U-2 SECRET -- A SECRET MEDAL, TOO

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP75-00001R000400100039-1
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 15, 2016
• Document Release Date: November 14, 2003
• Sequence Number: 39
• Publication Date: May 5, 1965
• Content Type: NSPR

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Approved For Release 2003/12/02 : CIA-RDP75-6000,1 ROOD b610 ~
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II-2 Secret
-A Secret
Medal, Too
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'five years to bestow the.medal'i never disclosed that the Soviet''
on Mr. Powers. Last Saturday spy had done his spying in
vas the fifth anniversary of the U. S. A Federal court fn
the U-2 flight. I New York sentenced him to''
the ceremony and the secret ^ The Moscow TV narrator
medal were made prior to the. said Abel was now living in
departure of John A. McCune Moscow and probably was,
as CIA director. President
watching the TV program. He
Johnson swore in Adm. _ Wil-. ? said his arrest was triggered
liam Raborn as the new CIA. by a "despicaible treason."
.director last Wednesday. The Russian spy, a, highly-
The night before, the Presi- educated man and an amateur
dent awarded a medal to Mr. , painter, was arrested in Man-
McCone for, his services as hattan after his aid, ?Reino
CIA head. That private core- Hayhaben, defected to the
mony was not announced until CIA }n Paris.
the next day. But that award,
the National Security Medal, Mr. Powers, was downed
unlike Mr: Powers' medal, is Y (the by aASovtecl concluded mbe was
issile)
not a secret.
The soft-spoken, dark- near Sverdlovsk, deep inside
haired Mr. Powers, raised in the Soviet Union while on a
the Virginia mountain.country photo reconnaissance. mission
and now 35 was traded for as a $30,000-a-year pilot for.
I?' The pilot was officially
cleared by the board of 1n-
Iquiry and a CIA report issued,
the day he testified before,
,the Senate found that he had
,lived up to "his obligations as
an American under the cir-
cumstances in which he found f
himself." It also said he would, 1
get his back pay.
Mr. Powers disappeared off.
the front pages, back into the
CIA. On Nov: '3, 1962, the.1
,CIA announced tersely that.
Mr, Powers had taken "a rou-t
tine test pilot job" with Lock,j
heed at Burbank. and had lef0
the Agency' bel:ause "his work
was finished." Mr. Powers and;
By David Wise
Washington Bureau Chief
WASHINGTON.
In a secret ceremony,' the
Central Intelligence Agency
last month awarded a secret
medal to Francis Gary Pow-
ers, the U-2 pilot whose crash
on, May 1, ;1960, deep inside
the Soviet Union,- shook the
world-and caused a good
`deal of anguish ' to the CIA,
The. summit meeting in
Paris collapsed in the wake
of the L)'-2 'uproar. The affair
chilled East-West relations
,and ended any meaningful
? contact ? between President
1 ,Eisenhower and then Soviet
t Premier Khrushchev.
Mr. Powers, officially a test
pilot In, Burbank, Calif., for the
Lockheed Aircraft Corp., man-
ufacturer of the U-2, received
the CIA medal in a ceremony
about two weeks ago at the
intelligence agency's head-
quarters in Langley; Va.
Like the ceremony, the
Soviet master spy Rudolf the CIA. Ostensibly, he was a ;his wife, Barbara, were di-.':
r`vanovich Abel on Feb: 10, civilian working for Lockheed.;vorced a.hd in October; 1 ?63,
{
1962. The exchange, arranged This was his "cover. 'lie remarried.
by New York attorney James When Premier Khrushchev . As far' as is known, lie' "has
B. Donovan, took place on a
mist-shrouded bridge in Bcr- revealed the U-2 had been:', remained at . Lockheed,., they
lin. downed, the Eisenhower ad--.company that providcd. the
By an Odd coincidence, the ministration was thrown into .cover" for the CIA' fU;ht3
Soviet Union yesterday made ' confusion: -''At -;.first, was. over Russia..;'ntil the;, .tost
the rare, and first, admission said that the -spy. plane' was,
that Col. Abel had served as a NASA "'Wkther"' plane, famous' one, on"May,-1,, 1960.
a master spy for Russia-and that the pilot had drifted off :And.this May, 1965.'the pleas-.
was decorated after his ex- ' course aftenn''his oxygen _ F;ave. ant young Man from the Vir-
change for Mr., Powers. A out. 'Then Premier '.Khru.:: gi'nia, hfll.,count;y has a medal
Moscow television program shchev revealed that he had. that he cannot -wear, awarded
said Abel had served in Soviet both plane Wand-'pilot. The,.. At a- ceremony,.:'which as far'
intelligence since 1927. It is' U. S. skid the t.: flight had.',as the CIA is concerned, never.,
unusual for the Russians to taken place, but denied it was 'took place:.,.
, - .. _,..,_L,.__._._. , ,wrnecct?e,.,dW.-I'lTrIhunI ant.
,not supposed ?to tell anybody
about it. He is not supposed to
wear it. In fact, it is sort of an
invisible medal.
. Certainly the CIA isn't talk-
ing about it. When the New
York Herald Tribt o-; Sicked ?a,spokesman for the ; Lgency to
confirm the award, he replied:
""No comment' at all. He's a
former. employee. 'We don't
comment 'on 'forma: eraploy-
ees.'
However, it ws reliably,
learned that the sc-.cret medal
was awarded at . it ceremony',
attended by sever-a.1 toil ofitc-
ials of the CIA. The award is
,known by some in the. intelli-
gence -business as "one of
those under-the-lapel medals.'.'
'There were at least two
mysteries' surrounding the
stration said the flight had
been authori'ed by President""
Eisenhower,- and. Implied that
the flights would continue.
TALKS END
: At the Paris summit; _ the
President said the flights over
Russia had been stopped' and
would not be resumed, 'but
the Soviet leader stormed out
and the meeting collapsed.
After Mr. Powers' return to
hid him for 24 days, subject-
ing him to exhausting interro-
gation,about what had hap--
1pened' up there. Principally,
the board of inquiry set up
why he had not used the
Francis Gary' Powers as he. ' "destruct" switches in the
high-flying U-2 that would
appeared as ' a Russian` have set off a powerful ex-
prisoncr in Moscow. in .'plosive charge-after a time
December of 1960. . , lag, the pilots were told. .. -
In ? testimony before the
.wanted to bestow an award 'I agents are being -hailed as mittee, after he. passed the
on its most famous 'employee heroes for home consumption. boar dof inquiry, -Mr. Powers
-one who brought the agency ? The telecast told how Abel 'said he 'had tried. to reach
.ender the". "Public scrutiny.; was defended against a "pus- the "destruct" ' switches, -- but
which it always trireessto'avoid. I sable ~ death sentence" -by Mr. 1couldn't because of gravity
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