By Any Means Necessary

More about the book

Unknown to the public and cloaked in the utmost secrecy, the United States flew missions against the Communist bloc almost continually during the Cold War in a desperate effort to collect intelligence and find targets for all-out nuclear war. The only hint of the relentless, clandestine operations came when one of the planes was shot down. But now, for the first time, award winning historian William E. Burrows, shows that others were captured by the Russians, Chinese, North Koreans, and were tortured, imprisoned, and killed, while their government looked the other way. In an effort to improve relations with Russia, Washington is still looking the other way, though it pretends otherwise. Burrows has interviewed scores of men who flew these 'black' missions, as well as the widows and children of those who never returned, all of whom want the full story finally told. He has done so with an eye to this story's immensely human dimension.