Indeed, one of the first things the U-2 proved was that there was no bomber gap, as some critics of the administration had claimed. There had been a nervousness since Russia’s Aviation Day in 1955, when a squadron of Bison bombers had flown over the parade, followed by several other squadrons. The U-2 revealed that what the Soviets had almost surely done that day was flown the same few squadrons in repeated sorties. As for the missile gap, the U-2 showed that though the Soviets were working on their missiles, they had yet to launch an ICBM.
