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Peebles, Curtis. Dark Eagles: A History of Top Secret U.S. Aircraft Programs. Novato, Calif: Presidio, 1995. 344pp. $17.95
Through extensive research from a variety of sources, Curtis Peebles gives the reader a fascinating and informative look into the top secret world of"black aircraft." He chronicles a dozen or so projects that produced such exotic planes as the SR-71 and the F-117, which were developed and first flown largely without public knowledge. The reason for all the secrecy was, of course, to keep foreign countries from knowing the extent of U.S. technological developments.
The beginning of the "black" projects came in September 1941, with the decision to build the first operational jet fighter, the XP59A, using the British Whittle engine. Wartime security demands by the British and American governments wrapped the project in the kind of secrecy and deception that was to be a model for later such projects. The Bell P-59 Airacomet was not successful as a fighter, but the Lockheed P-80 was. The Shooting Star's secret birthplace was the "Skunk Works," the experimental design facility created by Clarence "Kelly" Johnson, Lockheed's legendary...