Project 119L was a Cold War

reconnaissance In military operations, reconnaissance or scouting is the exploration of an area by military forces to obtain information about enemy forces, terrain, and other activities. Examples of reconnaissance include patrolling by troops (skirmisher ...

operation by the

U.S. Air Force The United States Air Force (USAF) is the air service branch of the United States Armed Forces, and is one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. Originally created on 1 August 1907, as a part of the United States Army Sign ...

in which large espionage balloons floated

cameras A camera is an optical instrument that can capture an image. Most cameras can capture 2D images, with some more advanced models being able to capture 3D images. At a basic level, most cameras consist of sealed boxes (the camera body), with a ...

over the

Soviet Union The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, ...

Operations

The spy balloons would photograph sensitive Soviet sites and either hang in the air or land in the Sea of Japan until either a crew flying the

C-119 Flying Boxcar The Fairchild C-119 Flying Boxcar (Navy and Marine Corps designation R4Q) was an American military transport aircraft developed from the World War II-era Fairchild C-82 Packet, designed to carry cargo, personnel, litter patients, and mechani ...

or a naval vessel retrieved them. The project caused a row between the U.S. and Soviet forces when the Soviets discovered the remnants of a U.S. spy camera in February 1956. Other reconnaissance balloon projects from the era included

Project Skyhook Skyhook balloons were high-altitude balloons developed by Otto C. Winzen and General Mills, Inc. They were used by the United States Navy Office of Naval Research (ONR) in the late 1940s and 1950s for atmospheric research, especially for con ...

Project Mogul Project Mogul (sometimes referred to as Operation Mogul) was a top secret project by the US Army Air Forces involving microphones flown on high-altitude balloons, whose primary purpose was long-distance detection of sound waves generated by Sovie ...

, Project Grandson, and Project Genetrix. The previously conducted "Project Moby Dick" used much smaller balloons launched from what was called a "Covered Wagon". Their payloads were then tracked across the continental United States to map and study high altitude wind trajectories.Peebles, Curtis, 1991. ''The Moby Dick Project: Reconnaissance Balloons over Russia.'' Smithsonian Books, Project Flying Cloud, Weapons System 124A, was a derived concept to use balloons to deliver

weapons of mass destruction A weapon of mass destruction (WMD) is a chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear, or any other weapon that can kill and bring significant harm to numerous individuals or cause great damage to artificial structures (e.g., buildings), natu ...

References

Fairchild C-119 "Boxcar"
Cold War espionage Soviet Union–United States relations Balloons (aeronautics) Aerial reconnaissance Military equipment introduced in the 1950s {{mil-aviation-stub

Operations

See also

References