Operation Brass Knob
Del Rio, Val Verde County, Texas
Marker Inscription
Laughlin Air Force Base pilots flew secret surveillance missions during the height of the Cold War. The Strategic Air Command formed the 4080th Strategic Reconnaissance Wing in 1956, utilizing high altitude Martin RB-57D and Lockheed U-2 aircraft for covert surveillance of the Soviet Union. The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) used U-2s, most staged from Laughlin AFB, to monitor activities in the Caribbean following the Cuban Revolution. Based on intelligence reports, President John Kennedy ordered military flights over Cuba to investigate a suspected buildup of Soviet-supplied missiles with nuclear warheads close to American soil. The first flight over Cuban airspace, on October 14, 1962, used reconnaissance photography to find evidence of medium range ballistic missiles in Cuba. The U.S. Navy processed and the CIA confirmed the presence of launch sites through photo interpretation. On October 16, the CIA briefed Kennedy, and a maximum aerial photographic reconnaissance effort commenced, codenamed "Operation Brass Knob." Subsequent U-2 flights produced photographs of 95 percent of Cuba's territory. Kennedy announced a naval quarantine of Cuba on October 22. Military action, including naval maneuvers, increased, and the Cuban Missile Crisis peaked on the 27th, when a surface to air missile shot down the U-2 of Rudolf Anderson, Jr., the only combat casualty of the conflict. Surviving U-2 pilots later revealed all eleven U-2 pilots received enemy fire. When Kennedy presented the 4080th with an Outstanding Unit Award, he noted, "The work of these units has contributed as much to the security of the United States as any unit in our history, and any group of men in our history." (2007) SUPPLEMENTAL PLAQUE 1: October 14-27, 1962 pilots: Majors Rudolf Anderson, Jr., Buddy L. Brown, Edwin G. Emerling, Richard S. Heyser and James A. Qualls. SUPPLEMENTAL PLAQUE 2: October 14-27, 1962 pilots: Captains George M. Bull, Roger H. Herman, Charles W. Kern, Gerald E. McIlmoyle, Robert L. Primrose and Daniel W. Schmarr.
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
From Laughlin Air Force Base near Del Rio, Strategic Air Command and CIA crews flew high-altitude U-2 and RB-57 aircraft on secret Cold War reconnaissance. In October 1962 their cameras captured the Soviet missile sites in Cuba that touched off the Cuban Missile Crisis, and under 'Operation Brass Knob' U-2s photographed nearly all of the island. The crisis peaked on October 27 when a surface-to-air missile downed Maj. Rudolf Anderson Jr., the confrontation's only combat death.
Why it matters
The reconnaissance flights staged from this Texas base gave President Kennedy the evidence that defined the Cuban Missile Crisis, the closest the Cold War ever came to nuclear war.
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Related people
- · Rudolf Anderson, Jr.
- · John F. Kennedy
Related events
- · Cuban Missile Crisis
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
Rudolf Anderson, Jr.
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South Carolina native Rudolf Anderson joined the Air Force in 1951 and flew reconnaissance during the Korean Conflict before being stationed at Laughlin Air Force Base near Del Rio. On October 27, 1962, at the height of the Cuban Missile Crisis, he was piloting a U-2 over Cuba to photograph a missile site under construction when antiaircraft fire brought down his plane, making him the only American airman killed in the crisis. Decorated posthumously, he was honored in 2001 when Laughlin's operations building was named Anderson Hall.
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