Panhandle U2 pilot feared he'd be blamed for starting nuclear war

Bill Kaczor | The Associated Press
Posted October 8, 2005, 1:11 PM EDT

APALACHICOLA, Fla. -- No one was more relieved than Richard "Steve" Heyser when the Cuban Missile Crisis ended peacefully 43 years ago. Heyser didn't want to go down in history as the man who started World War III.

The now-retired Air Force lieutenant colonel piloted a U-2 spy plane back then. On Oct. 14, 1962, he took the photos that President John F. Kennedy called "unmistakable evidence" of ballistic missile launching sites that the Soviet Union was building in Cuba.

"I kind of felt like I was going to be looked at as the one who started the whole thing," Heyser, 78, said at his Florida Panhandle home. "I wasn't anxious to have that reputation."

Heyser's name, though, is forever linked to the missile site pictures, but he believes 10 other Air Force U-2 pilots who also flew over Cuba during the crisis should share the credit. <snip>

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