That was after he invented the Infra Red telescope. Then he was offered a job at to make a camera to put on the U-2 airplane to see if the Soviets were about to launch a military strike against the USA. [That is, to see if there was any indication anywhere inside the USSR if they were planning on a strike of any sort against the USA. No one in the USA had any info, and President Eisenhauer had been advised to launch a preemptive strike against the USSR. Instead, he exercised caution, and decided to create the U-2 project.
[In fact, the U-2 camera showed that the USSR was not planning any sort of attack on the USA. So the U-2 had the great merit of avoiding WWIII.]
