In Error, B-52 Flew Over U.S. With Nuclear-Armed Missiles
Thursday, September 6, 2007;
that were mistakenly attached to the airplane's wing, defense officials said yesterday.
The Stratofortress bomber, based at Minot Air Force Base in
North Dakota, was transporting a dozen Advanced Cruise Missiles
to
Barksdale Air Force Base in
Louisiana on Aug. 30. But crews inadvertently loaded half of them
with nuclear warheads attached.
Air Force officials said the warheads were not activated and at no
time posed a threat to the public. But a timeline of the episode
supplied by the Air Force yesterday to House and Senate lawmakers
indicated that the missiles in question sat on a runway in
Louisiana
for nearly 10 hours before workers noticed that the nuclear warheads
were inside.
Military officials also said they were concerned that the warheads
were unaccounted for several hours while the missiles were in
transit.
The missiles never left Air Force control, they said.
The cruise missiles -- part of an Air Force fleet of more than 400
of their kind -- are being retired and usually would not carry
nuclear
warheads while being transported. Defense officials said the B-52's
mission last week did not include training runs, so
the missiles were
never meant to be launched. The cruise missiles have a range of about
2,000 miles and are designed to hit
precision targets well behind a
potential enemy's lines.
Two defense officials said it is unclear how stringent safeguards
for the handling of nuclear weapons were skirted, allowing the
missiles with the warheads to be loaded onto a pylon that was then
attached to the underside of the B-52's wing. Air Force officials
said
the mistake was a serious breach of rules and that an investigation
began immediately.
Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Carl M. Levin (D-Mich.)
and
Sen. John McCain (Ariz.),
the panel's ranking
Republican, yesterday jointly called the episode
"a matter of grave concern" and, in a letter to
Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates,
requested an investigation of
the incident by
the Pentagon's inspector general.
The aircraft's pilots and other crew members were unaware that they
were carrying nuclear warheads, officials said. "Essentially,
this is
an issue of a departure from our very exacting standards," said Lt.
Col. Edward Thomas, an Air Force spokesman at the
Pentagon, who
declined to confirm that nuclear warheads were involved. "The Air
Force maintains the highest standards of safety
and precision, so any
deviation from these well-established munitions procedures is very
serious, and we are responding swiftly."
The incident, first reported by the Military Times, prompted senior
leaders to relieve a munitions squadron commander of his duties.
Other
airmen have been temporarily suspended from duties.
"Nothing like this has ever been reported before, and we have been
assured for decades that it was impossible," said
Rep. Edward J. Markey (D-Mass.), co-chairman of the House
Bipartisan Task Force on Nonproliferation. "The complete
breakdown of
the Air Force command and control over enough nuclear weapons to
destroy several cities has frightening
implications not only for the
Air Force, but for the security of our entire nuclear weapons
stockpile."
The Air Force's Air Combat Command has ordered a stand-down for its
bases next week to review procedures and prevent a
repeat of the
mistake. "All evidence seems to point to this being an isolated
mistake," Thomas said.
Geoff Morrell, a Pentagon spokesman, told reporters at a news
conference yesterday that Gates was informed of the incident
early
last Friday and has been receiving daily progress reports. Morrell
said
President Bush was also notified.
In a statement yesterday,
Rep. Ike Skelton (D-Mo.), chairman of the House Armed Services
Committee, said he found the
reports "deeply disturbing."
Was That Nuclear-Armed B-52 Flight Destined for Iran?
Written by Dave Lindorff
Monday, 10 September 2007
There’s something definitely screwy about the August 30 incident in which
a B-52 bomber flew from Minot AFB in North Dakota to
Barksdale AFB in Louisiana carrying five fully armed
Advanced Cruise Missiles, each equipped with nuclear
bombs capable of
exploding at anything from 5
kilotons to 150 kilotons.
The government has been quick to say that the
flight, which violated a number of long-standing
orders regarding shipment of nuclear
weapons in US
airspace, was a “mistake.”
But was it a mistake?
The biggest question is why a B-52 armed with
nuclear-tipped cruise missiles would fly to
Barksdale AFB. If, as reported, the weapons
were
being transported to be decommissioned, which
supposedly is the destination for 400 of these
doomsday weapons, then they should
have been
destined for Kirtland AFB in New Mexico, near the Pantex plant outside Amarillo, TX, where they would
be dismantled. As
Michael Salla writes in a
disturbing piece in Saturday’s edition of
OpEdNews, the weapons should also not have been
flown at all on a
B-52, as there have been standing
orders for 40 years against such flights over US
soil, following several accidents in which bombs or
nuclear-armed rockets were lost because “broken
arrow” incidents including inadvertent bomb drops or
crashes. A second order,
issued in 1991 at the end
of the Cold War by George Bush’s father, barred the
loading of nuclear weapons on any bomber. Any pilot
would have known this, as would any ground support
people loading the missiles on the B-52.
According to Salla, if these five cruise missiles
were really being transported by air to Texas for
decommissioning, they should have
been disarmed and
flown in specially designed transport planes that
are built to resist nuclear leakage in the event of
a crash. They
would never be transported under the
wings of a B-52.
What makes the incident even more suspicious is that
Barksdale AFB is a staging area for B-52s being sent
to the Middle East for
combat duty. As the website
GlobalSecurity.org reports: “Barksdale Air Force
Base is headquarters for the 2d Bomb Wing, Eighth
Air Force and 917th Wing. The 2d Bomb Wing provides
global combat capability and trains all B-52 combat
crews.”
The official
Barksdale AFB website says: “Barksdale warriors
and B-52s have a proud tradition serving both at
home and abroad in
support of the Global War on
Terrorism; they have played vital roles in combat
operations supporting Operation Enduring Freedom
in
Afghanistan and Operation Iraqi Freedom.”
The original expose of the B-52 flight appeared in
the newspaper . Staff writer Michael Hoffman writes
that his initial source for the
story was three
officers “who asked not to be identified because
they were not authorized to discuss the incident.”
So this is a case where some military officers who
knew something wrong was happening did the
honorable, patriotic thing and went
public with a
publication they trusted, both to do the right
thing, and to protect them.
So what is actually going on here?
that it has been widely reported that the top brass in the US military (note: with the exception of some wackos in the Air Force), have
staunchly opposed any use of nuclear weapons in the event of an air attack on Iran. So an order to send nuclear-armed cruise missiles
to the Persian Gulf region, if that’s what this flight was, would not likely have come through the normal chain of command from the
Secretary of Defense through the Air Combat Command (ACC, successor to SAC). It would, Salla hints darkly, have come through
the back channel set up since even before 9-11 by Vice President Dick Cheney, who is known to be pushing for an attack on Iran, and
who would like nothing better than to use nuclear weapons to disable Iran’s nuclear processing facilities.
We’re talking about high treason, if Salla is right.
And the seriousness of what happened — five nuclear-tipped cruise missiles, in firing position, flown across the width of the continental
US in violation of all standing orders to a base that is a staging area for B-52 flights to the Persian Gulf war zone — demands a full
public investigation.
The Democrats in charge of Congress, and the Republican minority, may not have the stomach to stand up to the Bush
administration’s obsession to keep the bloodletting going in Iraq, and they may not have the courage even to put a stop to plans to
attack Iran, but even the most reprehensible weasels and cowards among them should have the basic decency to know that this
bizarre and suspicious flight needs to be investigated to the fullest to get to the bottom of what was going on.
Salla suggests that behind the scenes, Gates and the generals, who clearly distrust and dislike the vice president and who don’t
want an Iran attack, will use this incident to go after the vice president and force him into a “medical” resignation. He says that
the exposure of the flight will also put any attack on Iran on hold, because military leaders will be worried that there are other
nuclear weapons that have been introduced into the equation secretly, either for use in Iraq or for a “black flag” operation against
US forces.
Let us hope so they are right, and that this will be Cheney’s undoing.
I’m not as confident as Salla, however.
If it turns out that Cheney was behind this incident, that its goal was as sinister as Salla suspects, and that it was only the brave
action of several officers who went public and leaked information about it that led to the undoing of the plan, it may take more than
behind-the-scenes pressure from the Defense Department to take down the vice president.
Moreover, if Cheney simply resigned, without the incident being exposed publicly, Americans would not ever know how close we
came to global disaster, martial law, and the end of America as we know it. It is essential that Congress get to the bottom of this one.
Every person remotely connected to this mission needs to be called before Congress and put under oath to explain what happened.
An independent prosecutor should also be named to start a criminal investigation.
Note: Back in the early 1970s, my wife and I knew an Air Force reservist who told us he was flying secret missions for the
government, to Central America and to the Middle East. He never explained what these were, but it was clear that they were
connected with secret operations of a military nature. This individual, who had turned belatedly against the Vietnam War,
and had begun to question what he was doing in secret, died under mysterious circumstances in his apartment. His mother
went to the morgue to pick up the body only to discovered to her horror that it was not her son. Someone had removed his
corpse, making any investigation as to cause of death impossible. There are sinister operations carried on by this government,
and this looks like one that is as sinister as it can get. The crew of that B-52 and the ground crew that loaded it, should be
watching their backs.
|
B-52 Bomber Incident and Insider Trading? Was Someone Trying to Profit from a Nuclear Attack Against Iran Before September 21? by Michael E. Salla, M.A., Ph.D. September 11, 2007
A B-52 bomber loaded with five (increased to six in later reports) nuclear weapons fitted on the pylons under its wings was discovered after sitting for ten hours on a tarmac at Barksdale AFB on 30 August 2007. Three anonymous Air Force officers leaked the news of the incident to the Army Times newspaper which announced the discovery on 5 September 2007. The discovery immediately gained world wide coverage: LINK . The "mainstream" Big Business-owned news media has so far concentrated on the U.S. Air Force version of events that the incident was an "error" and is now subject to an official investigation. Barksdale AFB is a staging post for Middle East operations and routinely has B-52 flying missions. The B-52 incident has subsequently led to speculation that the nuclear weapons were intended for a covert mission to Iran, and the Office of the Vice President was probably involved in bypassing the normal chain of military command, LINK. The discovery of the B-52 came on top of rapidly increasing speculation that the U.S. Bush administration is about to authorize a massive pre-emptive aerial assault against Iran. According to the Sunday Times, the Pentagon has prepared for air strikes against 1,200 targets in Iran that would in three days destroy Iran's military infrastructure, LINK. What gives reports of a planned attack against Iran involving nuclear weapons greater credibility is a number of mysterious August 2007 purchases of a particular type of stock called 'put options' and 'call options' which are based on a dramatic shift in the U.S. stock market, 1 research.wtc7.net/sept11/stockputs.html"> LINK. The investments were so suspicious that they became subject to an insider trading investigation by U.S. Securities Exchange Commission (SEC) but the no one was ever identified or charged. This was despite a determined effort by the SEC to find who was behind the investments. The parallels with "put" and "call option" purchases just before 9/11 has led to speculation that the August billion dollar inves Iran's military infrastructure, or used in a False Flag operation that would have justified a U.S. assault on Iran. Admiral William Fallon, Commander of U.S. Central Command, was to direct conventional bombing operations against Iran's military infrastructure. The covert mission, however, would have had a different chain of command, where the Office of the Vice President was to take a prominent role. The nuclear weapons on the B-52 had adjustable yields between five and 150 kilotons which would have made them suitable in taking out Iran's deep underground nuclear facilities. The effect of tactical nuclear weapons to destroy Iran's nuclear facilities would have been devastating. Radioactive contamination would have dispersed widely affecting the health of millions in the region. At the same time, Iran's military and much of its civilian infrastructure would be destroyed by conventional munitions. This would have restricted Iran's abilities to cope with the health and humanitarian impact of the use of nuclear weapons, and destruction of itss. One question to be asked is who are the hidden investors with insider knowledge that stood to gain billions in short term profits from a possible attack against Iran?? This answer will give an important clue to the long term agenda being played out, and the principal actors involved. In the case of 9/11, similar investors were able to evade detection from an official investigation by the U.S. Securities Exchange Commission (SEC). The SEC launched an unprecedented investigation that deputized "hundreds, if not thousands, of key players in the private sector", LINK. According to former Los Angeles Police Officer, Michael Ruppert, what happens when individuals are deputized is that they are sworn to secrecy on national security grounds. This was a very effective way of keeping secret what was discovered in the SEC investigation. What is the most plausible explanation for the kind of investor that would have the power to subvert an SEC investigation in this manner? The most likely answer is the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). It has been alleged that CIA front companies annually supply funds for a black budget used to fund covert national security projects . The black budget has been estimated to range between 1.1 to 1.7 trillion dollars annually which is funnelled through the CIA to various military-corporate entities fulfilling such projects, LINK. Reportedly, a massive size black budget is needed to fund an alleged "second" Manhattan Project. Such alleged projects would be so deeply compartmentalized and classified, that most members of U.S. Congress would not be informed of their existence. The CIA is uniquely suited to perform this function of secretly raising revenue through the 1949 CIA Act which authorizes the CIA to expend funds "without regard to any provisions of law" (50USC 15:1.403f.a.1.). The CIA therefore does not have to follow any legal requirements for the funds it procures from various sources, and funnels to military-corporate entities directly responsible for the second Manhattan project. The discovery of the nuclear armed B-52 is likely to lead to an indefinite delay in plans for a pre-emptive military attack against Iran. There is nevertheless a need to expose the principle actors and the underlying agendas of those behind the covert plans to use nuclear weapons. It is also important to expose anonymous investors that intended to commercially profit from such an attack before September 21, and had insider knowledge of this. Former U.S. President Eisenhower had warned that an informed public is the best safeguard against unwarranted abuses of executive power. Arguably, a pre-emptive attack against Iran that does not have the support of the American people or U.S. Congress, would qualify for such an abuse. It appears that the period leading up to September 21, 2007 was to witness a pre-emptive attack against Iran, involving nuclear weapons loaded on at least one B-52 bomber. The humanitarian cost in terms of radioactive fallout, and casualties from the destruction of Iran's military and much of its civilian infrastructure would have been catastrophic for the Persian Gulf region (nuclear fallout would also subsequently circle the globe, which would be followed by the proliferation of related diseases and environmental problems adversely effecting all of humanity and other living species on Earth). Furthermore, the U.S. and global economy would have gone into a deep free fall in the event of dramatic increases in oil prices and further instability in the Middle East. Out of this planned tragedy, anonymous investors with possible CIA connections and insider knowledge, had the opportunity to plan for commercial profit. It is further alleged that financial proceeds would have been used to secretly fund an alleged second Manhattan Project that would-piggy back on the military execution of an aggressive neo-conservative agenda against Iran, in the Middle East geo-political milieu. Hopefully, the discovery of the nuclear armed B-52 has averted such a tragedy for the moment. Now is the time to consider the wisdom to consider allegations associated with an apparently aborted pre-emptive strike against Iran, and to make accountable all those who are responsible. About the author: Michael E. Salla, M.A. Ph.D., is a former Assistant Professor in the School of International Service, American University, Washington D.C. He is the author of five books and founder of the Exopolitics Institute, a 501(c)3 non-profit organization based in Kona, Hawaii. (This Institute is about how to make contact with Extraterrestrials) |
Find A Missing Nuke?
the United States Air Force, just stole a nuclear
weapon.
By Chuck Simpson
AboveTopSecret.com
9-12-7
Some History
Barksdale Missile Number Six deserves far more
public attention than it's received to date.
Missile Number
Six is
potentially the major story of at least this year.
Until 1968 under the Airborne Alert Program,
informally called Operation Chrome Dome, the Air Force routinely kept
about a dozen
strategic bombers with nuclear weapons flying at all
times.
One predictable result was crashes and incidents. In 1968 the Department
of Defense published a list of 13 serious
nuclear weapons
accidents that occurred between 1950 and 1968. In 1980
the list was revised to include 32 incidents through that year.
Notably, the Pentagon has not acknowledged any
accidents since 1980. This alone highlights the importance the
Pentagon is placing
on the recent transportation of nuclear weapons
from North
Dakota to Louisiana.
Through 1968, several reported incidents involved
plane crashes or malfunctions, beginning with the crash of a B-29 near
Fairfield,
California in August 1950. The resulting blast was felt 30
miles away.
In July 1950 a B-50 crashed near Lebanon, Ohio.
The high-explosive trigger for the nuclear weapon detonated on impact.
The blast was
felt over 25 miles away.
In May 1957 a nuclear weapon fell from the bomb
bay of a B-36 near Albuquerque, New Mexico. Parachutes malfunctioned
and the
weapon was destroyed on impact.
In October 1957 near Homestead, Florida a B-47
crashed. The nuclear weapon was burned.
In March 1958 a B-47 accidentally dropped a
nuclear weapon near Florence, South Carolina.
The high-explosive
trigger detonated on impact.
In November 1958 a B-47 crashed near Abilene,
Texas. The trigger of the nuclear weapon exploded upon impact.
In July 1959 a C-124 crashed near Bossier City,
Louisiana. Both plane and nuclear weapon were destroyed.
In October 1959 a B-52 with two nuclear weapons
was involved in a mid-air collision near Hardinsburg, Kentucky. One
weapon partially
burned.
In January 1961 a B-52 broke apart in mid-air near
Goldsboro, North Carolina. Two nuclear weapons were released. The
parachute on
one weapon malfunctioned, and contamination was spread
over a wide area. The uranium core was never recovered. Daniel
Ellsberg
reported that detonation was a very real risk because five of
six safety devices failed.
In that month near Monticello, Idaho a B-52
carrying nuclear weapons exploded in mid-air. No information was made
available as to
the weapons.
In March 1961 a B-52 with two nuclear weapons
crashed near Yuba City, California.
In January 1964 a B-52 carrying two nuclear
weapons crashed near Cumberland, Maryland.
In January 1966 a B-52 carrying four hydrogen
bombs crashed after a mid-air collision near Palomares, Spain. Two
weapons exploded
on impact, with resulting plutonium contamination. A
months-long program was undertaken to locate and extract the other two
weapons
from the ocean. Major policy changes were taken under
consideration.
In January 1968 a B-52 carrying four hydrogen
weapons crashed and burned near Thule AFB in Greenland. Explosives in
one bomb
detonated, spreading plutonium contamination. Apparently, the
other three weapons have never been accounted for.
Following large public protests Denmark, which
owns Greenland and prohibits nuclear weapons on or over its territory,
filed a strong
protest. A few days later the Secretary of Defense
ordered the removal of nuclear weapons from planes. After that order
was issued,
all aircraft armed with nuclear weapons were grounded but
kept in a constant state of alert.
In 1991 by Presidential order, nuclear weapons
were removed from all aircraft. Bomber nuclear ground alerts, during
which nuclear
weapons are loaded onto bombers during test and training exercises, were halted. After that time, all nuclear weapons to be
delivered
by plane were permanently maintained in secure storage
facilities.
August 30, 2007
All of which makes the transport of nuclear weapons in combat position on a combat plane so newsworthy.
On August 30, for the first time since 1968,
nuclear warheads in combat position were carried by an American
bomber. Numerous
international treaty provisions were violated in the
process.
38 are to be modernized and upgraded in Fiscal Year 2008 and the other 356 are to be decommissioned pursuant to the 2002 Moscow
treaty.
This has widely been interpreted to mean conversion to bunker-busters, most likely for use in Iran. This widely accepted explanation
is being used to explain why armed cruise missiles are being flown in American airspace.
information provided by "anonymous officers". The story was picked up by Yahoo Wednesday morning, published by USA Today and
The Washington PosT, and then quickly spread.
nuclear warheads should have been removed before the missiles were mounted on the pylons under the wings of the bomber.
"There was an error which occurred during a regularly scheduled transfer of weapons between two bases. The weapons were safe and
remained in Air Force control and custody at all times."
is truly astounding.
could occur.
re-supply of the Middle East.
to lead the public or Iran or both to logically conclude the missiles are bound for Iran.
scare Iran.
in hasty desperation. And no amount of pretty lipstick will be able to make the official explanations pretty.
they were shipped out of North Dakota.
AFB at Tucson. Nuclear weapons are decommissioned at the Department of Energy's Pantex facility near Amarillo, Texas, accessed
through Kirkland AFB in New Mexico.
have been mounted on the missiles, flown to Louisiana, un-mounted and flown to New Mexico.
both missiles and nuclear warheads are transported primarily by air, in specially modified C-130s or C-17s. Under no peacetime
circumstances do military SOPs allow transport of nuclear weapons mounted in cruise missiles mounted in combat positions on
combat planes.
service commands.
movement routes for nuclear weapons in their custody.
Joint Chiefs of Staff or the National Military Command Authority.
from their storage bunkers.
So the only possible error could have been loading nuclear warheads on the missiles instead of practice dummies.
distinctive red warning signs. This error is therefore highly improbable, absent tampering with signage.
guns front and rear and guards with M-16s. All steps in the process are done under the watchful eyes of armed military police.
to the ground face-down and temporarily "placed under arrest" by observant security forces. All progress stops until inspections are
made to assure the weapons weren't tampered with.
the storage bunker by turning the alarm off. And the squad commander clearly would not have authority to turn off the alarm.
are far too stringent and far too many people would be involved. Particularly given that the mounting was in violation of policy that's been
in place without exception for almost 40 years.
squad commander in charge of munitions crews at Minot was "relieved of duty pending an investigation". He has not been removed
from his position or disciplined. The crews involved have been "temporarily decertified pending corrective actions or additional training"
but have not been disciplined. No mention has been made of the wing commander.
re-certified.
Successful Confusion
stringent restrictions, improved safeguards and additional training. The public always has been and always will be safe.
extremely important.
The weapons were only missing during the 3.5-hour flight.
importance. They were left unguarded for almost ten hours.
disappeared. According to information provided to Congress, this time lapsed before airmen at Barksdale "noticed" the weapons were
present. News reports will continue to overlook this fact also.
by people at Minot. This information has also been forgotten.
in full military uniform, Hayden told assembled members of the Council of Foreign Relations:
significant aftershocks."
of a nuclear weapon on American soil.
|
Air Force secretary being briefed on why B-52 flew nukes over
U.S.
|
|
Created: September 14, 2007
|
|
The week after a B-52 mistakenly loaded with nuclear weapons
was flown to Barksdale Air Force Base, the secretary of the Michael Wynne's visit comes amid an ongoing investigation
into why the B-52 bomber from Minot was mistakenly armed The B-52 sat on a runway at Barksdale for 10 hours before it
was discovered that six of the cruise missiles under its wings "Secretary Wynne takes the recent breakdown in the munitions
system very seriously and is committed to ensuring All indications are that it was an "isolated mistake," Pentagon officials said. Air Force officials said the warheads were not activated and
never posed a public threat. They also said they were The B-52 was transporting a dozen cruise missiles to Barksdale. It happened on Aug. 30. (The Associated Press contributed to this report) |
- What made this a very significant event was that it
was a violation of U.S. Air Force regulations concerning the
transportation of
nuclear weapons by air. Nuclear weapons are normally transported by air in specially constructed planes designed to prevent
radioactive pollution in case of a crash. Such transport planes are not equipped to launch the nuclear weapons they routinely carry
around the U.S. and the world for servicing or positioning. - The discovery of the nuclear armed B-52 was,
according to Hans Kristensen, a nuclear weapons expert at the Federation
of
American Scientists, the first time in 40 years that a nuclear armed plane had been allowed to fly in the U.S. http://www.nti.org/d_newswire/issues/2007_9_5.html#149D6ECF - Since 1968, after a SAC bomber crashed in Greenland,
all nuclear armed aircraft have been grounded but were kept on a
constant
state of alert. After the end of the Cold War, President George H. Bush ordered in 1991 that nuclear weapons were to be removed
from all aircraft and stored in nearby facilities. - Recently, the Air Force began decommissioning its
stockpile of Advanced Cruise missiles. The five nuclear weapons on the
B-52
were to be decommissioned, and were to be taken to another Air Force base. An Air Force press statement issued on 6 September
2007, claimed that there "was an error which occurred during a regularly scheduled transfer of weapons between two bases." - Furthermore, the statement declared: "The Air Force
maintains the highest standards of safety and precision so any deviation
from
these well established munitions procedures is considered very serious." The issue concerning how a nuclear armed B-52 bomber
was allowed to take off and fly in U.S. air space after an 'error' in a routine transfer process, is now subject to an official Air Force
inquiry which is due to be completed by September 14. - Three key questions emerge over the B-52 incident.
First, did Air Force personnel at Minot AFB not spot the 'error' earlier
given
the elaborate security procedures in place to prevent such mistakes from occurring? Many military analysts have commented on
the stringent security procedures in place to prevent this sort of mistake from occurring. Multiple officers are routinely involved
in the transportation and loading of nuclear weapons to prevent the kind of 'error' that allegedly occurred in the B-52 incident. - According to the U.S. Air Force statement, the
commanding officer in charge of military munitions personnel and
additional munitions
airmen were relieved of duties pending the completion of the investigation. According to Kristensen, the error could not have come from
confusing the Advanced Cruise Missile with a conventional weapons since no conventional form exists. So the munitions Airmen should
have been easily able to spot the mistake. Other routine procedures were violated which suggests a rather obvious explanation for the
error. The military munitions personnel were acting under direct orders, though not through the regular chain of military command. This
takes me to the second question. - Who was in Charge of the B-52 Incident?
- Who ordered the loading of Advanced Cruise missiles
on to a B-52 in violation of Air Force regulations? The quick reaction
of the Air
Force and the issuing of a public statement describing the seriousness of the issue and the launch of an immediate investigation,
suggests that whatever occurred, was outside the regular chain of military command. If the regular chain of command was violated, then
we have to inquire as to whether the B-52 incident was part of a covert project whose classification level exceeded that held by officers
in charge of nuclear weapons at Minot AFB.
Attempt To Bomb Iran?
By Michael E. Salla, MA, PhD
Critically exploring whether or not there was a
covert attempt to instigate a catastrophic nuclear war against Iran is
illuminated
through an introduction using the recent B-52 Incident. On
August 30, a B-52 bomber armed with five nuclear-tipped Advanced
Cruise
missiles travelled from Minot Air Force base, North Dakota, to Barksdale
Air Force base, Louisiana, in the United States.
Each missile had an
adjustable yield between five and 150 kilotons of TNT which is at the
lower end of the destructive capacities of
U.S. nuclear weapons. For
example, the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima had a yield of 13
kilotons, while the Bravo Hydrogen
bomb test of 1954 had a yield of
15,000 kilotons. The B-52 story was first covered in the Army Times on 5
September after the
nuclear armed aircraft was discovered by Airmen.
http://www.armytimes.com/news/2007/09/marine_nuclear_B52_070904w/
How Chinese Military Hackers Took Control of a Nuclear Loaded B-52 !!!!
This is the case of the "Mistakenly Loaded" 6/5 ? Nuclear Cruise
Missiles that caused a complete shutdown of the U.S. Air force on
Sept.14 to do a survey of what happened.
The answer
The U.S. had China make custom made electronic chips for military
computers (to save money ?) and the Chinese built in back doors where
they could take control of the computers. Now the U.S. military will not
know if an order to Nuke a target came from them or China.
In case you missed this the first time around - Long But you Must read
it.
We are Toast !
Command Override
How Chinese Military Hackers Took Control of a Nuclear Loaded B-52 !!!!
Address:
http://www.willthomasonline.net/willthomasonline/Command_Override.html
Chairman Joint Chiefs of Staff addressing the National Press Club, Feb 17/06
COMMAND OVERRIDE
How Chinese Military Hackers Took Over A Nuclear-Armed B52
By William Thoma
The story sounded like a sequel to “Dr.
Strangelove”. Leaked by the Pentagon's news
service, Military Affairs to quell
scuttlebutt racing through the ranks-and
perhaps warn the world-a U.S. Air Force B-52
strategic bomber “mistakenly”
loaded with
six nuclear cruise missiles took off from
Minot Air Force Base in North Dakota on
August 30, 2007 and flew
for more than three
hours over at least five states, before
landing at Barksdale Air Force Base in
Louisiana.
The mistake was so egregious, the
National Command Authority comprising
President George BU.S.h and Secretary of
Defense Robert Gates were quickly informed.
The SecDef has since been assured that
nuclear weapons “were part of a
routine
transfer between the two bases… at no time
was the public in danger.”
Both statements are false.
In fact, nuclear weapons like these are
carefully crated for shipment between bases,
and placed inside the bomb bays
or cargo
compartments of transporting aircraft. In
stunning contrast, this reporter has learned
from two independent and
highly placed
sources that the six Advanced Cruise
Missiles dangling from the B-52's fatigued
and flexible wings were fully
armed and
ready to fire-except for a single fail/safe
switch under the Command Pilot's control.
The quickly blacked out episode has
prompted an Air Force investigation. Gates,
whose official defense computer was
hacked
last June, necessitating the shutdown of the
entire SecDef network, has ordered daily
briefings on the Air Force
inquiry. The
Minot base commander, who might turn out to
be the hero in this frightening affair, was
relieved of his
command.
DR. STRANGELOVE VISITS BOURBON STREET
As far as anyone knows, no U.S. aircraft has ever been armed with a full wartime loadout of six nuclear weapons. “Nothing
like this has ever been reported before and we have been assured for decades that it was impossible,” declared
Representative Markey, co-chair of the House Task Force on Nonproliferation. [AP Sept 5/07; Seattle Times Sept 5/07]
Hans Kristensen, an expert on U.S. nuclear forces, says he knows of no other publicly acknowledged case of live nuclear
weapons being flown on bombers since the late 1960s. [http://ace.mu.nu]
Director Stanley Kubrick's “Dr. Strangelove Or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb” was released in 1964
Each of the six ACMs carried a “dialable”
150-kiloton W80-1 warhead--for a combined
total of 60-times the destructive
power of the bomb that melted the city and
inhabitants of Hiroshima--over the
unsuspecting residents of five states.
Depending on the route flown, a
half-dozen armed nuclear weapons wafted for
three-and-a-half hours over North Dakota
and
either South Dakota or Minnesota, Nebraska
or Missouri, Oklahoma or Arkansas, and
Louisiana.
It's no secret that Dick Cheney and his presidential surrogate intend to bomb Iran into the Kingdom to Come.
[BBC News Aug 29/07]
But New Orleans?
“What does the government have against Louisiana?” asked a blogger named Lobster Martini.
[www.democraticunderground.com
TOUGH LOVE
The “mistake”
was supposedly discovered when the B-52
landed at Barskdale, where the plane should
have been secured
by an armed security
detail. Instead, it simply parked on the
flight line, where ground crew noticed the
words “nuclear armed” stenciled on the sides
of the missiles.
[
Three officers confirmed the warheads were,
in Bush's argot, “nucular.”
But the mission could have ended in a
“broken arrow” nuclear calamity if the
bomber had crashed, or inadvertently dropped
its ordnance. Munitions, and even entire
engines-such as the No. 1 turbine that fell
off an American Airlines DC 10 after taking
off from Chicago's O'Hare airport in May,
1979, killing two people on the ground and
all 271 people onboard-occasionally drop
from underwing pylons in flight.
[Chicago
Tribune May 26-30/79; National
Transportation Safety Board Aircraft
Accident Report
NSTB-AAR-79-17]
A few other examples:
-- A B-36 ferrying a nuclear weapon from
Biggs Air Force Base, Texas to Kirtland
accidentally drops a bomb in the New Mexico
desert.
[ww.nuclearfiles.org]
-- A
fighter pilot
accidentally dropped a BDU-33 dummy bomb
into a house, narrowly missing a family of
three.
[www.f-117a.com
-- A 500-pound bomb fell from an FA-18 plane
during a routine training exercise and
exploded on the edge of a U.S. base
100
miles north of Sarajevo. [
AP July 17/02]
-- A National Guard F-16 fighter jet on a
nighttime training mission strafed an
elementary school in New Jersey with 25
rounds of depleted uranium ammunition.
[AP Nov
4/04]
-- Another U.S. Air Force practice bomb
accidentally on the Yorkshire countryside in
England. [
BBC Jan 12/04]
-- Electromagnetic interference from
military transmitters may have caused an
F-16 jet to accidentally drop a 500 pound
bomb on rural West Georgia.
[Montreal
Gazette May 12/89]
A crash, mid-air explosion or structural
breakup-not uncommon occurrences with
heavily-laden B-52s-could have ignited
the
high explosives used to implode the
warheads. The ultimate dirty bomber's
fantasy could have seen plutonium--the
deadliest substance ever conjured by
humans-raining down over what would become a
statewide “national sacrifice zone”,
off-limits to all life-forms for more than 4
billion years.
Barksdale AFB is no stranger to nuclear
accidents. On July 6, 1959, a C-124 “Flying
Boxcar” crashed on takeoff, completely
destroying the aircraft and the nuclear
weapon it was carrying.
[www.cdi.org]
PROTOCOLS
The Air
Combat Command has ordered a
command-wide stand down for September
14, 2007 to “review procedures.”
Though
they actually responded flawlessly to
apparently authentic orders, the highly
trained specialists who carried out
the
nuclear loadout have been temporarily
“decertified” from handling nukes.
Representative Ike Skelton, chairman
of the House Armed Services Committee,
called the mishandling of arms capable
of
destroying cities “deeply disturbing.
There is no more serious issue than the
security and proper handling of nuclear
weapons.”
[AP Sept
5/07]
The crewdogs who flew their assigned
mission without mishap have been ordered
not to mention that all pilots are
required
to perform a “walk around”
inspection of their airplanes and
calculate elaborate “weight-and-balance”
graphs before
attempting to aviate.
Failure to notice or be informed of the
much heavier nuclear casings on the
missiles they were
carrying would have
jeopardized flight safety.
According to a well-informed and
extremely thorough U.S. military source
I call “Hank” (with whom I have broken
major
stories over the past 15 years),
someone “must have adjusted the bomber's
balance. It had to have been
done.”
In addition to knowing what is
externally attached to their airplane,
the amount of paperwork, signatures, and
discrete
passwords involved in releasing
a nuclear weapon from its storage bunker
and loading it onto an airframe are more
formidable than flak.
And there were six of them.
PICKUP AND DELIVERY
The coded
message to upload and launch the B-52
from Minot with six live nuclear weapons
carried the signature of the
“football” containing the day's nuclear
launch codes that is carried close to
the president at all times by a
specially detailed
aide. After checking
and counter-checking their coded orders,
as few as a dozen people in uniform were
actually involved
in the subsequent
secret nuclear mission.
According to Hank, at least three
high-ranking officers were escorted into
Minot AFB's nuclear arms bunker after
passing
through multiple doors secured
by pass codes, whose complete sequences
were supplied each officer, who only
knew part
of each code. One hiccup, a
fumbled code sequence, or “the wrong
wrench” would have cancelled the loadout
instantly.
SAFETY FIRST
Because
the base had stood down for Labor Day,
the timing was ideal for security. In
his standing orders for August 30, 2007,
5th Bomb Wing commander Colonel Bruce Emig encouraged his troops to “Enjoy a
safe Labor Day weekend.
“Warbirds, It's hard to believe that
Labor Day weekend is already here!” the
colonel wrote. “Though cooler
temperatures
are right around the
corner, the weather forecasters tell me
that we should have a warm, summer-like
weekend. Since Air
Combat Command and
Air Force Space Command have declared
Friday a Family Day, many of you should
be able to enjoy
a nice, 4-day break as
we transition from summer to fall. I
wish all of you a relaxing and enjoyable
time off, and urge you all
once again to
please keep safety in mind in all you
do!”
[www.libertypost.org]
Under a bomber's nuclear umbrella in a
discrete corner of the sprawling
airbase, air, ground and ordnance crews
did not
converse with each other. Or
anyone else. Everyone involved knew
better than to ask questions that could
abruptly end
their careers by
inadvertently tipping people who did not
need to know.
LOADOUT
Within
hours, an airplane with a wingspan
longer than the Wright Brothers' first
flight was safely loaded with avgas,
sandwiches, and six nuclear weapons.
Uploaded to the bomber using an
accordion cradle on each missile
trolley, each
Advanced Cruise Missile
was fueled once it was secured to a hard
point under the aircraft's wings.
Because the ACMs were
not inside a bomb
bay, where they could be armed in
flight, each underslung missile had to
be fully armed before takeoff.
“Wing
walker” is not a B-52 job description.
The plates connecting the firing
circuits of each warhead to the cockpit
were then activated, and the safeties
were pulled
from each clearly marked
“nuclear weapon”-rendering it “live”.
For the Explosive Ordnance Disposal
detail who performed
the loadout, there
could be no doubt they were activating
six nuclear weapons.
Alarms on the flight line should have
sounded as soon as they sniffed hot ions
leaking from the pulled pile rods in six
slowly
fissioning warheads. But the
alarms remain silenced. That order, Hank
insisted, could only have come under the
properly
coded signature of the National
Command Authority-Commander-in-Chief G.W. Bush or Secretary of Defense,
Robert Gates.
The ensuing takeoff was an event
branded on the central nervous system of
every creature in auditory range as
eight jet
engines at maximum takeoff
thrust levitated six missiles, up to
46,000 gallons of fuel, and an airplane
the length of a
150-foot ship into a
blue yonder that had just become much
wilder. Everyone within miles knew that
a B-52 had come into
Minot and taken off
again. But only God and the devil knew
where it was going.
[www.boeing.com]
And they weren't saying.
WHO DUNNIT?
In the
silence left by this momentous
departure, if there were questions,
nobody voiced them. Perhaps there were a
few
quietly delivered high-fives
instead. Despite the high stress that
runs counter to every human instinct,
everyone involved
had carried out their
assigned duties with complete attention
to the details required to launch a
half-dozen live nuclear
weapons
“safely”. The professionally conducted
operation was carried off in complete
secrecy, without a hitch, only after
the loadout and launch order had been
digitally confirmed as coming from the
NCA.
There was only one problem regarding the originators of those orders, Hank emailed me:
“IT WAS NOT US.”
FAULTY (COMPUTER) TOWERS
Let us
quickly review. My earlier exclusive on
my former website, willthomas.net,
disclosed how in October 2006, North
Korea's leaders asked China to take out
Japan's shiny new recon satellite before
it could be tasked by American officers
to monitor Pyongyang's first atomic
test. Blowing up someone's satellite is
an act of war. But overriding its “Made
In China”
microchips with a remote
command from the ground could never be
proven. Even if no solar flares were
recorded at the time.
This first Chinese demo got the
Pentagon's attention. After all, their
stated goal of “Full Spectrum Dominance”
over Earth's
land, seas, airspace and
electromagnetic spectrum depends on
America's successful weaponization of
space. But as the
Joint Chiefs are only
now discovering, many of the supposedly
secure chips in America's civilian
infrastructure-as well as
all military
communications, surveillance and weapons
systems-have been “Wal-Marted” by U.S.
corporations to low-bid
Chinese
suppliers-who rigged them for failure or
takeover by “command override” in the
event of war.
SEE DICK RUN
The second demonstration of
China's newfound capabilities to manipulate microchips
came in late February 2007, when
Dick Cheney's 757, flying
home from Australia where the Vice President had not been
well received by the locals, was forced
to divert to
Singapore.
In a story intriguingly tagged, “U.S. Denies Cheney
Forced To Land,” Agence France-Presse reported that the
White House
admitted the Vice-President's “specially
secured” Boeing 757 had “suffered electrical problems”
before landing in Singapore.
But Cheney spinner Lea Anne
McBride insisted, “This was the preplanned, scheduled
refueling stop. We were not diverted.
The vice president
did not get off the plane during his refueling stop.”
[AFP Feb 26/07]
Wrong again.
According to U.S. military personnel present on the
tarmac at Paya Lebar Air Base-who according to Hank said
were “trying
to yak with the locals: 'Can you get us this
part? Do you have a Radio Shack?'”-a small Chinese
delegation met with Cheney
outside his
electronically-challenged aircraft. Wandering in and out
of the brief conversation, Hank's sources described the
brief encounter, which occurred shortly after 1400 hours
Singapore time.
Disembarking Air Force One, Cheney said something like, “Gosh, we got this kind of interesting problem…”
“No, you don't understand sir,” a Chinese official interrupted. “This is how we brought you here. And this is why.”
Cheney's visitors itemized the separately wired galley
stoves, reading lights, in-flight video, and power outlets
onboard
the Vice President's aircraft that had all conked
out in flight. They knew this, they said, because the
electronic signals that
had disabled the microchips
controlling these various devices had been directed by
their government. In an impressive feat,
the Chinese
military had located and selectively targeted a stealthy
aircraft painted with radar-absorbent materials flying
at
nearly 500 knots at 35,000 feet without a public
itinerary.
According to Hank's boots-on-the-tarmac sources, the mostly one-way conversation in Singapore concerned “Gulf of Tonkin possibilities.”
“They reached out and touched someone,” Hank related.
“They had a message they wanted to get across: 'You've got
ships
out there in the Gulf. If this thing cooks off, all
bets are off because some of the things that are put out
there, we are really
now wanting people to talk about.'”
The Chinese were referring to their control of most of the microchips on this planet.
A very thoughtful Dick Cheney departed two hours later.
OPENING THE GATES
The next Chinese digital
demo came last June. In what came to be called “the most
successful cyber attack ever mounted
on the U.S. defence
department,” Chinese military hacked into a Pentagon
computer network serving the defense secretary's
personal
office.
Like their American counterparts, the People's
Liberation Army (PLA) regularly probes U.S. military
networks. But American
officials said these latest cyber
attack caused grave concern when China demonstrated it
“could disrupt U.S. defenses
systems at critical times.”
“The PLA has demonstrated the ability to conduct
attacks that disable our system... and the ability in a
conflict situation to
re-enter and disrupt on a very large
scale,” revealed a former official, adding that the PLA
has also penetrated the networks
of U.S. arms corporations
and war-launching think-tanks.
[Financial Times Sept 3/07]
A Chinese official named Jiang repeated his government's
denial that it had penetrated other government and
military
computer networks. But British and German
newspapers cited intelligence and other officials saying
that government and
military networks in Germany, the
United States and Britain had been broken into by Chinese
army hackers this summer.
According to the Associated Press: “China's military
has openly discussed using cyber attacks as a means of
harrying or
defeating a more powerful conventional
military. In a 1999 paper on unconventional strategies
titled 'Unlimited Warfare'
two top Chinese military
figures wrote that a hacker could have more power than a
nuclear bomb.”
In a report this year, security software maker Symantec
Corp. listed China as having the second most malicious
computer
activity in the world-after the United States.
[AP Sept 6/07]
Speaking as a soldier, Hank commented, “The June hack
showed an enormous hole in our ability to protect and
communicate
our information.
LOST IN SPACE
The next hack came almost immediately, when Russian
computers controlling the International Space Station's
orientation
and supplies of oxygen and water inexplicably
failed while the station's three crewmembers were hosting
seven visiting
shuttle astronauts.
But this time, the system was unable to re-boot.
"A failure of this type has not occurred before," the BBC reported. [BBC June 14/07]
"This is serious," stated James Oberg, a retired rocket scientist turned author and consultant. "These computers run their life support, so if they
can't be restored, the space station could become uninhabitable." Oberg added, "Statistically, this is not random. There is some new
environmental factor that must identified and isolated, and neither step is trivial." [TechNewsWorld June 14/07]
Russian flight controllers and onboard engineers traced the problem to "odd readings" in electrical power cables feeding the Russian
computers through a corroded junction box labeled BOK 3. [Space.com July 16/07]
The gremlins returned to the Russian machines on February 5, when another ISS computer system crashed in the Zvezda Service Module that
routes data between orientation sensors and four positioning gyroscopes. The space station's solar power stopped supplying power, and
communications were cut with Earth.
Though power and comms were restored three hours
later, New Scientist reports, "The cause of the
computer crash remains a mystery.
NASA has so far not
identified the cause of the crash."
[New Scientist Feb 5/02]
But Hank was on it. "They had limited oxygen, a limited
time frame," he observed. The astronauts onboard the
space station didn't know
if the next computer
malfunction "would open an airlock." But like an
airliner in flight, the station should have smoothly
shifted over to
backup systems.
It didn't.
"The word 'redundancy' never got into the story,"
Hank pointed out. Instead, all three backup circuit
boards wired into three isolated circuits,
"had to blow
out in the same way at the exact same time. The fault
that occurred in the first board, the second board, and
the third board all
had to be the same damn thing at the
same damn time."
"Impossible," he declared. Especially, since each of
the simultaneously faulty microchips had been "stress
tested to hell and back. Except for
internal stressors."
Except for "Made In China" microchip mischief.
While it is not yet confirmed that the February 5
microchip malfunction was related to the June 14 space
station hack, according to Hank's
sources, on that
earlier date the Chinese pulled the equivalent of
Cheney's Singapore diversion--in space. "Nobody got
busted for it," he adds.
"You always hear about the
company at fault."
Not this time.
AC WE SEE
While White House fundamentalists remained
mesmerized by the firepower ostensibly under their
command, Beijing kept trying to send a very
different
message. Their next installment came in early September
2007, when U.S. Air Force officers passed through
multiple levels of security
and entered the inner
computer sanctum of America's Air and Space Command deep
under Cheyenne Mountain. This digital repository stores
regularly updates archives needed to execute "clean
reinstalls" in case air force computer systems crash or
are otherwise compromised.
Entering the quietly humming room, the air force
officers were shocked to see monitors aglow with light.
The displays were supposed to be off.
As they watched in
shock and awe, randomly typed letters scrolled across a
screen. The words were gibberish. But the message was
heart-stoppingly clear: "We Can Play With Your Toys!"
The sender "left breadcrumbs," Hank related. The deliberately attached ISP (Internet Service Provider) pointed to China.
This was bad enough. But what really freaked out the
officers was the realization that none of these "stand
alone" machines was online.
None of them contained a
modem!
The only way to access these machines, Hank revealed, is
to "use the sneaker net to walk up to it and tap on the
keyboard. And yet they
were interacting, and they were
doing it in real time. They fussed with our stuff. These
guys were able to go into what was a stand alone
system
and take control of it."
How did the PLA hack supposedly secure air force
computers lacking network modems? Just like as select
power companies can now pipe
the Internet to home
computers through electrical power lines, the Chinese
were able to play on SAC's supposedly secure computers
through
the AC power cables connecting them to the
national power... "grid".
But how did they break supposedly "unbreakable" military encryption?
And how were they able to transmit signals to
override specific chips buried under a mountain of
granite halfway around the globe? According
to Hank, the
International Space Station was not in line-of-sight
with China when it's onboard computers and back-up
systems simultaneously
went down.
HIT MAN
When it comes to dialing up a bomber to drop
nuclear weapons on another country, "It's kind of like
hiring a hit man," Hank explained. You
meet him in the
parking lot with the assignment, a weapon, and cash.
Later, you confirm that you haven't changed your mind.
Then the mission
proceeds, and either the target or the
hit man is taken out.
In the case of the mission out of Minot, the First Phase
began with an initiation order authorizing weapons
release to arm a B-52 specially flown
in for this
operation. Proper codes and paperwork provided the Pilot
in Command with an initial heading to fly, and initial
waypoints or nav
points to punch into the plane's GPS.
No destination was provided. The pilots were just
supposed to get in and drive.
They did.
Once the B-52 was airborne, it flew into an
electronic black hole. No electromagnetic emissions came
from the bomber. There were no radio
calls to home base
asking, "Are you guys sure you really want to do this?"
Even more startling, no coded IFF squawks identified the
BUFF
(Big Ugly Fat F---r) as friendly to prowling
post-9/11 fighters. And no transponder beeps identified
the airplane and its mission.
This is not the normal procedure for transporting
weapons, or flying a B-52 through heavily-trafficked air
corridors over the Continental United
States. Every
aircraft flying at high altitudes over CONUS, (or
through Controlled Airspace around airports at lower
attitudes) must transmit their
identity on an assigned
transponder frequency.
Commercial planes squawk in their own dialect. "When
you're talking a government vehicle, like a C-130
[military transport], that's another
level up," Hank
noted. "It's a different kind of squawk. ATC knows how
to treat that kind of traffic differently. A B-52 is
another level up.
Controllers don't see that every day.
A C-5 [flying down from Colorado to dust a hurricane,
for example]-they really don't see that every day."
The transponder code of the B-52 out of Minot would
have prioritized it to civilian Air Traffic Control, and
they would have cleared a corridor
for its exclusive
track-much like a presidential motorcade.
If this Bad Boy had been transferring six advanced
nuclear cruise missiles to Barksdale, as official spin
insisted, its transponder would have
squawked: "Hey,
guess what? We've got nukes onboard! Make sure no one
runs into us. And if this signal stops scramble recovery
people
wearing proper attire."
Or code to that effect.
But this did not happen.
"The Situation Room in the White House was not stood
up, but they still have people there,? Hank continued.
?One of their jobs is to track
nuclear weapons. Somebody
in that head shed should have seen a transponder code
matched up with nuclear weapons loaded onto that
aircraft. That should have been something that went up
on the board. They would have known that a B-52 was
getting a full loadout, and
that all procedures had been
followed. And someone else would have said, 'Mmm,
six nukes. We'll keep an eye on it."
And given an order for radar operators to push a
button to highlight that particular blip.
Instead, the blacked-out BUFF flew on.
TARGET IRAN
High in the stratosphere, where the nitrous oxide
exhaust from eight fuel-hungry turbines attacked this
planet's shredding ozone layer,
boosting global warming
another notch toward a catastrophic methane meltdown,
wings never designed to carry heavy ordnance flexed up
and down like a bird in flight. The crew must have
considered the long roster of crashed Stratofortress
with ?broken arrows? onboard. Not
for a second could
they forget that the six live nuclear weapons strapped
to their wings were as close to detonation as a
gremlin's wet dream.
Or the fail-safe switch under the Plane Commander's gloves.
An hour or two out of Minot, a bell chimed in the
cockpit and a secure printer spat out a coded paper
message. Even if they betrayed no
emotion, the pilots
must have felt a chill. Because the mission's next
critical Fail-Safe had been passed. "We've thought about
it, and the
mission is still a go," the message
essentially read. If these new orders had not been
received, or had been issued incorrectly, the plane
would have immediately turned back to the nearest base
capable of handling its special needs.
But their orders were in order. Positively
authenticated by both pilots as coming from the NCA, the
new message received onboard the
bomber issued the radio
frequencies, call signs and rendezvous coordinates for
"hitting" one of three aerial refueling planes
constantly
orbiting over the Gulf of Mexico. Their new
"Go Code" also identified their target region. After
topping off their tanks, they were to take up
a heading
for another Gulf, half a world away.
BLIND MAN'S BUFF
Wouldn't the base commander, or the other
officers involved in sending live nuclear weapons toward
Iran have second thoughts about a strike
that could
trigger an even bigger political-military chain
reaction?
Not necessarily, Hank explained. Military leaders
usually favor intimidation in place of bloodshed. If the
Iranians could be dissuaded from
acquiring a nuclear
deterrent of their own, or decide to stop supplying
their Shiite brothers next door with sophisticated
shaped-charge
rockets capable of penetrating the
depleted uranium hides of M-1 Abrams tanks-terrific!
Everyone involved in the mission must have hoped
that in
this high-stakes brinksmanship, when Iranian sensors
picked up the radioactive signature of an inbound
American nuclear bomber
strike, the mullahs in Teheran
would burn their Korans and turn to Jesus.
On the other hand, how do you say "pissed off" in
Persian? The mullahs might panic and start pushing
buttons of their own. Especially when
the Israeli Air
Force was notified of the strike, and launched
"supporting" fighter-bombers of their own.
In any case, it was out of the hands of the base
commander and his immediate superiors. Since any one of
these key staff officers could
conceivably be kidnapped
or impersonated during a nuclear strike, none had the
authority to issue a recall order. Even if someone in
the
chain of command issued an RTB (Return To Base), SAC
bomber crews en route to the final IP coordinates to
commence their attack are
trained to ignore all such
entreaties.
In fact, a frantic "Come home for lunch," or "Call
your wife" command would confirm for the crew that
something really was amiss, and they
were at war.
In this way, a series of rote military assumptions
can make an ash out of you and me.
WHAT, ME WORRY?
that six nuclear cruise missiles with his name on them were headed toward Iran.
sources was a nuclear power plant hard against the mountains of Iran. "But the bomber would still have five missiles left. And it would not leave
the area empty," Hank insisted. "If they go loaded for bear, they're not going to leave with a rabbit."
After all, he added, a pre-BDA [Bomb Damage
Assessment] would have been done before launching the
bomber "to determine how many it
would take. And they
needed six?"
Despite all the Hollywood hype, cruise missiles are
notoriously inaccurate. Just ask the folks ducking
strays in Kuwait or Iran. Still, a cruise
missile
striking within 30 miles would have taken out that
Iranian power plant. But if the nuclear-tipped ACM had
detonated over its pile?
"Bad. Bad. Very bad," as Hank would say. Because the
resulting electromagnetic pulses from such a synergistic
chain reaction would have--
among other things--fried
every unhardened Chinese microchip aboard every American
ship, plane and vehicle in the Persian Gulf.
"You don't have to sink the CAG, just turn it off,"
Hank said, referring to the formidable--yet completely
microchip dependent--Carrier Air Group
steaming off the
coast of Iran. "Once they realized that these ships were
just bobbing around out there," the bad guys would have
"launched
10,000 rowboats" from surrounding shorelines
to go play pirates.
Was this why several Chinese Aegis destroyers were
steaming in from the east about 250 nautical miles from
the Straits of Hormuz? Was this
why two or three Chinese
submarines had been deployed to the area of the
transiting destroyers the week before?
Or were the two Chinese anti-aircraft destroyers part
of an elaborate fail-safe in case the demonstration
glitched and the bomber could not be
recalled? Even if
their anti-aircraft missiles could not reach the distant
plane (easily tracked through its rigged Chinese chips),
specific signals
sent from the ship could have turned
the plane around. Or its fuel off.
What were the Chinese thinking?
CHINESE CHECKERS
and Gulf Coasts, Beijing has felt under siege as earthquakes and wild, shipping-interrupting storms continue to be conducted "all the way to
China" by the powerful Gakona, Alaskan transmitter. [See "Where Have All The Hurricanes Gone"-upcoming on willthomasonline.net]
Three times, the Chinese have attempted to override
HAARP. And failed. Elaborate demonstrations of their
electronic warfare capabilities--
including fizzing
circuits in space, and a face-to-face with the U.S.
Vice-President in Singapore--had not persuaded American
leaders to A:
Refrain from hoisting a false flag over a
Persian Gulf of Tonkin, and B: Turn HAARP off.
Surely, Beijing must have reasoned, ordering a United
State Air Force strategic bomber loaded out with six
armed nuclear weapons to fly over
the United States and
then on towards Iran would conclusively demonstrate who
was now in charge.
"This op would not have 'Made In China' stamped all
over it," Hank pointed out. "Instead, American bombs,
American bombers and American
systems were used." No
matter how the mission had proceeded, if Washington had
been forced to tell the world, "It wasn't us. We lost
control
of our bomber carrying six atomic warheads"--how
would that have looked to a global audience already
angry over America's misuse of its
military might?
Whatever Beijing's intentions, Hank was not the only
person in the U.S. military to have his head rearranged
by this latest Chinese
demonstration. "They might have
wanted to go all the way. Of they might have wanted to
put pieces in play and see how far they
could go," he
surmised. "Maybe the Chinese started, and stopped it."
Either way, the unauthorized Minot mission has
bluntly shown the White House and the Pentagon: "If you
start something, we can stop it.
You no longer know how
much control you have over your own weapons systems
because we can play with them at will. No matter where
you are, no matter what you're doing, if you're using
our chips you are vulnerable. And you can't know if our
Trojan chips are in your systems
unless you tear apart
every circuits in every surveillance, communications,
weapons system, pipelines, telecom and power grid in
your entire
military and civilian inventory and look.
And then dismantle every network they are connected to."
"And one more thing," Beijing inferred, "If you take
offense and pop off a missile, remember, we might make
it do a loop-de-loop and come
right back down on its
originating silo."
Hank and others in America's command hierarchy
remain alarmed and puzzled-which makes them even more
uneasy. Would China's
leadership have precipitated a
cloud of radioactive fallout downwind over their own
population? Emphatically, yes. The country's
generals
have long counted an expendable population and
land mass as key factors in "winning" a nuclear war.
Best case scenario, this recent flight of fancy was a warning for Washington to chill the bomb Iran rhetoric, and dial down HAARP.
"Maybe the Chinese got it right and they were just
messin' with us," Hank mused. "Or they got it wrong, and
something very bad almost
happened. But why only one
plane? Why stop there? It's a limited use of a system
that is now exposed."
But what can we do about it?
And what a message it sent!
[See
"Cyber War"]
RECALL
Phase Three of the mission would have sent coded
target grid coordinates and time(s) of weapon(s)
release, as well as updates on weather
over the area,
enemy defense status and friendly escorts. Those orders
never came.
Instead, Phase Four was initiated. When the cockpit
teleprinter spat out paper tape again, it read, in so
many words: "Forget the whole thing.
Abort the mission.
Turn back." The only people capable of issuing a nuclear
strike recall order would be the President, the
Secretary of
Defense, a specific designate of the SecDef
authorized by special code. Or a Chinese military
hacker.
As Hank notes, "The plane had to be diverted to a base that could handle nuclear weapons." That would be Barksdale. But...
"Live hot nukes would have tripped alarms on the
tarmac when it touched down. Either they were
nonfunctional on both ends [Minot and
Barksdale], which
is scary beyond belief considering what we're talking
about." Or the Joint Chiefs or the NCA could have
ordered the
radiation sensors silenced to keep the
mission-and the hijacked mission-under wraps. Or the
Chinese could have turned them off. If the
system is
digital, Beijing probably controls it.
Bottom line: if the incoming bomber had crashed
approach, no one responding would have known they were
dealing with a quiver-full of
"broken arrows".
BARKSDALE
Thought the missiles were never launched, they
still remain in play. As Hank worried, "Six nukes are
now forward deployed to the air force
base that handles
Middle East ops."
A former counter-terrorism expert with the CIA and
the State Department shares his concern. Larry Johnson
does not buy the official story that
six nuclear weapons
were "mistakenly" flown over the USA-not after a retired
B-52 pilot reminded him. "The only time you put such
weapons
on a plane is when they are on alert, or if the
crew has been tasked to move the weapons to a specific
site." Besides running nuclear war
exercises like the
Global Guardian drill it ran on the morning of 9/11,
Barksdale AFB deploys "heavies" to the Middle East.
Like Hank, Johnson wants to know, "Why would we want
to preposition nuclear weapons at a base conducting
Middle East operations?" His
pilot pal believes that an
insider leaker tried to send up a bright red flag.
Johnson asks, "Did someone at Barksdale try to
indirectly warn the
American people that the Bush
Administration is staging nukes for Iran?"
[www.antiwar.com]
But Hank points out another problem. Cruise
missiles-which are essentially autonomous, unpiloted
drones-have special needs. Since six cruise
missiles
showing up at Barksdale were an oddity, can they be
adequately stored and maintained there? The Gulf Coast
is "a very different
environment" than Nebraska, Hank
emphasizes. How long is Barksdale going to hold onto
them? In the hurricane season?
"Are we going to see some of them floating out on the
tide?" Hank wants to know. Americans need a big confirm
that these weapons have
been sent back north to a better
home.
Verify this story here
2007Audio: http://www.willthomasonline.net/willthomasonline/_RefFiles/B-52_takeoff.mp3
The Story That Never Was: The "Silencing" of the B-52 "Whistleblowers"
It seems like somebody is
throwing misinformation out to the Progressive community either to discredit
us or to have us
chase phony stories around that in effect, waste our time.
I recently received information, and I see that many of us did,
about the
supposedly “dead” soldiers that helped to “out” the story on that B-52 that
carried nuclear weapons from Minot
AFB to Barksdale AFB. I heard about it
from an e-mail that was sent by a good friend. Since I had just been burned
by the
“Amero” coin story in which I received information that the Denver
mint had begun making “Amero’s”, I was suspicious
and asked my friend to
check his sources. Sure enough, my friend wrote that he had been duped
again. The worst part of
this saga is that he traced the story back to the
same source that had released misinformation on the Amero!
My source that I believe would rather be left nameless traced the original
story that he got to another source. He actually
called that source to find
out where he got that information and it traced back to Hal Turner. The
original article that wrote
about the so-called “deaths” was on the Military
Times website. Since Michael Hoffman wrote the article I called him today.
Mr. Hoffman was very forthcoming and told me that he had two sources that
told him about the story, and when he
investigated it, he found that the two
servicemen that perished, but that they had no connection whatsoever with
the
bomb-laden B-52.
Mr. Hoffman also told me that he had received e-mail from Hal Turner about
the article and he had advised Mr. Turner to
remove the article from his
website on the premise that he was disseminating fraudulent information.
Apparently Hal
Turner cares nothing for the truth as you can see here:
http://www.halturnershow.com/index.html and that the story is
still on
his website.
I have read a few articles, one here at Opednews.com that still maintain
that the soldiers that turned the information over
to the Military Times
have been silenced…permanently. This is pure misinformation and Hal Turner
along with all that jumped
on this story should have checked their sources
more thoroughly. This could have been a counter intelligence program
designed to make anyone repeating this story look ridiculous. This isn’t an
isolated case. People that write articles should
be very careful to check
their sources, if at least two impeccable sources can’t verify a story, that
story should remain out
of print until a second source has been verified.
That’s the way I see it.
http://liberalpro.blogspot.com
Former Chairman of the Liberal Party of America, Tim is a retired Army Sergeant. He currently lives in South Carolina. A regular contributor to OpEdNews, he is the author of Kimchee Kronicles and is currently at work on a new novel.
- Todd Alexander Blue, of Wytheville, Va. was born August 13, 1987 in Washington, D.C. to John Briggs and Patricia Blue. He departed this life on September 10, 2007. Todd graduated from George Wythe High School in 2005. After high school, he enlisted into the U.S. Air Force. While serving in the Air Force, Todd received many honors. He was stationed at Minot Air Force Base in Minot, N.D. Todd leaves behind lots of great memories of him. He was a star athlete in track and field and football. He was very outgoing, ambitious, and great with helping others deal with hard situations. He was preceded in death by his grandfather, Mr. Clarence Blue, Sr. He leaves to cherish his memory his mother, Patricia Blue; his father, John Briggs and stepmother, Faith Briggs; one sister, Alvina Blue; two brothers, Bryan Blue and Patrick Bryant; three wonderful grandmothers, Ms. Sarah C. Blue, Mrs. Mildred Patterson, and Mrs. Remonia Haskins; two grandfathers, Mr. Willie Patterson and Mr. Cecil Haskins; ten aunts; four uncles; one niece; two nephews; and many other friends and family. A memorial service will be held at 3 p.m. on Sunday, September 16, 2007 at Bethel A.M.E. Church, 635 E. Main Street, Wytheville, Va. with the Reverend Daryl E. Beamer, Sr. officiating. Interment will take place at Arlington National Cemetery in Washington D.C. Arrangements entrusted to Penn's Funeral Home, Pulaski.
- Published in the Roanoke Times on 9/14/2007.
- http://www.legacy.com/roanoke/obituaries.asp?Page=SearchResults
- http://www.rense.com/general78/death.htm
B-52 Nuke-Involved Airman Murdered?
No Cause Of Death Listed
Our Thanks To Ted Twietmeyer
For Locating Airman Todd Blue's Obituary
9-17-7
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