best. Yet the context helps explain Eisenhower’s thinking: just a few months earlier, James Killian had made his heart-stopping presentation in the White House about the vulnerabilities of the United States to a surprise attack. In reply the president had ordered a rapid program to get the U-2 spy plane operational. Its first test run would come in August. Eisenhower desperately wanted the information the secret overflights would provide to be sure that the USSR was not preparing a major attack. But how much easier it would be if both sides simply opened their skies to aircraft for approved
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