by Kevin Wright
Mission preparation started about three hours before take-off. The flight plans were created by the navigators and the AOs with the consent of the Aircraft Commander. Between them they created the target pack for the flight, Robert explains:
We could fly them pretty much in the order the pilot wanted, with the major constraint that it was not possible to turn back once inside the Corridor – a fact that meant that on two occasions our aircraft was struck by lightning because we were unable to turn back in bad weather.
There were two sorts of targets: routine targets were covered on a daily/weekly/monthly basis as required and where slippage would make little difference. ‘Special’ targets were often urgent, temporary and time sensitive. They were covered when the squadron was instructed to do so. Whilst the flight planning was in process, the other crew members would collect the materials necessary for their duties. The aircraft was pre-flighted by the aircrew, but everyone else on board had specific tasks for take-off and landing too. The squadron used the call sign ‘Herky’ as used by standard C-130 transports for training missions and ‘Ask’ for operational missions.
Single flights were the norm but multiple missions for an individual aircraft, and multiple aircraft missions by both night and day, were not uncommon. Aircraft could be tasked at short notice to fly additional trips and sometimes an aircraft could return from one mission, be retasked, turned round and sent off again. To allow for such contingencies the aircraft carried sufficient film canisters for two consecutive flights as standard procedure.
The crew then assembled for the pre-flight safety briefing. Crews were large, consisting of two pilots, two navigators and the loadmaster at the front with the SEOs, and up to seven ELINT operators in the back. There were also two AOs and two FLIR operators. The AOs and FLIR operators were from the 497 RTG and always wore USAF uniform, although some came from the US Army and US Marine Corps. There were no formally constituted crews; each was simply made up from available personnel. Besides normal safety aspects the briefing included actions in case of forced landing in the GDR. In such circumstances the crew were to destroy the aircraft using flares and hydraulic fluid once on the ground. There were also instructions on how to expose all the film and destroy the aircraft in flight, whilst the crew were bailing out.
After departing from Rhein-Main, the SEOs would take special aiming sights to the flight deck and place them on mounts behind and adjacent to the pilots’ positions. They were described as being rather like the ‘head-up displays’ used in many modern military aircraft, and were used by one of the two navigators. One was responsible for the critical, accurate navigation needed whilst flying the Corridor and the other for monitoring progress and targets en route as well as operating the ‘Big Item’. Soon after take-off, whilst the aircraft was unpressurised, the sensors would be uncovered and prepared for use by the crew.
The C-130 would route to its assigned Corridor, defined by the targets on the flight plan. However, this could be changed at short notice if unexpected opportunities arose. As the aircraft approached the IGB, the infrared camera would be turned on. The aircraft flew at between 3,000 and 10,000ft when in the Corridors – depending on the weather and ground activities. The 7405 OS aircraft were the only US aircraft responsible for their own navigation when in the Corridors. They flew irregular courses to take in the installations and activities on their target list. The flights used the cover story that they were just standard ‘trash haulers’, though this would have been barely credible to anyone regularly observing their comings and goings from the fences at Tempelhof. In later years the cover story was modified to state just that the aircraft were ‘exercising their rights under treaty’ to fly the Corridors.
Cameras were activated as the aircraft approached its target, with the forward navigator calling ‘camera right’ or ‘camera left’ to the SEO so he could move the camera to the appropriate side of the aircraft. The vertical panoramic camera was operated to meet the target plan, but any crew member could call for it to be activated, so that targets of opportunity, or areas of interest, could be captured for later exploitation.
There were around seven positions onboard, two of which were occupied by Russian and German linguists for COMINT operators – with the remainder being occupied by ELINT operators – who listened out for Soviet and East German military activity. They were particularly interested in Soviet and East German air defence network communications and the operators on the C-130s would provide real-time warnings to the their crew members if they believed the aircraft might be under threat. The rear crew would also communicate with US listening stations monitoring US and opposition aircraft activities.
The aircraft were regularly tracked by Soviet/GDR radars and sometimes locked onto by their SAM systems that were in, or close to, the Corridors. Coded messages would be passed between the C-130 and US ground stations, some genuine, some false, to keep the Soviets guessing. Messages prefixed ‘Sky King’ meant ‘all aircraft copy’ and could include warnings. If the ground stations, or the crew, believed the aircraft was about to be intercepted, all the sensors would be closed down and hidden as quickly as possible. On average the C-130s were intercepted about once a month, although Robert Zoucha recalls that on one flight his aircraft was shadowed by a MiG-23 Flogger, a MiG-21 Fishbed and a MiG-25 Foxbat in very rapid succession. Shortly before this the aircraft had received a ‘Sky King’ warning, so they simply packed up and returned to base, not really knowing why the intercepts had taken place.
Flights would normally take around two hours to go in and out of Berlin, to which another forty minutes each way could be added if using the Northern Corridor. Once over Berlin, the aircraft would fly for another thirty minutes to cover BCZ targets before landing at Tempelhof AB, almost never anywhere else. Before the aircraft landed it was ‘normalised’ – all the sensors were hidden and the observation blisters replaced with standard hatches. After landing the crew would disembark – up to twenty-three of them – and stop to have a lunch break of between an hour and one hour and twenty minutes. During the break one of the AOs would contact the Tempelhof intelligence unit (then the 6912th Electronic Security Group) to check for any urgent changes to the return leg of their flight plan. This inevitably led to the crews being described as the ‘Berlin for Lunch Bunch’ or BFLB by parts of the USAFE community and C-130 personnel in general.
On returning to Rhein-Main, the SEOs would put the exposed film in canisters and leave them onboard to be taken by the AOs to the 497 RTG for processing and exploitation. Robert recalls that there was little feedback on the results of individual missions, although the AOs would occasionally say that they had some ‘good shots’. Given the frequency of the flights, there was probably little time to provide feedback.
On rare occasions the aircraft encountered sensor problems – such as being unable to close camera hatches or retract the FLIR ball. In such instances it was considered impossible for the aircraft to return to Rhein-Main as this would unacceptably expose it to public view. Instead the aircraft would divert to Ramstein AB where a special C-130-sized hangar was kept empty for such contingencies. After passing the message ‘Maggie’s drawers are down’ the aircraft would divert to Ramstein AB and land and taxi directly into the hangar before shutting down the engines whilst the hangar doors were quickly closed behind it.
One of the 7405 OSs unusual tasks was in the aftermath of USMLM Major Nicholson’s shooting on 24 March 1985 at Ludwigslust. He was shot dead by a sentry with Soviet military authorities alleging that he had been climbing a fence to gain access to the installation. The day after the shooting a 7405 OS C-130E was tasked to photograph the incident site. The resulting imagery revealed that not only was there no fence, but the fence Nicholson was supposed to have been climbing when shot was being frantically erected by Soviet troops.
US Corridor missions were flown until 29 September 1990, just a few days before the formal German unification and the disappearance of the Air Corridors. When US flights
halted, they had flown ‘more than 10,000 missions patrolling the Berlin Corridors and siphoning vital information from the very heart of the Soviet presence in Europe’.39
Other Operations
In addition to the 7405 OS’s Corridor missions, other missions were being flown by the CIA, SAC and other squadrons from the 7499 OG.
The CIA Connection
Besides US Air Force operations the 7405 SS appears to have had close connections with the CIA, although discovering the extent of this relationship is still not easy. For example, Chris Pocock records the deployment of Agency RB-69A (Lockheed Neptune) Project Cherry aircraft to Wiesbaden in 1957 for low-level reconnaissance operations.40 Tart and Keefe have also provided a more detailed account of other CIA operations conducted by ‘C Flight’ alongside 7405 SS ‘Special Project’ activities. ‘C Flight’, flew up to three C-118As from Wiesbaden on ‘diplomatic courier flights’ to US embassies in Europe, North Africa and the Middle East. Two of the aircraft were allegedly used to provide regular, non-scheduled support flights for some of the CIA’s extensive operations in Europe and the Middle East.41 The aircraft were administratively and logistically subordinate to the 7405 SS but operationally they answered to an element in Headquarters USAFE.
Two aircraft are known to have carried ‘bogus’ tail numbers for a time: 51–3823 was allocated ‘51–3842’ in July 1965 but reverted to its original tail number when it returned to the USA in October 1965; similarly 51–3825 was allocated the false serial ‘51–3846’ in June 1965, reverting to 51–3825 on return to the USA also in October 1965. There is speculation that these aircraft were used in support of CIA operations.
One of these C-118s was involved in an incident that illustrated how closely connected USAF and CIA operations could be. On 27 June 1958, C-118A (51–3822), came down in Soviet Armenia. The aircraft was in regular military transport aircraft markings and had left Wiesbaden AB bound for Karachi in Pakistan, routing via Wheelus AFB in Libya and RAF Nicosia in Cyprus. It left Cyprus for Tehran using the civilian airway that passed through Turkey about 50 miles south of the Soviet border. The C-118 appears either to have become genuinely lost or to have been ‘spoofed’ into straying into Soviet airspace. The aircraft was intercepted and engaged by Soviet fighters when about 100 miles inside the Soviet Union. It finally force-landed on a very short, partially finished runway in a remote part of Azerbaijan around 50 miles from the Iranian border and was totally destroyed in the post-crash fire. All nine occupants escaped serious injury, five having abandoned the aircraft by parachute as it had descended. All the occupants were taken into Soviet military custody. The US State Department statement said that the aircraft was on an ‘embassy courier run’. Michael Beschloss has described the flight as transporting CIA personnel, sensitive documents and other items to the various locations en route. Some of the documents are alleged to have related to CIA-sponsored U-2 operations in the Middle East, and to other governments’ participation in the U-2 programme.42 In the face of strong US diplomatic representations and the lack of any incriminating evidence, the Soviets were unable to significantly disprove the US cover story, so accepted the US version of events that the aircraft was lost. Ten days later, the personnel were handed over to the US Attaché from the Tehran Embassy at the Iran–Azerbaijan border.
Precision Parameter Measurements System
Another CIA operation, mounted in the Corridors, involved collecting ELINT data under a programme originally sanctioned in 1954. This programme involved the CIA developing a ‘Precision Parameter Measurements System’ (PPMS) to collect high-quality ELINT data. The intention was to measure very accurately radar signal parameters to determine their detection capabilities and tracking characteristics. The first serious attempt to measure these for intelligence purposes in this way was in 1958 against the Soviet P-35 Saturn (NATO Code name: Bar Lock) early warning radar. This was being deployed to a number of locations to detect and track US U-2s as they began deep-penetration flights over the Soviet Union. CIA managers demanded definitive information on the Bar Lock’s power output, radiation pattern coverage and detection and tracking capabilities to more precisely assess this threat to the U-2 programme. A set of power-measurement equipment, although crude by modern standards, was installed in the hold of a C-119 (Boxcar) aircraft. With little advance testing, a series of flights was undertaken along the Berlin Corridors where the Bar Lock signals could be easily intercepted. Although the experiment was not entirely successful in its power measurement, it suggested some possible solutions for additional collection and the development of new measuring equipment.43 These were incorporated into the successful follow-on Project Wine Sap C-97G.
The ATRAN Programme
In 1956 two squadrons of the 7499 SG were involved in a short-lived task to provide support for the ATRAN system that guided the TM-76A Mace and TM-61B Matador nuclear-capable ‘cruise missiles’ to their targets. The TM-61B version of the missile had a maximum range of around 700 miles and would fly at below 1,000ft. The missile’s guidance system compared the actual in-flight radar terrain scan with that of a pre-loaded 35mm filmstrip radar reconnaissance map and then made any necessary course corrections. The film was produced from actual and simulated radar images marked with the route’s key topographical and other features.
The 7406 SS’s task was to collect the required radar imagery for the targeting film strips as part of Project Aunt Sue. They flew three specially modified RB-50D aircraft (Project Half Track) along the IGB, collecting a combination of modified navigation radar and optical camera imagery. Between June 1956 and 19 October 1956, ‘A’ Flight flew 52 RB-50D ATRAN missions. These missions terminated almost a year before the first successful airborne ATRAN test was completed in late September 1957.44
The 7405 SS flew a modified C-54D (Project Lulu Belle) to collect photographic and radar imagery in the Corridors and along the IGB. The aircraft flew forty-three ATRAN missions between December 1955 and autumn 1956 when the project was halted and the associated equipment removed. The modifications included installations of a stabilised ‘thermal reconnaissance device’, an APS-27 radar and the Goodyear AN/DPQ-4 ATRAN system. To make the necessary space for the electronic equipment, the auxiliary fuel tank area was reconfigured and false bulkheads were installed to hide the classified equipment from non-cleared passengers and observers.45 There is some debate about why both the RB-50Ds and the Lulu Belle C-54D were used. A possibility is that the latter may have been an interim platform pending arrival of the Half Track RB-50Ds or was used to provide a ‘quick reaction capability’.46 More likely, the Lulu Belle C-54D could be flown in the Corridors without provoking an adverse Soviet reaction, which the RB-50s couldn’t. Whilst the terrain and routing for the missiles in West Germany and close to the IGB and in the Corridors could be mapped accurately, once they were in East Germany beyond that view, the filmstrip had to be created using sand box terrain models.
USAFE Reconnaissance Operations outside the Corridors
USAFE’s wide area of interest meant that it conducted ICFs outside the Berlin Corridors and BCZ. Initially these missions were flown by B-17s of Det ‘A’ 10 RG, which soon expanded USAFE ‘ferret’ flights further afield to include the border of the Soviet Zone with West Germany, Austria and the Baltic Sea area.
7406th Support Squadron (7406 SS)
From its formation in 1955 until disbandment on 30 June 1974, the 7406 SS flew peripheral, predominantly COMINT, missions from the Baltic in the north to the Black and Caspian seas in the south. The Baltic missions ceased in June 1973 as the emphasis moved to the Mediterranean area, with increasing numbers of operational missions flown from Hellinikon near Athens. During its nineteen-year existence the 7406 SS mainly operated from Rhein-Main AB and although the squadron was a USAFE asset, the USAF Security Service (USAFSS) together with the NSA controlled much of its tasking.47 For operational missions, the 7406 SS provided the flight crews and aircraft, but specialist crew members (sensor operators) in the back of
the aircraft, known as ‘Sailors,’ came from Detachment 1 of the 6911th (later the 6916th) Radio Squadron Mobile that was part of the USAFSS. The 7406 SS missions ended when the SAC RC-135s, flying out of RAF Mildenhall in Suffolk, UK, took over the missions and the squadron disbanded on 30 June 1974.
Aircraft of the 7406th SS
The 7406 SS initially received seven RB-50s, including four Boeing RB-50 Dreamboats assigned to ‘B’ Flight and three for the ATRAN mission. The first arrived on 11 December 1956 but operational missions did not start until January 1957 because of security and training problems. The RB-50s were notoriously difficult to keep airworthy because their unreliable R4360 engines, similar to those in the C-97 Stratofreighter, which required constant maintenance and frequent changes. The maintenance personnel believed that if a RB-50 or C-97 arrived at its destination with all four engines running, something was wrong!
The Dreamboat era did not last long and in June 1958 the squadron began conversion to ten C-130A-IIs (Projects Sun Valley I / Rivet Victor I). The aircraft had a second navigator position installed on the flight deck. The rear cargo door was sealed and the main cargo deck had three bays containing ten intercept positions. At the rear of the cargo deck there was an electronics maintenance station. Crew comfort was a considerable improvement over the standard C-130 with four ‘airline-type’ seats at the rear of the main cargo deck, a galley with oven to provide hot meals and drinks and an airline-type toilet. As with previous aircraft the flight crew were drawn from the 7406 SS and the ten sensor operators from the USAFSS.48 In October 1971 the C-130A-IIs were replaced by C-130B-IIs (Projects Sun Valley II / Rivet Victor II), which remained on strength until the 7406 SS disbanded.
