“In December 1956, we still had four functional RB-57A-1 reconnaissance aircraft sitting on the flight line at Yokota—doing nothing,” recalled Robert “Pappy” Hines at the symposium. “I had an idea. Why not give the aircraft to the Chinese Nationalists and let them continue flying reconnaissance over Communist China? I presented my idea to my superiors, who tasked me to come up with a concept of operation. It then went up the chain of command, to the very top, and it was approved. When eventually my operations officer revealed all this to me, I suggested they designate a colonel as project officer. I, as a captain, was the chosen one. I argued a captain didn’t have enough horsepower. To no avail. With the dedicated assistance of then Captain Louis Picciano, five noncommissioned officers, and one technical representative from the Glenn Martin Company, we had a new foreign reconnaissance team ready for action in six months. With that project completed, I was reassigned to Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, where I remained until my retirement in 1964.” “Pappy” Hines, as he was affectionately known to his fellow aviators, retired as a major from the US Air Force and participated in the 2001 Early Cold War Overflights Symposium at DIA Headquarters in Washington, DC.
Captain Louis Picciano, one of “Pappy” Hines’s fellow RB-57A flyers, accompanied the transfer of the RB-57As to the Nationalist Chinese. “We often took the Chinese pilots out over Iwo Jima,” he recalled, “and all the other different islands surrounding Okinawa, to do dead reckoning flights just like they were going to do on an actual mission.” The RB-57A-1 was a single-seat aircraft, so for instructive purposes two aircraft had to be launched. “During this time we moved our families to Taiwan. The Nationalist Chinese pilots flew two or three successful overflights over mainland China. In 1958 one of the RB-57As was shot down. This incident ended RB-57A overflights of Red China. It was evident that such missions were no longer going to go unchallenged. The MiG-19 was capable of engaging our aircraft at operating altitude. With MiG-19s deployed in the Soviet Far East and in China as well, it looked like the RB-57A-1 was just about done in Asia.”
Cargill Hall, Emeritus Chief Historian of the National Reconnaissance Office, and good friend, notes that as a result of that mass overflight by SAC RB-57D aircraft over the Soviet Union on December 18, 1956, an agitated President Dwight D. Eisenhower ordered a cessation of all American overflights of denied territory. Although the president would authorize CIA U-2 overflights to begin again in 1957, the air force SENSINT Program ended with Eisenhower’s December edict. Eisenhower may have shut down the SENSINT Program, but technology was as much of a player in that decision as that multiaircraft SAC overflight in the Vladivostok region. The first flight of the Lockheed U-2 high-altitude reconnaissance aircraft took place on August 4, 1955, a fact that President Eisenhower was very much aware of and a development that he had high hopes for. In 1957, the Space Age began when the Soviets launched Sputnik-1 into earth orbit. A moment of panic ensued for America’s military when the Vanguard rocket that was to take America into space exploded on its launchpad—a moment for Dr. Wernher von Braun to come on stage and begin to set things right.
As for the European Heart Throb contingent. Six of the ten RB-57As converted to RB-57A-1 Heart Throb aircraft arrived at Rhein-Main Air Base, Frankfurt, Germany, on August 23, 1955. The pilots Captains Ralph Findlay, William Gafford, Robert Holladay, Kenneth Johnson, Robert Thorne, and Gerald Cooke were the initial selectees. Within months of his arrival, Ralph Findlay transferred to the 10th TRW, RB-66s, at Spangdahlem Air Base and was replaced by Major Bert Grigsby. They went through the same training at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio, as did the Heart Throb contingent that went to Yokota Air Base. They flew a limited number of missions against Eastern Bloc countries such as Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Yugoslavia, and as far as western Romania and the former East Prussia, now a Soviet possession. Their last overflight was in August 1956, after which they flew numerous photo reconnaissance missions over western Europe. Recalled Major General Gerry E. Cooke, then a captain, “We took pictures of everything in Europe from the New Hebrides off Scotland’s coast, to Gotland Island off the southeast coast of Sweden, to Turkey, Saudi Arabia, North Africa, to Morocco. We deployed to many places and trained constantly. At one time we flew four aircraft into Bandirma, Turkey, a primitive place, where we flew off grass strips. This was a new experience for me in this aircraft. The Heart Throb bird did well on grass. Ground support needs were minimal if pilots were not in a pressure suit. All we needed was a box of starter cartridges, a case of engine oil, and a screwdriver—and some bottled oxygen. One sortie in the winter of 1956 to 1957 took me to Gardermoen, Norway, where the snow was about ten feet deep except on the runway and in the revetments.
RB-57A-1 Heart Throb maximum mission radius for the six aircraft flying out of Frankfurt in 1956.
“In 1958, the Black Knight RB-57D version of the RB-57 began to arrive at the 7407th Support Squadron at Frankfurt Air Base, Germany, from Laughlin Air Force Base, Texas. It was a swept extended-wing version of the Canberra with two extra jets on pylons beneath each wing. It was the model just before the big wing RB/WB-57F. To me,” recalled General Cooke, “the ‘D’ airplane was unimpressive. It lacked the grace of the basic, clean Canberra. Furthermore, U-2s had arrived in theater, first in England and then at Wiesbaden in 1956, before moving to Giebelstadt, and soon thereafter to Incirlik Air Base in Turkey. Since the 7407th Support Squadron frequently operated from Adana on temporary duty, some of us were briefly involved in the orientation of the U-2 flyers. Although impressed with the U-2’s performance, I could muster no feeling for this operation. The civilian intelligence control, combined with using ‘demilitarized’ air force fighter pilots who were receiving salaries almost seven times our own, produced mixed feelings. With my Heart Throb experience behind me, I would not have been comfortable in this kind of operation and thought it a strange setup. I never envied those in the program, although their salaries were head turning. Subsequent events confirmed the accuracy of my misgivings, and General LeMay’s early scorn of the program. The air force subsequently turned the U-2 to salutary use during the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962.”
The early version of the U-2 high-altitude reconnaissance aircraft was a clean looking, lightweight aircraft; in years to come, it was to grow in size, weight, and complexity to the point where the later versions in fact are quite different airplanes. Tail #56-6696 was the first U-2 delivered to the 4080th SRW at Laughlin Air Force Base, Texas, on June 11, 1957. The aircraft pictured here was #13 of the first batch of twenty U-2s built for the air force and flown by the 4080th.
In summary, Major General Cooke concluded at the Early Cold War Overflights Symposium in 2001, “The RB-57A Heart Throb was a great airplane and a joy to fly. In subsequent flying assignments I was never again to experience such measure of pilot freedom to decide and act, and to exercise personal judgment about flying and operational matters, as I did in Heart Throb. I believe we represented the tail end of the kind of military flying that began in World War I, and last existed in the 1950s. We were given objectives and responsibilities—and entrusted to deliver. I believe we did deliver.”
Looking back at his experiences as a young captain in the Heart Throb program, General Cooke at the Early Cold War Overflights Symposium noted, “Most of us in the Heart Throb environment found ourselves for the first time in a Top Secret, need-to-know, Compartmented, national-level controlled security apparatus. Up to this time I had never heard of any security clearance category above Top Secret. I do not remember having a Top Secret security clearance prior to this assignment. Yet, not once do I recall pilots discussing a classified overflight mission with each other or anyone else in our squadron or in social situations. Our subsequent assignments scattered us throughout the air force. We had no opportunity to share our common experiences. We also had no squadron reunions. We were never released to talk about these experiences until now. Security also became a family responsibility. Our spouses undoubtedly knew, in general terms, w
hat we were up to. In those days they just simply did not talk about ‘Dad’s job.’ All military things were secret as far as they were concerned. My wife never knew where I flew in the Heart Throb program until the summer of 2000 when we were informed that the Heart Throb missions had been declassified.”
THE RB-57A-1 HEART THROB: A CHALLENGING PLANE TO FLY (1955–1956)
Ike was very cautious, but he was so intent to gain information on Soviet missile development that he approved a joint CIA/RAF operation in 1955. A stripped down Canberra flew at 55,000 feet, and photographed the secret test facility at Kapustin Yar. The Canberra was hit by ground fire and barely made it back to base. Years later, the CIA concluded that the operation had indeed been compromised by Kim Philby, who was a mole for the KGB.
—Ben Rich and Leo Janos, Skunk Works
Louis J. Picciano Jr. was one of a small group of RB-57A-1 flyers, including Joe Guthrie, Jim Bryant, and “Pappy” Hines, based at Yokota Air Base, Japan, a perennial reconnaissance hub for the US Air Force, a base from which in later years I flew many PARPRO missions in RB-47H reconnaissance aircraft. The RB-57A-1 Heart Throb was a modification of the B-57A, requiring 110 major modifications of the original British Canberra bomber to turn it into an RB-57A-1—and that didn’t mean that all of its peculiarities had been discovered or fixed. Lou Picciano and his fellow aviators rose to the challenge, but at times it was a close thing as each and every one of the four discovered.
“I became involved in the reconnaissance business before I even knew what the word meant,” recalled Lou Picciano in 2001 at the Early Cold War Overflights Symposium at DIA Headquarters in Washington DC. “I was just a few years out of the aviation cadet program in 1951, assigned to a ferrying squadron in Amarillo, Texas, flying C-119s around the world. I had a good squadron commander who ask for volunteers to ferry jet-powered B-57s. I was sent to San Antonio for five rides in the T-33 jet trainer to see if I was ‘adaptable for jets.’ When I tested well, I was sent to Shaw Air Force Base in South Carolina. Bill Gafford, who eventually led the Heart Throb contingent to Europe, was my B-57B instructor. It took several months to check out in the aircraft because of a low in commission rate. I finally finished and ended up back in Amarillo ferrying B/RB-57s from the Martin Company Middle River plant in Maryland to Robins Air Force Base in Georgia.
A Royal Air Force Canberra Mark 2, one of two Canberras delivered to the Martin company, bearing USAF insignia, left Northern Ireland on February 20, 1951, for Gander, Newfoundland, and landed in Baltimore on February 21. This was the first jet aircraft to complete an unrefueled flight across the Atlantic Ocean. On March 2, 1951, the air staff directed production of the B-57, eventually building a total of 403 of all models.34
“One day while at the Martin plant I ran into Bill Gafford again. ‘What are you doing up here?’ I asked him. Aren’t you supposed to be down at Shaw?’ He was evasive and said he couldn’t talk about it. I asked him if he would be interested in me joining his unit, whatever it was they were doing. He said, ‘Yes.’ Then told me that his unit would move to Europe and I might enjoy the assignment. I asked him to drop my name in the hat. Two weeks later I received orders to go to Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Ohio, where I met Bill Gafford and Joe Guthrie. Gafford told me that there had been a mix-up and he couldn’t take me with him to Europe; instead, he said, Guthrie and I would be going to Japan. At Wright-Patterson we were measured for our partial pressure suits before departing again for Robins Air Force Base to pick up four sleek-looking RB-57A-1s. I still did not know what sort of a mission I had volunteered for. As I inspected the aircraft I could see they had no bomb bays, but they had little windows underneath. Probably for cameras, I figured. We flew all four to Hamilton Air Force Base in California, where we sat for quite some time waiting for favorable winds. Our names were painted on the airplanes. I was a lieutenant at the time, the other three were captains. You could see our names on the aircraft from a long way off.
“On August 25, 1955, we took off from Hamilton for Hawaii, then on to Johnson Island. I was Guthrie’s wingman, and next to me was another pilot, ‘Pappy’ Hines. Pappy was on Jim Bryant’s wing to the right of Guthrie. After we landed at Johnson Air Base, Guthrie told me he wanted me on his right wing in a formation takeoff. I was stunned. Because I had not flown in formation since training as an aviation cadet. I had never made a formation takeoff. While Jim Bryant and Joe Guthrie planned the next leg of our flight to Kwajalein and Guam, Pappy and I sat in the corner smoking. I think I had two cigarettes in my mouth at once. Nervously I asked Pappy, ‘Can you give me any tips on a formation takeoff?’ ‘Once your power gets stabilized,’ he replied, ‘make small throttle movements and stay close to Joel. You absolutely do not want to go off the right side of the runway and roll up in a fireball.’ I quickly put another cigarette in my mouth. I only had eight hundred hours flying time, total. Didn’t feel I was really up to snuff for this maneuver. As it turned out, the formation takeoff went great.
“After Pappy arrived at Yokota Air Base after his engine change in Kwajalein, we realized that none of us knew anything about reconnaissance. So we began ground school training. I still remember the formula: focal length over altitude equals scale. Once we had that information, we had to compute how much film it would take to cover the target. It was a good school and taught us most of the tricks of the trade. While still learning the nuts and bolts of aerial reconnaissance, Joe Guthrie would kick us out onto the tarmac to fly our planes. Every couple of weeks we would have to struggle into our suits and fly a mission we had worked out in reconnaissance school. I remember the mission Joe Guthrie flew to Sakhalin Island where he made a 360-degree turn. The group commander said, ‘Get that guy back to reconnaissance school. You don’t make 360s.’ What did we know?
“Everything was going well and I began to think this duty was going to be a piece of cake. Then things turned sour. I loved the RB-57A-1 Heart Throb airplane, but it was a one-way romance. The aircraft was tricky to fly and prone to strange behavior in flight. On one occasion, the left engine just quit on me. No problem. I came in on one engine and landed, hoping this was not a bad omen. Then Jim Bryant went out on his overflight mission, and one of his tip tanks failed to jettison and lodged up against the vent mast. When that happened, his airplane pitched up and stalled. When the cockpit armrest came out, it triggered the ejection sequence. Jim tried to put the pin in but couldn’t do it. He was sitting on a hot seat. All the violent movement sheered off some engine compressor blades, so that engine was gone and useless. Jim Bryant managed to deal with all of his problems, but it didn’t look good for us. The next time I went up I couldn’t get the landing gear to retract. I had three green lights, indicating the gear was down and locked. After burning some fuel I landed, rolled about 400 feet, then heard a ‘clunk, clunk, clunk’ as all three wheels retracted into the undercarriage. ‘You should have seen the sparks,’ one wide-eyed mechanic told me. I was beginning to wonder about this airplane.
“Joe Guthrie took my RB-57A-1 into the hangar, and he and Jim Bryant put it on jacks to examine the undercarriage. They were able to duplicate the problem I experienced in the air. When they picked up the airplane on the runway, they dropped and bent it a little bit. Now we had to fly it to Tachikawa, about ten miles away, where there was a repair depot. Joe Guthrie and Jim Bryant patched the plane up the best they could, and Joe flew it, gear and flaps down, to Tachikawa. There it stayed for four months until we got it back. I continued to have difficulties with this airplane. I was flying to Johnson Air Base, put the gear down, put the flaps down, and ‘boom’ straight down I went to about 1,000 feet. All of a sudden the aircraft recovered and flew normally. This airplane featured a flap-and-yoke-connected operation, I learned. When the flaps went down, the airplane tended to pitch up, then the yoke automatically moved forward to pitch it down. When the signal went to the yoke to move forward, the flaps did not come down right away, explaining my startling loss of altitude on approach to Johnson. I knew
this airplane was out to get me.
“Joe Guthrie flew the first overflight mission. Jim Bryant flew the next one, followed by Pappy Hines. It was my turn with Joe Guthrie as my backup. Sometime that October I took off and immediately tested my cameras. There was no green light on the six-inch camera. I swapped the bulbs—that wasn’t the problem. I came back and called the tower, the signal for Joe to take off. The problem turned out to be a sheered camera film drive shaft. Somebody up there didn’t want me to fly that mission.
“Our overflight operations began to wind down, but for a reason we would never have suspected possible at the time. We had a young lieutenant named Ray Ramsey stationed with us, a little bitty guy who flew the RF-86. On one training flight over Japan, soon after he had finished his mission, he decided to see how high he could get the RF-86 to fly over Yokota Air Base. He kept going up, and up, and up to above 50,000 feet. He happened to look up and to his great surprise there was an aircraft flying over him to the east, toward Tokyo, at an even higher altitude. Alarmed, he immediately went into a dive and landed. He reported to Colonel Kaufman, our squadron commander, that he had seen a strange-looking airplane flying above him. Kaufman called Colonel Avery at Group Headquarters and reported the sighting. Avery in turn called 5th Air Force, and Ramsey was ordered to report immediately for interrogation. So, Ray did as he was told, and they showed him pictures of various Russian aircraft. Finally, they showed Lieutenant Ramsey a picture of a MiG-19, and he immediately recognized it. With the MiG-19 in the Russian inventory, they had the ability to intercept any of our reconnaissance aircraft over their airspace. This was not possible with the MiG-15 or MiG-17 fighters. The MiG-19 deployment to the Far East shut us down.” And of course the same was true in Europe, where the MiG-19 was deployed even earlier, before its deployment to the Pacific region of the USSR.
Silent Warriors, Incredible Courage Page 14
