything, he has not the full extent of the incred- Powers did not use to de- remote Virginia valley in ible bungling that took stroy his plane; or about Appalachia. Understandably, become bitter. But no man, place in Washington when why the CIA timed a flight he fled. To the Air Force. he writes, "likes to admit he the CIA's high-altitude spy over Russia so close to a When mysterious men play- has been used." plane was downed 1,200 summit meeting on which I ing Keystone Cop games in Perhaps that Is what espi- miles inside the Soviet he world had pinned its motel rooms offered him a onage and Cold War is all Union. First, the Eisenhower fragile hopes for peace. The job at $30,000 a year ("It was about. Governments using administration dusted off an destructor unit was a device nearly as much as the cap- people, playing games, inept CIA cover story and designed, in the event of tain of a commercial air- pursuing means that grad- announced that the U-2 was trouble aloft to allow what liner received!"), he signed ually become ends. What was a "weather research" plane Powers describes as "a up. more important to the intel- that had strayed off course. small but supposedly suffl- Shot down near Sverd- ligence operators—a summit Soviet Premier Khrushchev cent margin of time to bail lovsk, grilled by the KGB, meeting, or one more U-2 savored that for two days, out before the explosion oc- Powers builds a rather per- flight over the Soviet then disclosed that he curred." He denies that the suasive case that he told the Union? had both the plane and its U-2 pilots worried that the Russians as little as possi- The U-2 episode made live pilot. Whereupon the CIA had rigged the timer to ble. After his return, the Americans aware for the State Department admitted destroy both plane and pilot. CIA put Powers throUgh a first time that their govern- the flight—but said it was Powers (and CIA) maintain second grilling. He was re- ment spied, and sometimes unauthorized. Two days after that the unit would not have habilitated by the agency lied. It focused major atten- that, President Eisenhower destroyed the plane, only the and hailed as a hero—be- tion on CIA, and on the con- reversed field, took personal cameras and certain equip- cause, CIA, by so doing, tinuing question of how in- responsibility and indicated, ment. Yet 'he says ground could also rehabilitate itself. telligence operations can be through his Secretary of crews tested the timer before And Powers knows it. The made compatible with demo- State that the CIA over- each flight because "a few primary concern of his supe- cratic government. As flights would continue be- seconds could mean life or riors in Langley, Powers Francis Gary Powers has ob- cause the Russians didn't death." writes, "was to get CIA off served, "Never again would have an open society. So the matter remains the hook." we he quite so innocent." .
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