Operation Overflight: A Memoir of the U-2 Incident (Revised)

In this new edition of his classic 1970 memoir about the notorious U-2 incident, pilot Francis Gary Powers reveals the full story of what actually happened in the most sensational espionage case in Cold War history. After surviving the shoot-down of his reconnaissance plane and his capture on May 1, 1960, Powers endured sixty-one days of rigorous interrogation by the KGB, a public trial, a conviction for espionage, and the start of a ten-year sentence. After nearly two years, the U.S. government obtained his release from prison in a dramatic exchange for convicted Soviet spy Rudolph Abel. The narrative is a tremendously exciting suspense story about a man who was labeled a traitor by many of his countrymen but who emerged a Cold War hero.

Author: Francis Gary Powers, Curt Gentry
Publisher: University of Nebraska Press
Published: 12/01/2003
Pages: 344
Binding Type: Paperback
Weight: 1.15lbs
Size: 8.90h x 6.00w x 1.00d
ISBN13: 9781574884227
ISBN10: 1574884220
BISAC Categories:
- Biography & Autobiography | Military
- History | Military | Aviation & Space
- History | Russia & the Former Soviet Union

About the Author
Francis Gary Powers served as a pilot in the U.S. Air Force and completed twenty-seven U-2 photographic reconnaissance missions for the CIA, including several overflights of the Soviet Union, until shot down by a Soviet surface-to-air missile on May 1, 1960. Upon his return to the United States in 1962, he flew the U-2 as an engineering test pilot for Lockheed Aircraft. Powers died in a helicopter crash in 1977.

Curt Gentry has written or contributed to many books, including Helter Skelter: The True Story of the Manson Murders and J. Edgar Hoover: The Man and the Secrets. He lives in San Francisco.