events
Cold War: U-2 Crisis of 1960: Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev announces that his nation is holding American U-2 pilot Gary Powers.
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Cold War
1947–1991 geopolitical rivalry between US and USSR
The Cold War was a period of global geopolitical rivalry between the United States (US) and the Soviet Union (USSR) and their respective allies, the capitalist Western Bloc and communist Eastern Bloc, which began in the aftermath of the Second World War and ended with the…Source: Wikipedia (CC BY-SA)
1960 U-2 incident
Cold War aircraft shootdown
On 1 May 1960, a United States U-2 spy plane was shot down by the Soviet Air Defence Forces while conducting photographic aerial reconnaissance inside Soviet territory. Flown by American pilot Francis Gary Powers, the aircraft had taken off from Peshawar, Pakistan, and crashed…Source: Wikipedia (CC BY-SA)
Nikita Khrushchev
Leader of the Soviet Union from 1953 to 1964
Nikita Sergeyevich Khrushchev was the First Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1953 to 1964 and the Chairman of the Council of Ministers (premier) from 1958 to 1964. As leader, he stunned the communist world by denouncing his predecessor Joseph Stalin and…Source: Wikipedia (CC BY-SA)
Lockheed U-2
American single-jet-engined, subsonic, ultra-high-altitude reconnaissance aircraft
The Lockheed U-2, nicknamed the "Dragon Lady", is an American single-engine, high–altitude reconnaissance aircraft operated by the United States Air Force (USAF) and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) since the 1950s. Designed for all-weather, day-and-night intelligence…Source: Wikipedia (CC BY-SA)
Francis Gary Powers
American pilot (1929–1977)
Francis Gary Powers was an American pilot who served as a United States Air Force officer and a CIA employee. Powers is best known for his involvement in the 1960 U-2 incident, when he was shot down while flying a secret CIA spying mission over the Soviet Union. Powers survived,…Source: Wikipedia (CC BY-SA)