Editing Lockheed U-2 (section)

===="Bomber gap" disproven====
{{main|Bomber gap}}

On 10 July, the Soviets protested what they described as overflights by a USAF "twin-engine medium bomber", apparently believing that it was a [[Martin B-57 Canberra|B-57 Canberra]]. The U.S. replied on 19 July that no American "military planes" had overflown the Soviet Union, but the fact that the Soviets' report showed that they could track the U-2s for extended periods caused Eisenhower to immediately halt overflights over eastern Europe. Beyond the Soviet protests, the president was concerned about the American public's reaction to the news that the U.S. had violated international law. To avoid project cancellation, the CIA began [[Project Rainbow]] to make the U-2 less detectable. The eight overflights over communist territory, however, had already shown that the bomber gap did not exist; the U-2s had not found any [[Myasishchev M-4]] Bison bombers at the nine bases they had visited. Because the Eisenhower administration could not disclose the source of its intelligence, however, Congressional and public debate over the bomber gap continued.{{sfn|Pedlow|Welzenbach|1992|pp=100–112}}