Please include this as the description: "On May 1, 1960, the news that the Soviet Union had downed a CIA high-altitude spy plane added the names "U-2" and "Francis Gary Powers" to the convoluted narrative of Cold War espionage. Yet this celebrated episode was only one aspect of an extraordinary history of covert, high-tech intrusion of secret U.S. aircraft into other nations' air space worldwide. Now, The Central Intelligence Agency and Overhead Reconnaissance: The U-2 and Oxcart Programs offers an official, comprehensive, and authoritative history of this manned overhead reconnaissance program. Long classified, it describes not only the program's technological and bureaucratic aspects, but also its political and international context. The book begins by carefully documenting the origins of the U-2, the top-secret testing of the plane, its specially designed high-altitude cameras and complex life-support systems, and even the suggested use of potassium cyanide capsules by the pilots if captured (it was up to each pilot to decide if he wanted to take one with him?some did, most did not). Once operational, its flight over the USSR in July 1956 immediately made the U-2 the most important source of intelligence on the Soviet Union, but its use against the Soviet target for which it was designed produced a persistent tension between its program managers and President Eisenhower, with the former much more eager to expand its use and the latter going along only reluctantly. After the 1960 U-2 incident and the capture of pilot Gary Francis Powers, the President forbade any further U-2 flights over the USSR. This was hardly the end of the U-2's participation in the Cold War. From the Bay of Pigs and the Cuban missile crisis to the skies of Laos and North Vietnam, the U-2 provided the same top-secret intelligence data as it had in the 1950s on revolts in Indonesia and Tibet. Even after the end of the U-2 era, the CIA attempted to continue its work via the Oxcart project?the A-12 surveillance aircraft?until fiscal pressures and CIA-Air Force rivalry caused its demise. Based upon both full access to CIA records and extensive classified interviews of its participants, along with maps, drawings, and low-resolution photographs, this important study provides an engrossing and timely look into the development and implementation of a top-secret U.S. intelligence effort, its technological wizardry, notable accomplishments?and the worldwide negative repercussions when it was revealed. Both fascinating history and cautionary tale, The Central Intelligence Agency and Overhead Reconnaissance will be of immense interest to students of military aviation, intelligence operations, international relations, history of the Cold War."

Here is a broad and richly documented examination of a little studied social group--the German nobility outside Prussia. Gregory Pedlow considers the nobles of the small but representative state of Hesse-Kassel from the end of the ancien regime to the era of German unification. Although this period has been most often described in terms of the "triumph of the bourgeoisie," the author shows that landholding Hessian nobles were able to preserve much of their political prestige and social and economic power during these years. By demonstrating a mixture of conservatism and flexibility instead of blind reaction, the Hessian nobility maintained its position as a landed elite. The author focuses on four main areas: the noble family, with material showing changes in marriage patterns and family size and the impact of such demographic changes on inheritance practices; noble landownership, with documentation as to how noble landholdings and landed income survived the loss of traditional noble privileges and payments by peasants; noble occupations, with information (including collective biography) showing nobles' education, career choices, and degree of success in obtaining positions in government service; and the nobility's political response to the growing pressure for reform during the nineteenth century. Originally published in 1988. The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.

Here is a broad and richly documented examination of a little studied social group--the German nobility outside Prussia. Gregory Pedlow considers the nobles of the small but representative state of Hesse-Kassel from the end of the ancien regime to the era of German unification. Although this period has been most often described in terms of the "triumph of the bourgeoisie," the author shows that landholding Hessian nobles were able to preserve much of their political prestige and social and economic power during these years. By demonstrating a mixture of conservatism and flexibility instead of blind reaction, the Hessian nobility maintained its position as a landed elite.

The author focuses on four main areas: the noble family, with material showing changes in marriage patterns and family size and the impact of such demographic changes on inheritance practices; noble landownership, with documentation as to how noble landholdings and landed income survived the loss of traditional noble privileges and payments by peasants; noble occupations, with information (including collective biography) showing nobles' education, career choices, and degree of success in obtaining positions in government service; and the nobility's political response to the growing pressure for reform during the nineteenth century.

Originally published in 1988.

The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These paperback editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.

Please include this as the description: "On May 1, 1960, the news that the Soviet Union had downed a CIA high-altitude spy plane added the names U-2 and Francis Gary Powers to the convoluted narrative of Cold War espionage. Yet this celebrated episode was only one aspect of an extraordinary history of covert, high-tech intrusion of secret U.S. aircraft into other nations air space worldwide. Now, The Central Intelligence Agency and Overhead Reconnaissance: The U-2 and Oxcart Programs offers an official, comprehensive, and authoritative history of this manned overhead reconnaissance program. Long classified, it describes not only the program's technological and bureaucratic aspects, but also its political and international context. The book begins by carefully documenting the origins of the U-2, the top-secret testing of the plane, its specially designed high-altitude cameras and complex life-support systems, and even the suggested use of potassium cyanide capsules by the pilots if captured (it was up to each pilot to decide if he wanted to take one with him?some did, most did not). Once operational, its flight over the USSR in July 1956 immediately made the U-2 the most important source of intelligence on the Soviet Union, but its use against the Soviet target for which it was designed produced a persistent tension between its program managers and President Eisenhower, with the former much more eager to expand its use and the latter going along only reluctantly. After the 1960 U-2 incident and the capture of pilot Gary Francis Powers, the President forbade any further U-2 flights over the USSR. This was hardly the end of the U-2 s participation in the Cold War. From the Bay of Pigs and the Cuban missile crisis to the skies of Laos and North Vietnam, the U-2 provided the same top-secret intelligence data as it had in the 1950s on revolts in Indonesia and Tibet. Even after the end of the U-2 era, the CIA attempted to continue its work via the Oxcart project?the A-12 surveillance aircraft?until fiscal pressures and CIA-Air Force rivalry caused its demise. Based upon both full access to CIA records and extensive classified interviews of its participants, along with maps, drawings, and low-resolution photographs, this important study provides an engrossing and timely look into the development and implementation of a top-secret U.S. intelligence effort, its technological wizardry, notable accomplishments?and the worldwide negative repercussions when it was revealed. Both fascinating history and cautionary tale, The Central Intelligence Agency and Overhead Reconnaissance will be of immense interest to students of military aviation, intelligence operations, international relations, history of the Cold War."