Hmmmm

Larry, what is Putin doing?  Mobilizing his strategic bombers that have been moth-balled since the end of the cold war. Violating British air space, Alaskan air space, Guam, Georgian air space?  Nothing's written in stone, allegations are flying this way or that. But something's going on.  My guess is that Iran certainly figures in somewhere, but it may be a pretext to a broader issue - specifically the forming geopolitical context over Caspian oil and gas.  

There's a terrific piece in the Asia Times today on the newly completed USACE built bridge spaning the Oxus River in the Panjir region of Afghanistan, connecting stratigically important Tajikistan with Afghanistan.  A major nibble at Russian energy hegemony in Central Asia.  I wouldn't be surprised if terrorists attack this bridge in the near future.  But my inclination is that the "great game" referred to by the author, M K Bhadrakumar, is the central informing element in US policy in Central Asia, and Iran plays a key role in everyone's ambitions in this part of the world.  

So yes, I think it makes sense to start moving US nukes around - regrettably so. 

Neoboho

The more likely explanation for the leak of the info is that, instead of a brave whistleblower trying to stop the war machine, it was an intentional Cheney cabal gambit in their ongoing simultaneous agitprop campaigns targeting the Pentagon/realists and the Iranians.

OK. Should we loosen up some cannon as well?

.> This is getting creepier and creepier.

That's the kind of phrase I generally read when my eyeballs are singed by accidentally reading a Radical Right meme e-mail. Let's stay reality-based here: 99.85% chance this was a mistake. A stupid, career-ending mistake, but then again that is why there are PALs on the warheads themselves.

sPh

You might be surprised, JeffC.  While I was in Vietnam some of the best critiques of the war and the military itself I read on the pages of the Army Times.  Things may have changed since then, obviously, but I can certainly remember thinking "I can't believe I read that in a military rag." 

Neoboho

Putin violating British and American airspace?? What fantasies are you trying to push? This is pure garbage.

The number one threat to peace in the world today is the USA. There is no close second. If the US is repositioning nuclear weapons at an airbase serving the ME we should be very very worried. Last year Hirsh revealed that Pentgon gamers were looking into the nuclear option regarding Iran. According to his sources this was not routine. His sources mentioned that more sober minded military types were trying to 'walk this plan' back into the closet.

Either way -- agitprop for the Iranians, or a whistleblower alert -- it isn't good.

At some point, all necessary munitions, fuel, and personnel will be in place, armed and (if necessary) programmed -- all depending upon what's called for in the operational plans. Then a 'go' order can be given. And if there is an operational plan regarding Iran that calls for nuclear-tipped cruise missles -- it's even less good.

I'm not sure about B-52 Wings, but our B-2 fleet is based at Whiteman AFB in Missouri. The B-2 can carry conventional, or nuclear, munitions. If anyone has friends there, and remembers what it was like when they were launched in 2003 -- when they hear it happening again, we may be 18 to 20 hours from a more serious war -- that's as long as it will take them to reach targets in Iran. That will be seriously not good.

This isn't brinksmanship. It's something else.

Oh good grief! This "bomb Iran" paranoia is getting as tiresome and absurd as the mirror iamge paranoia on the Right where there's always some dastardly terrorist plot about to go down.
How do you know there were nukes? A groundless rumor spread by someone claiming to be inside the base, when for all you know it was some blogger a thousand miles away? And while the Bush administration is notoriously incompetent, I trust the military is still on the ball enough not to parade its nukes around in plain sight of the world outside their bases (they also don't have those little atom symbols painted on them as they do in the cartoons; in fact I'm not sure how anyone not in the know would be able to tell a nuclear topped missile from a conventional missile.
Can we plaese get back to talking about serious adult stuff that we might actually be able to do something about-- like next year's election, universal healthcare, the mortgage marlet mess, and the rest of that stuff. There's quite enough trouble in the real world without borrowing more from the imagination.

"How do you know there were nukes? A groundless rumor spread by someone claiming to be inside the base, when for all you know it was some blogger a thousand miles away?"

No, the story is from the Military Times. Did you even bother to really look at this? I am not sure if this merits a 1 or a 0.

Bush makes everyone paranoid...and for good reason.
What I'd like to know is what happens to the warheads now. Okay it was a mistake...but now that they're here already do they just keep them there? At a airbase that is a jump start point for ME operations? I can see how it got press as "look at what some dumbshit did" but the paranoia comes from the base involved. What happens to the nukes now is worth noting

I lived through the missile crisis, although I was pretty young. Worhth considering is that Kennedy's first reaction on discovering that Kruschev had put one over on us was summary use of force to destroy the installations. It was actually CIA director McCone that talked him down to bargaining. And it was of course a little humbling for Kennedy to learn exactly how many Jupiter missiles we had positioned on Turkish soil, pointed at Russia.

More than a few people, especially the principals, were surprised when they woke the next morning, still alive. Russian theater commanders had authority to use the nukes, and there are stories of one being close to doing so in response to the blockade. Curtis LeMay couldn't wait to invade. But still, it didn't happen, we cut a deal, and so on.

I take the lesson that when the bet is upped by bringing in nukes, people get real attentive. My guess is that if people are talking nukes re Iran, it won't happen. It's when they think they can do it all with precision conventional ordinance that they feel no hesitation.

Still, it smells bad. Wonder if we'll find out without having to wait fifty years for declassification.

J. McCutchen

What on earth are you talking about? "Makes sense" why? The Russians R coming? The IslamoFascists? The Ayatollahs?

Nuke Waziristan.

This country is chock full o nuts. Iraq proved that

They must be up to something...why else would Tucker have Ed Schultz and Eugene Robinson on talking about everything BUT this?

It will be interesting to see if the MSM buries this story until the big event.

From Santa Rosa's, Ca. Press Democrat 9/5/07:

Admiral William Fallon, commander of U.S. Central Command, addressing the San Francisco Commonwealth Club on Monday "criticized Iran for it's 'unhelpful role' in the Middle East, but said the United States is not contemplating an invasion." "I don't plan to attack the place. That's not my charter."

He was also giving a 'rosy' picture of results of the troop surge in Iraq, so that reassures me on Iran.

not. good.
BUT: crude oil futures for nov and dec. haven't moved significantly - except the open interest on Dec. contracts (but that can be attributed to seasonal factors: traders are like sheep, they expect a cold winter). So the markets say no Iran run for now. Then again, the markets are right until they're wrong...
[CT]
One million page hits against Bush!!!

I agree with mcboo, and I have the same kind of sensations around this.

I was one of the kids practicing duck-and-cover drills during the last two weeks of October in 1962 -- which even in the fifth grade, we believed were only to give us something to feel 'involved' in Civil Defense. Of course, we were five miles from a Minuteman missle field, so no one had any illusions that being under a desk meant anything.

Governments always prefer to keep public awareness of potential disaster low, usually for good reasons -- but this 'administration' is secretive for different reasons: When you're going to break the law, you don't want anyone to know in advance.

A mistake? To fly with any ordinance requires sign-offs from ground crew, chain of authority, etc. And nukes are far and beyond other ordinance.

The claim they accidentally forgot to remove the warheads and didn't notice, after it was leaked they were moved, not plausible. It's not like nuclear warheads are disassembled on the runway and left beside the fuel trucks. Removal of a warhead is going to set gears into motion, any number of which are sure to notice they don't have the warheads.

Presuming these were nukes as alleged and this info was leaked, either by a whistle blower or a deliberate propagandist sending a message to someone, the probability of movement by mistake is close to zero.

So Nancy can play with her grandchildren (who could get fried along with the rest of us because Grandmom took "impeachment off the table"). Geez, Denny Hastert already did that. Thanks again, Democratic party leaders (also known as idiots and/or cowards and/or career path over everything - even your grandchildren's future)!Tom

Nukes flying over Louisiana??

Maybe the US Army Corps of Engineers' latest scheme for rebuilding the levees?

And while we're nuking Iran, guess who's sleeping snug as a bug in a rug:

www.asecondlookatthesaudis.com

Osama bin Laden must be laughing his ass off? I mean, how could God not be on his side?

Garbage?  Fantasies?  My gosh, you have Google at your fingertips - at least you could have checked before putin your foot in your mouth.

RAF scrambles to intercept Russian bombers (July 18, 07)

Russian bombers buzz US base in Guam

Report: Missile came from Russian airspace (Georgia)

Russian bombers to fire cruise missiles over Arctic

I don't deny your statement about the US being a threat to world piece, but you have to recognize that war is at least a two part proposition, and in the lead up we have a bunch of chicken and egg arguments.  As regards Iran, the problem of why Iran is so important should be addressed.  Nukes, terrorist support, fundamentalism etc. are all pretextural arguments.  The US interest in Western and Central Asia is energy, period.  If you don't believe me, ask Dick Cheney.

Neoboho

So... simple, stunning, staggering, mind-blowing incompetence?

Hmmmm

It would be very interesting to know exactly how this story developed. Anybody know who first leaked this to the press, and when?

It's from rense. In other words, completely and utterly NOT CREDIBLE.

On an operational mission, the missiles would be carried (and launched) from the wings. It makes some sense they would be carried that way, since there would have to be custom packing crates to carry them in a transport. Live warheads, however, seem rather unlikely.

The warhead was the W80-3, which is a derivative, along with a number of other weapons, of the "physics package" of the B-61 "tactical" gravity bomb.

--
Howard

*equal opportunity offense to both extremes*

"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it" [George Santayana]

It showed up in Navy Times.

All I can say is this: if Bush uses nukes or attempts to use them for any reason against Iran I pray unto God that the military officers at the Pentagon will seize him, put him under arrest, deliver him over to the congress to have him impeached on the spot, then sent directly to the Hague for trial before and international tribunal.

Knock it off, Val. At first I thought it was a cruise missile.

Watch this.

I do not believe that most Dems are doing what they can to get us out of Iraq. I do not believe they will get us out of Iraq if they control all 3 branches in 2o009. Ahh, Webb another FISA bill fan.

As to toys, they are a distraction from BIG issues. The Dem won't protect American workers. They won't back making "free" trade fair. They aren't going to protect us from the broad range of hazards that come into this country in a deregulated globalized market. It's just a "cute" issue. And sure, it gets my Senator Amy on the morning talks shows so she can be Senator Mommy.

She still votes for war. She still votes for FISA. She still doesn't support universal health care.

But Senator Mommy she is.

We have become an infantile party terrified of big issues and major change.

The Republicans claim they are going to protect us from global threats and the Democrats claim they are going to protect us from toys.

Nuke or Non-Nike cruise missle.
They must look the same from the outside.

Will we possibly be faced with the stupid excuse after a pre-emptive "standard" cruise missle attack that "gee, I didn't know it was a nuke" - ?

Aren't we supposed to call them bunker-busters now? Your liberal bias is showing.

Oh, I was just pretending to be a military stragegist, I suppose.  But I'm reading a lot of material that claims that a new cold war has begun, largely because Putin won't stay in the box that the west imagines they put him in.  As it stands, I believe that Russia has been the number one beneficiary of the blunders of Bush and the Neocons.  Funny - in the Neocon literature (I use the term lightly) it was China that had to be stopped from becoming the new hegemon.  Now it looks like Russia and China will have to duke it out in the future to earn than honorific.  But if I was a neocon, and I was dedicated to remain the hegemon, and Russia took out its bombs and shaked them at me, well, I'd take out mine and shake them back.  That's what I meant by "makes sense."  Perhaps you missed my suffix: "regretably."

Neoboho

of course, what if that 'higher-up' goes much higher than we're considering on this thread. imagine cheney orchestrating this entire sequence with the intent of it circulating around the world. does a damn good job of drawing away from the iraq debate while simultaneously forcing some of the GOP presidential candidate hawks pivoting on stage to validate the nuclear option - raising the stakes in national discourse dramatically.

Not sure what you mean. Nukes have been tested on fortified targets since the November, 1951 "Uncle" shot. It resulted in one of the dustiest mushroom clouds ever seen. As probably everyone knows by now, nuclear bunker busters don't work very well--the yield required varies as an exponential function of the depth of the target. For the math-inclined it might be worthwhile to estimate the depth of the Iranian targets, then back-calculate to estimate the yield of the device needed to reach that depth. Just don't be surprised if the number you end up with is around 140. Nothing liberal about math.

About that Iran war game:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/09/02/wiran102.xml
It was held at Heritage of all places!!! And of course they are wildly optimistic about it... I love the part where they say they're gonna open ANWR for drilling to counteract the predicted spike in crude prices. It is really amateur hour (I mean it has been amateur hour for the past 7 years or so...).

BTW, I think it was this particular article that got TPM started on this whole Iranmongering trip. While I agree with Josh that one should not underestimate the delusion level at the White House and the OVP, I still think we are quite a long ways from an Iran run. I think they will do it, probably before the forced end of the surge (that would be April 2008), but not before January (they need to prepare us after all - and they need clouds and shorter days as well - remember January 91?)

[CT]
One million page hits against Bush!!!

Okay, forgive me my lack of bleeding-edge technical knowledge, but I was under the impression that deep earth-penetrating nukes were reinforced free-fall weapons that used mass and speed to drive deep underground before detonating. Cruise missiles, being small winged aircraft, follow a flatter trajectory and aren't particularly robust, so they don't seem well-suited to carrying DEP bombs. Am I wrong?

At this moment, I believe the big story here is the apparent loss of operational control of five nuclear weapons. It doesn't make sense to me that we'd stage nukes to the Middle East mounted in missiles destined for the shredder, unless the warheads were destined to be mated with newer delivery systems at Barksdale and carriage on the old missiles allowed the BUFF to get there fastest with the mostest. I've no idea how the AF or, in the old days, SAC shuffled its nukes around. Absent more knowledge, the surface story - "Oops!" - is scary enough.

As for why nukes would be deemed necessary for taking out Iran's assets, use at the onset of hostilities seems unlikely, but if Iran managed to take out a carrier or deliver chem/bio/rad warheads to a neighboring state, I think there'd be a great temptation to use nukes in response.

Clem,
Perhaps they weren't moved(this assumes it was not a colossal error) for use against Iran, but rather to provide a casus belli against Iran, when one goes missing and detonates on US soil.

What then?

You really need to be more suspicious.
/snark

Re-read your Kissinger on the Congress of Vienna, and your several hundred years of European history before and after that ...

the sensible thing to do, for adult sovereigns of great yet limited resources, is to try to split the opposing alliance whose combined weight over-awes yours ...

Yet sixty-two years into the nuclear age, these stupid children we have "leading" us in our "democracy" only know how to start fights ...

The wars in Afghanistan and Iraq are going so well, the snark goes, are going so well, why not add another ?

The neo-con children have not yet felt any pain from their failures in Iraq and Afghanistan yet, so they have no dis-incentive to new military mis-adventures ... it's the wars on the environment, the global working classes, the Democrats and the media that ARE going so well for them, that emboldens them to new wars.

Am I the only citizen who prays for a "meet-up" of intelligent activists around the AEI in DC on Monday next, when Ledeen and friends war-monger in a warm-up in the afternoon, before Gingrich war-mongers at night, who will (legally and non-violently, of course) shame and deter these lunatics who run our world ???

My next bumper sticker: Any child can start a fight, it takes adults to create peace.

Let's get going people ... watch out, I might be knocking on your door in Clackamas County OR next week, and I might be on Community TV in Lane County OR a few weeks after.

Let's organize now to be able to end American imperialism by 2012 or 2016 -- which will entail restoring the Constitution and the rule of law, restoring democracy and progressiveness to American life, and most likely turning the ship on global warming too, who's smart and strong enough to survive?

See above post about political realities. Blaming Pelosi for the overall zeitgeist of present day America, is idiotic.

That's exactly the problem with so many online whiners. It's easy to complain how the world "should" be, and blame Pelosi or whoever for not making it happen.

But going and meeting conservatives and moderates in real life, rubbing elbows, and actually convincing them to support various political positions, that's a whole nother matter.

I'll stick my neck out and predict that this buff-carrying-nukes incident is part of an not-so-expert bluff. All kinds of highly detailed reports about U.S. readiness to strike have been appearing in the British press and DailyKos but not here.

Were I a global gamesman advising the Bush administration, I'd note that Bush's reputation as a madman (an asset carefully cultivated by Nixon and Kissinger) is an asset in decline. What better time and cause than to exploit it now against Iran's nuclear program. I'm just sayin'.

"Blaming Pelosi for the overall zeitgeist of present day America, is idiotic."Agreed, but blaming Pelosi for taking impeachment "off the table" is accurate.

SeeDee

Kozmik, with all due respect (meaning I would never classify your remarks as idiotic), I would like a list of those 'conservatives and moderates' whom you have 'reasoned' into accepting the dismal and disastrous facts RE the present status quo of America that exist after nearly a decade of 'CONSERVATIVE' (fake conservative, that is) control.

Even within my own family (which is fairly close-knit despite varying political and religious views) I've not had much luck 'converting' the 'conservatives' to acceptance of the fact that we need to change tactics and policies and directions as far as our country is concerned.

Of course, left-wingers know and realize the limits imposed by thin majorities...of course, they know they must accept constitutional provisions RE impeachment; but, that definitely does not mean that they should remain silent in prodding our Democrats to 'do the right (pun) thing'.

And nothing Putin is doing wasn't done 100s of times by both sides during the Cold War.

Ironically, IMO he just wants to make us spend ourselves into a hole while Russia grows rich with oil revenues. Hell, maybe turnabout is fair play.

J. McCutchen

I'm with ya up until the nuclear part. Yup, Newton's Third Law of International Politics - For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction.

Russia and China know that the Eagle Has Crash Landed; that Bush's reckless adventurism has hastened the decline of US world hegemony, and have in fact conducted their first ever joint military maneuvers.

The new Eastern Euro NATO/EU members are meant to take notice here but I don't think we're close to the chicken little moment yet

We don't need nuclear saber-rattling. We're in enough deep doo as it is. Pax Americana is over. History has not ended.

The original plan was to transport non-nuclear Advanced Cruise Missiles, mounted on the wings of a B-52, to Barksdale as part of a Defense Department effort to decommission 400 of the ACMs. It was not discovered that the six missiles had nuclear warheads until the plane landed at Barksdale, leaving the warheads unaccounted for during the approximately 3 and one-half hour flight between the two bases, the officers said.

the warheads unaccounted for read un-controlled, un-guarded by protocols for security and thus up for grabs by ??? if not having been grabbed already and being transported to disappear!

It reads just as bad to me, in fact I am more worried now,
what am I MISSING?

-----------------------------------------------
Today, are we searching for I deals or Ideals?
-Thinking

But I think nuclear brinksmanship sucks, personally.  But when I play "tactician" it figures in. 

Neoboho

But why not assess the facts on the ground, Kozmik?  Since the day Bush decided that foreign policy equaled military intervention, Russia has benefitted from every round.  Starting with Afghanistan: the first two weeks of the Afghan invasion were spent knocking out targets in the north that were of strategic value to the Russians - especially the Checchen strongholds, while the Northern Alliance camped outside Kabul wondering where the American ordinance was.  That's the price Bush paid to get Putin to sign on with the Alliance, yes?  A couple of billion worth of carnage to please Russia.  Such a deal.  And then Iraq, and the price of oil skyrockets from 25 bucks to 60 by 06, and today it's 75 bucks.  So who benefits?  The energy producers, and Russia is the world's second largest oil producer, behind Saudia Arabia.  Russia is numero uno in natural gas.  Not surprisingly, Russian economic growth rate has been around 7% since the Iraq invasion, twice the growth rate of the US.  

Russia has also paid of it's Soviet Era national debt of 22 billion ahead of time in 06, and is now a Paris Club lender nation.  It's remaining foreign debt is 45 billion (5% of its GDP).  Let's see, for comparison's sake, the US debt is 9 trillion bucks, close to 70% of the GDP.  Russia has been running a budget surplus since 2002.

So it looks to me that you've underated the Russian economy and overrated US omnipotence.  Besides, Russia has 'tomic bombs too. 

Neoboho

Perhaps it was an intentional stunt, "leaked" to The Military Times, to get Iran to piss their pants (and give up their Nuke program.)

I wouldn't bet on it, but I thought I'd mention the possibility. (Because I don't think Iran gives a crud.)

Another possibility would be if there is actionable intelligence that another al queda leader's meeting is about to take place, and they don't want to miss this time.

You don't mention repercussions in the adjoining nation that happens to have 160,000 of our citizens in it right now. The moment the first bomb falls on Iran, the relative few of them in Sunni areas get a whole lot safer. And the relative few in Kurdistan pretty much stay safe for a while. But everywhere else in Iraq is instantly enemy territory, in a way that it never has been before. Americans will have no -- as in zero -- Shi'a support: no collaborators, no friends, no employees, no interpreters. Iraqi Arab Shi'a attitude toward Iranian Shi'a is, if not love/hate, at least like/distrust, but that wave function collapses into pure sympathy the moment we open a Pandora's box of whoop-ass on Iran. SIIC and Sadr will have a truce within hours, and will keep it for the duration. The only reasonably safe place in Shi'a or semi-Shi'a Iraq will be the Green Zone. And that will get the shit mortared and rocketed out of it, and will have to work like hell to prevent a blockade. And that's before Saddam's old artillery gets brought in.

Basically, like everything else this administration does, the utterly predictable and utterly unpredicted negatives will dwarf the fragmentary and fleeting positives that were supposed to make the world all happy and shiny again. And we will be told that it's Nancy Pelosi's fault for not supporting the troops.

That's not a rational argument.

I know that if the Democrats in the House all voted for impeachment Cheney/Bush would be impeached.

Wow. Here you are talking about impeachment, and you don't even know how it works. Oi vey.

Impeachment requires a simple majority in the House. Conviction and removal via impeachment requires a 2/3 majority in the Senate.

If the all the House Dems voted for impeachment (not realistic to begin with) then proceedings would begin, but it would fail in the Senate anyways, dishearten moderates, and rally Republicans. Like I said, a bad idea, and at best a waste of time.

Grow up. And yeah, it is a "stupidly emotional obsession" to fixate on the impossible.

I find this hard to believe. That is, I agree with Larry that this isn't something that could occur very easily through oversight. The procedures that are established for weapons loads on aircraft are very rigid with all manner of checks. I find it hard to believe they were all overlooked. The number of screwups that would have to occur stretches the likelihood of probability to the breaking point. There are manuals and checklists for this type of thing that have to be rigidly followed and the process requires signatures for multiple discrete steps from qualified weapons teams etc. I just can't see where all the controls on this were violated. If this really happened as described we have some very big problems. And I know because I was an NCOIC for NAV/Weapons avionics computers in the USAF for 12 years. The workcenter / personnel I supervised serviced the on board computers that controlled the in flight release / launch of weaponry. I've been out for twenty years but it was very serious business then and it can't have changed in that sense. The screwup implies weapons load team and weapons load supervisor, ground crew personnel, line chief and air crew all screwed up. The sheer number of violations of discrete procedures that had to be violated is a stretch. And the aircraft was likely on alert status to have been loaded with said weapons. To make the transit to Barksdale it would first have to come off alert status. Coming off alert status automatically means the weapons would have to be off loaded. Flight (Wing) ops initiates the status change. Maintenance ops is informed and then has to dispatch a weapons team to off load the weapons payload. Until that happens the aircraft can't be released back to flight ops for flight. This entire process is controlled like crazy. It makes no sense. Statistically this is possible, but it is right up there with winning one of the multi-state lotteries. In fact, the number of controls probably makes it an even greater statistical improbability. One thing for sure. A lot of people will be standing tall in front of the 'old man' and they'll be hard pressed to answer his questions. If it even happened as stated.

I agree with your post, but I do think the "never blame on malice..." aphorism has to be rethought in an age of Cheney, Addington, and Rove. It is not beyond that group to work up and execute competent large-scale plans in secret.

sPh

Critiques of the military and the war I can understand, but not the leaking of information concerning the movement of nuclear weapons. Such information is, I'm pretty sure, Top Secret. You don't print top secret military information in the Military Times unless someone with a lot of stars on his shoulder says "make it so."

heavy bombers can physically lift bombs, and deliver them from higher altitude (i.e., with more gravitational kinetic energy) than a fighter-bomber

If I remember my high-school physics correctly, a dropped object can only reach a certain speed due to air resistance. So whether you drop it from 40,000 feet or 20,000 feet makes no difference - the kinetic energy is the same because it can't physically travel any faster than its terminal velocity, which decreases the closer the object gets to the ground, due to air density. The real advantage of a heavy bomber lies in the fact that it can lift heavier bombs with more explosive force, and it can do so for longer distances. We have heavy bombers because we need global reach.

It makes some sense they would be carried that way, since there would have to be custom packing crates to carry them in a transport.

I imagine they already have custom packing crates. I can't imagine a situation where you wouldn't have custom packing crates for all your ordinance.

Amyfw,

Excellent informational post, thanks.

Setting aside that impeachment will become a standard weapon of both parties in the future and fundamental democracy will be regularly negated mathatics is against you. The Democrats don't have the votes in the Senate to convict either Bush or Cheney, or to cut off funding for Iraq. Therefore until the next election and a lot more Democrats arriving in the Senate this is venting but not possible.

Daniel A. Greenbaum

That's so hard to believe?

Briefly, this article in the NYT seemed to claim that the general in charge had been fired.  Now, I can't find that version, but the fact that the hint was out there might be taken to indicate that this is more screw up than saber rattle.

True, but you reach that velocity fairly quickly. I don't know the actual numbers, but I don't imagine it takes more than a few thousand feet for a bunker buster to reach terminal velocity.

My point is that we have heavy bombers so we can fly really heavy bomb payloads half way around the world, not so we can fly them really high so they hit the ground harder. An Israeli fighter-bomber can fly high enough for its ordinance to reach terminal velocity. I suspect an Israeli fighter-bomber can fly high enough to shoot down a heavy bomber. So altitude isn't an issue.

Since the missiles are reported as scheduled to be decommissioned, it wouldn't make sense as a veiled threat out of Cheney's office.

To me, it makes more sense as a leak by someone who is trying to stop something insane from happening.

Listening to Fresh Air and Terry Gross yesterday we got a new insight about how Bush-Cheney team has built an "Imperial Presidency" that gives the President much more power than most informed people realize. The thought of George Bush planning to and also having the legal authority to drop nuclear bombs on Iran is truly frightening. The last six years gives us an insight on how a small group can hijack a democracy. Some of the dynamics are similar to the slide of Germany into fascism.

Don't be fooled by the fact that the US military can easily overrun the armies of 3rd world countries equipped by Russian-made hardware. Iraq (for example) had Russian weapons, yes, but several generations old.
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Not really

http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/iraq/ground-equipment-intro.htm

At the end of the war with Iran, most Republican Guard heavy divisions were equipped with Soviet T-72 main battle tanks, Soviet BMP armored personnel carriers, French GCT self-propelled howitzers and Austrian GHN-45 towed howitzers -- all modern, state-of-the-art equipment
********************************************
I also enjoyed this description of an encounter of three Iraqi T-72s with a DISABLED M-1A1

A story illustrating DU's offensive and defensive renown involves an M1A1 "Heavy Armor" tank that had become mired in the mud. The unit (part of the 24th Infantry Division) had gone on, leaving this tank to wait for a recovery vehicle. Three T-72's appeared and attacked. The first fired from under 1,000 meters, scoring a hit with a shaped-charge (high explosive) round on the M1A1's frontal armor. The hit did no damage. The M1A1 fired a 120mm armor-piercing round that penetrated the T-72 turret, causing an explosion that blew the turret into the air. The second T-72 fired another shaped-charge round, hit the frontal armor, and did no damage. This T-72 turned to run, and took a 120mm round in the engine compartment and blew the engine into the air. The last T-72 fired a solid shot (sabot) round from 400 meters. This left a groove in the M1A1's frontal armor and bounced off. The T-72 then backed up behind a sand berm and was completely concealed from view. The M1A1 depressed its gun and put a sabot round through the berm, into the T-72, causing an explosion.

I've never seen so many people who know so very, very little about nuclear weapons say so much of so very little consequence.
******************************************
Amen! And thank you

I wouldn't go so far as to say that everyone here has very little knowledge. Yes, I agree that the warhead issue was likely to be a ground issue, and I suspect some people, if not disciplined in other ways, are going to lose their Personnel Reliability Program (PRP) certification. Even so, I don't see a violation in a bomber, rather than a transport, carrying a weapon to its decommissioning destination, given that the weapon is a normal wing hardpoint munition for that particular platform.

As far as yield, while 140 KT may be the maximum yield, the W-80, AFAIK, has variable-yield capability.

As far as chaos, I'm trying to remember which German general made an appropriate comment -- I want to say von Manstein, but I'm not sure he had enough sense of humor to observe "War is chaos. The reason the Americans do so well at it is that they practice chaos every day."
--
Howard

*equal opportunity offense to both extremes*

"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it" [George Santayana]

I am curious. Is our military losing its grip in the same way that FEMA has lost its grip? NASA seemingly lost its grip some years ago, but I do not know if it has really recovered.

Thank you for your inside information!

Wouldn't you assume a B-2 rather than a B-52? And those are all based at Whiteman IIRC

A caller to KLSD in San Diego this morning pointed out that the anthrax used in the 2001 US attacks was traceable to US govt research strains. He thought the nukes would be used here in the US.

The US air defense on 9/11 somehow went awry. Special case, war games, shredded air control tapes... Cheney in charge?

Re the gravity/velocity physics arguments above, mechanical engineer Judy Wood's Billiard Balls paper showed in simple terms that the official story of the collapse of the World Trade Center towers (pancaking) could not be true because it would have taken longer for the towers to come down.

Terry Nichol recently said Tim McVeigh was guided by someone in the FBI. McVeigh said he bombed the OK City Fed Bldg because of Waco, where US military attacked US citizens on US soil, and because checks and balances hadn't corrected the govt imbalance.

Larry Craig opposed renewal of the Patriot Act because he remembered Ruby Ridge and Waco and didn't want those Patriot Act loopholes and expanded powers available to a president and lackey atty general. Bush called him a "goddamned traitor" and instructed Republican Senate committee to look for a replacement. Now all attention is on Craig (strategic leak so useful) as loose nukes quietly fly around US.

All these questions. Why aren't we investigating them? Why are the police are assigned to catching toe tappers in bathroom stalls? Something's wrong.

All of this while the Democrats can't focus on agreeing about impeachment.
Tom

C'mon - don't be so hard on ole Jeff.  It just occured to me that he was the Internet's first blogger, recycling stories from elsewhere that he finds interesting.

Besides, you can't really say a flying object isn't real if it hasn't been identified. 

Neoboho

I think you really need to check the rense.com site mentioned elsewhere on this thread. I wouldn't be surprised if he's "investigated" every single one of your questions, and there's so much more. I presume you already know about the black helicopters, there are better sites for that.

Sorry, Kozmik, I'm no longer willing to ignore your insulting and disrespectful remarks.  If you think my argument is silly and goofy, then what's your point in engaging it?  Are you here on this forum on a mission to inform others that their ideas are "stupid" and "idiotic"?  

Let me remind you:  you insulted sphealy by saying "that isn't even a rational argument."  If you've checked today's news, you'll see that sphealy's irrational argument is exactly what happened - the nukes were loaded by mistake.  Perhaps you've never served in the Armed Forces, but those of us who have know the technical term for this kind of mistake:  a fuck-up. 

Neoboho

I guess I am a little unclear as to why my argument is not rational. Perhaps next time you could offer some actual analysis, or even your own argument?

By the way, have you read the two books referenced? Ever worked in reliability engineering? I have plenty more titles if you need them.

sPh

If it weren't bad enough that the Military Times publishes an article describing top secret movements of nuclear weapons, now CNN has published an article stating to all the world that all our fighter jets and bombers will be grounded on September 14.

"The Air Force announced that all flights of fighters and bombers in the United States will be halted on September 14 to allow for a review of procedures."

This is alarming - that they are doing it, and that they are announcing it. Anyone planning any sort of action, military or terrorist, against the US would KILL to get that kind of advance intel on our air defense capability. If we are so secure that we can announce this, what does it say about the actual level of threat?

There have been stand-downs like this before, and there have been backup mechanisms in place. Remember that Navy and Marine aircraft aren't all in distant places on carriers; there are always some in the US. I also wouldn't be surprised to find several flights of Air Force interceptors and their crews going through review, but at the end of runways with ready aircraft.

--
Howard

*equal opportunity offense to both extremes*

"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it" [George Santayana]

Excellent and most interesting post, Amyfw.

I think the signal weakness of the psy-op argument is that our opponents already know (or assume) what our capablilities are. We've been advertising them, and the Bush Administration made it clear upon assuming office that nukes were no longer to to be regarded as weapons of last resort. The Iranian civilian and military leaderships would be foolish not to assume that nukes are, at the very least, on the table and possibly in-theater. If the five nukes on that B-52 were something other than a huge snafu, and were part of a saber-rattling campaign, the more receptive target audience is an Iranian populace that is already restive, frustrated with the retarding of a liberalizing society, an economic recession and gas rationing, and not their putative leaders. Finding out that Americans were a) bombing up and b) "casual" about nukes might make the average Iranian citizen more likely to consider the benefits of an domestically induced regime change.

If there are any readers fluent in Persian around here, I'd be interested to know if the B-52 story penetrated Iran's popular press and what the response has been.

If SeeDee joined the Navy she could be SeaBeeSeeDee. :-)

You obviously did not read the whole comment. Either that or you are one of the few people left in the country who doesn't know who Larry Craig is.

Victor Borge joke:

"I'm checking three suitcases, and I'd like this one to go to Switzerland, this one to London, and this one to Paris."

"But why?" says the ticket agent.

"That's where they went last time."

SeeDee

LOL, yeah...

Just so happens SeeDee ain't no she...HE is a contemporary of JohnW1141..and while you were on your pleasure tour of Europe (presumably), SeeDee WAS actually in the NAVY.

I can swap first-hand stories with you 'bout Leyte Gulf, Luzon (Lingayen Gulf, Jan '45) and 30-days worth of dodging kamikaze Japs at Okinawa, but, as you know, we won't go any further into such tales lest we begin to look like self-serving braggarts.

Anyhow, appreciate your sense of humor :-)...

My apologies for my gender miscue but I'll blame John..."he started it!". ;)

Given this new information (a guy and ex-navy) I'll stick with the "seedy CD" part of my post. My old man did two tours in the navy in Vietnam (river patrol boats) so I know just how seedy a navy man can be! That was quite a bit different type of navy experience then yours but you both used to float so I'll assume the similarities don't stop there!

SeeDee

Bravo for all your trouble and thanks for the clarifications.

Don't forget to clue us in on the info (or opinions) garnered from the 'buddy' at Minot.

Goody! I get the last word here. Those "accidentally live" cruise missiles were sent to Louisiana as the first stop on their way to Israel. Gotta beef up our ally you know.

Hoppy in Sacramento

There have been stand-downs like this before

Yes, but don't you think announcing it on CNN is somewhat out of the ordinary?

It's too much for me too, Tom.

Please see my (first) blog entry -- actually a copy & paste job I did from a terrific email I got from 'The Pen' today about their swift Impeach Cheney program ... complete with impeachment caps (headgear); or just check out:

IMPEACHMENT CAPS:

http://www.usalone.com impeach_cheney_cap.php

They have peops wearing the Impeach Cheney? caps and handing everyone who asks about it sign-on sheets to register their voices on this truly increasingly imperative issue right now!

Those results are being entered on their web site (as well as the hard copies being sent in to their offices), so they can be brought to the members of congress ...

and they call it a 'footrace' between the impeachment and the impending carpet bombing of Iran ...

rally Repubs at their own peril ... people will be watching and keeping score ... not all of them are *that* stupid ...

SeeDee

OK, kozmik, I'm still waiting for that 'list of conservatives, moderates, chicken-hawks, Likudniks, and any other right-wingnuts' that your (or moderate Democrats') persuasive power has 'reasoned' into the realm of Democratic aims in Congress.

You've denigrated many other commentors' personally, for whatever reason it is not clear; and here I've requested that you specifically show some movement on the part of Repugs who seem intent on protecting Bush's blunders. Will you please respond to my request?

Maybe tlees2 is right, as in correct...maybe the bringing of impeachment charges against BOTH, Bush and Cheney would create the explosion of indignation among American voters needed to effect real change.

Certainly, if the 'loose nukes' incident is NOT an accident, that is, if it is part of some diabolical plot from the VP's office to extend the war to Iran, an explosion of American citizens should be expected and hoped for.

those elections were stolen -- more people *did* vote for anything but Bush ... but their votes were not counted!

when enough people express their demands that these freaks be impeached some members of congress will have to re-evaluate how they intend to vote on it ...

we can and must flood them with the certainty of our intentions about getting these insane monsters out of power now!

let them know that they will face the consequences if they don't serve the will of the people!

we can rush them; know what I mean?

I didn't think it was all that outrageous when Iran offered us help in going after the perps of 9/11, but I guess Cheney thought so when he rebuffed them ...

if only Cheney hadn't thought that was so outrageous! Now he's going to *nuke* them!

We can wish, but ... we probly won't see that ...

maybe a citizens' arrest is more realistic though ...

although that might take many many many of us ...

No, actually it is quite common.

sPh

Of course there was no need to bribe people like me to enlist and go to war.

Maybe that idea of equal sacrifice that existed during your war is, relatively speaking, a Stone Age idea.

yep, seems so;

FDR had 4 sons:

James; During World War II he was second-in-command of the 2nd Raider Battalion of the Marine Raiders, an early US Marine commando unit organized and trained to conduct guerrilla-style attacks behind enemy lines. Eventually he retired at the rank of Brigadier General, winning the Navy Cross and Silver Star in combat. James suffered from having flat feet, so while soldiers were required to wear boots, he was allowed to wear sneakers.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Colonel Elliott Roosevelt was a pilot in the United States Army Air Forces (USAAF) during World War II. He flew a P-38 Lightning in the North African campaign of November 1942.

During World War II, he accompanied FDR as a military aide to the Casablanca meeting and the subsequent Cairo and Tehran Conferences.

As an Army photo reconnaissance pilot, he and the men in his unit also played a key role in the D-Day landings.

~~~~~~~

Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Jr. (August 17, 1914 – August 17, 1988) was the fifth child of Eleanor Roosevelt and Franklin D. Roosevelt (the 32nd President of the United States). He was born at his parents summer home on Campobello Island, New Brunswick, Canada. An earlier child of the same name died in infancy.

He was a Naval officer in WWII and decorated for bravery in the battle of Casablanca.

~~~

John Aspinwall Roosevelt (born Washington DC March 13, 1916 - died New York City April 27, 1981) was the 6th and last child of the 32nd President of the United States, Franklin Delano Roosevelt and his wife Anna Eleanor Roosevelt.

He served with honor in World War II as Lieutenant and received the Bronze Star for his logistics work with a carrier task group in the Pacific.

~~~~~~~
and then there was me, the lowly son of a railroad worker.

Have you a cite?

By a cite, I mean one that addresses how the training would operate without a air defense radar network inside the continental US, and other real-world technical issues.

Now, I can think of contingencies where that could be managed, such as having a number of AWACS aircraft airborne. They are a finite quantity and there aren't enough to cover the country.

There were engineering tests underway of connecting JTIDS Link 16 to fighters, but it certainly wasn't operational at the time, to send either military or FAA radar imagery.

The FAA radar is really not primarily radar in the classic sense, but tracks transponders that can be turned off. It has a very limited ability for "skin paint", but it is unclear if that could have helped.

Without a transponder, visual identification would be necessary to confirm which specific airliner, in a busy air environment like NY or DC, is the hijacked one. That takes time when many aircraft are aloft.

Finally, assuming the fighter finds the right aircraft, what are the rules of engagement? Firing a Sidewinder or AMRAAM missile into a large aircraft doesn't make it blow up as an enemy fighter might. You now have several hundred tons of metal, fuel, and bodies that are going to come down somewhere. In New York, for example, there were fully populated schools near the WTC. How would your scenario prevent slaughter on the ground, or is it just for protecting specific high-value targets?

--
Howard

*equal opportunity offense to both extremes*

"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it" [George Santayana]

Troops that I know, who have served in combat in Iraq and Afghanistan, are appalled by the idea of having the Bush twins by. You may know that the British Prince Harry, who volunteered and is fully qualified as a tank platoon leader, was, under his protests, barred from going to Iraq because the Army command thought he would be a constant target.

It's fair to say that a leader, especially a leader that hasn't served in a risky role, might not encourage his children to volunteer. Still, it is a volunteer military, and to insist that the children of high officials enlist is putting a special requirement on those (adult) children.

Comparing the war to other wars is quite a different matter. Again, I know people who have served there and disagree with policies, but also believe they have an obligation to be there. One senior sergeant, for example, thinks he is the best chance that the people in his platoon come back in one piece.

--
Howard

*equal opportunity offense to both extremes*

"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it" [George Santayana]

SeeDee

And what, hcberkowitz, is to keep the 'twins' from joining as a symbol of the true committment of Bush/Cheney to spread the 'sacrifice' required by the war equally among the American citizenry? What they are a 'symbol' of at present is the elitist, 'can't be bothered', rich kids don't fight wars (ala the late Leona's "only little people pay taxes") attitude.

As JohnW1141, pointed out with his info RE the FDR kids in WW II, it is really a matter of LEADERSHIP...

As for the Brits (and Prince Harry), there is considerable difference NOW between the Iraq plans of the UK, which plans to withdraw sooner, rather than later, and the idea of Bush & Company who seem intent on an American military presence in Iraq for DECADES.

Your statement that "expecting children of high officials to enlist is putting a special requirement on those young adults" (or words to that effect) is, IMO, sheer gobbledy-gook. Do you think that those soldiers who are fighting and dying in Iraq are not under a 'special burden'?

I have a grand-son who, having completed his current tour in Iraq, is now, thankfully, en route to the States from there. He is under no illusions RE the stupidity of the Iraq war, nor the prime motivating factors causing it, but, in our discussions, we've both acknowledged his duty to honor his committment. So, don't lecture me on the mind-set prevailing among those who have fought in Iraq, please.

And what, hcberkowitz, is to keep the 'twins' from joining as a symbol of the true committment of Bush/Cheney to spread the 'sacrifice' required by the war equally among the American citizenry?

--
Howard

*equal opportunity offense to both extremes*

"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it" [George Santayana]

Thanks for the response.

Why is obligatory, in a volunteer military, that the child of a chickenhawk doesn't want to enlist?

You will have to rephrase that question for me. I can't even guess what you meant to ask with any confidence.

Just to be clear about the rest of your answer, are you saying that each of these people you cite of refer to specifically said that they would be "appalled" at the idea of serving with the Bush twins? Considering that if they were to serve with them it would be because the twins had volunteered, did they say why they would be 'Appalled to serve with them?

Now, I ask you directly: what is a child's obligation to treat volunteer military service in a manner consistent with a politician parent's position?

I asked you directly if those twenty to thirty people you referenced actually said they would be “appalled” to serve with the Bush twins. From your non-answer I will guess at what the correct answer is.

As to a child’s obligation to serve in the military based on their parents beliefs and actions, I have never said they have any. That said, I keep hearing how the party of family values instills in THEIR children the values of patriotism, love of country, and the ideals of service, to name a few. While no particular child is obligated to join, it seems that a higher percentage would.

Why are you concerned with draftees? That wasn’t the subject and we don’t have a draft. Are you getting concerned that our country will get backed into a corner and actually need a draft? Are you afraid that draftees will actually lose an asymmetrical war quicker than our all-volunteer forces are doing so?

And then there are those who don't enlist during wartime for the simple reason that the idea of combat makes them shit their pants.

(Of course these are the same people who don't enlist during peacetime either because "there's no need to.")

SeeDee

I've no inclination, let alone patience, to deal with your protracted offering, hvberkowitz...
However, I must refer to your, "The people I talk to, however, believe that 2-year draftees are apt not to have the skills to avoid dying...etc."

How many wars have the 'people you talk to won'? Do they have some record of infallibility in assessing the efficiency of training among 'draftees' v. volunteers? Certainly, the past 4 or 5 years does not reflect very well on the brass in the Pentagon... and their immediate superiors when it comes to either tactics and/or strategies.

Your main argument in belittling draftees seem to be that, at present, the term would be only 2 years. If that service term were a problem, a simple solution would be to extend the requirement for a 30-month sign-up at induction.

I will say again, emphatically, that, if a country is confronted with a situation that threatens its existence from outside enemies, then every single living citizen should be willing to sacrifice to the point of death itself to repel such threat...and to attain that 'equality of sacrifice', a system of conscription directed to all socio-economic strata to effect that equality is needed.

I'll mention one little personal note to illustrate different attitudes prevalent in this country in WW II, and the attitude epitomized by George W. Bush's avoidance of combat with his maneuvering into a 'combat-exempt' slot in a T-ANG back in the 'Nam era:

One of my co-sufferers in 'boot camp' in 1943 was a guy named Thomas W. Lamont, Jr. who I think was a grandson of J. P. Morgan.. We developed a brief friendship and, after moving on to our duty 'stations' (mine in the Amphibs) I followed his assignment to submarine duty...He was lost in 1944 while serving on the USS Snook in the Pacific theater.

I recount this only to illustrate the fact that the sense of 'duty' was not limited to classes or influences, and did not depend on being a volunteer or a draftee.

Your apparent belief that 'drafted' personnel would not absorb the technology of modern weaponry and systems quickly is, IMO, total bunk.

As far as chaos, I'm trying to remember which German general made an appropriate comment -- I want to say von Manstein, but I'm not sure he had enough sense of humor to observe

"War is chaos. The reason the Americans do so well at it is that they practice chaos every day."

Howard, try Admiral Doenitz. (unless it wasn't him ) :-)

That comment always made me smile.

Thanks for the lecture about growing up and the Constitution."Impeachment requires a simple majority in the House." Those are your words and they agree with what I said. Since the Democrats have a majority in the House, Bush and Cheney would be impeached (accused). Removal requires two-thirds of Senate. I know that which is why I didn't mention removal in my original post. I guess you were too busy worrying about my emotional obsessing to pay close attention to what I said.Tom

I would uprate this comment, but that function isn't working for me at the moment. This troll rating strikes me as ratings abuse, or perhaps a lack of understanding of the system.  It appears to me to be a comment made articulately enough, and in good faith.  Maybe it's a bit rough, but not out of bounds.  Wholly Rogue Emperor, please check out this post on the ratings system.

SeeDee

And thank you, sir, for the lengthy exchange...In parting, I'll say only one more thing about your assessment of what is important of the qualities a soldier should possess: Your rating of 'ability to master technology' (in SO many words) as the most important factor only proves to me that you've never actually been involved, hcberkowicz...'Courage' and 'Motivation', which you downplay in importance, are a great deal MORE important than you realize, apparently.

Quite candidly, there is nothing more contemptible than those proponents of the (any) war who urge the sacrifice of others' flesh and blood with b/s about 'noble causes', and 'patriotism', and 'defense of our country' while studiously avoiding advocating any measure that would entail like 'sacrifices' of their own kin....for those supposed self-same motives.

Chicken-hawks, and their ilk, fit into this category of contemptibility...and that includes, at the forefront, George W. Bush and virtually his entire retinue of top White House officials.

Hard to miss: 

SeeDee

Altus (OK) AFB and the former Burns Flat AFB (Burns Flat, OK) which is now being readied as the nations first commercial spaceport...it (Burns Flat) has L-O-N-G runways...used to base KC-135 tankers but I understand it also handled B-52's at one time.

Both bases within about 100 miles of PanTex.

Believe me, virtually everyone who resides in the upper TX Panhandle and all of Western Oklahoma are aware of PanTex and its purposes.

These debates are usually not entirely fruitful because there are two reasonable--yet mutually exclusive-- ways to look at the matter:
1) Agitate the Democratic politicians to get more active in promoting a truly progressive agenda. This is asking them to be LEADERS. (That is asking them to lead the barfly to the church.)

2) Assess the political situation and don't blame the Democrats for not trying to do the Quixotic.

There is merit in both views, but I tend to agree more with Kozmic's approach than with those advocating agitation in the situation we find ourselves in at this time.

It does seem to me that "average Joe" is dormant.
It does seem that the right has effectively injected a huge dose of militarism in "average Joe"
The elections are approaching, and if vigorous agitation turns "average Joe" off, we will not do as well in the general as we would have if we just sit here and let them stew in their own growing MOUNTAIN OF FAILURES.

In any case it is a matter of tactics and not of ideology. We seem to all be pretty much on the same page on that.
Having said that, we could probably tone down the vitriol.

Andrew

Impeachment may not have been on the table if the politicians are afraid to bring it if it does not end in removal.

However, stating that it is off the table -- a statement probably made in an excess of caution generated by a rovian induced fear that attacking republicans is bad for democrats ( the reverse is true) makes it that much more difficult to use impeachment when it is needed.

If Cheney were contending with impeachment he would have that much less time to contemplate how to attack Iran.

Very good real-world view. Legislators, regardless of party, need to be convinced that their constituents want such action. Personally, I believe that 535 (or more when there are multiple district offices) local demonstrations, visiting delegations, or focused letter campaigns, are more effective than massive demonstrations in Washington.

Man is not a rational animal; man is a rationalizing animal. A legislator that wants to rationalize could look at several hundred thousand people on the Mall and think they probably don't include his constituents. A group of constituents, demonstrating or bearing petitions, appearing at a district office can't be rationalized away.

The challenges of motivating activists and motivating elected officials are different.

--
Howard

*equal opportunity offense to both extremes*

"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it" [George Santayana]

What's good is that there was someone with the integrity, and the balls, to wire us up! Things are moving very fast.

But, sometimes, to make real progress, you gotta slow down. Time to slow down. Hint.

This post is a long one. I make no apologies though because there are some aspects of this case where more info is required and this motivated me to post. All of the technical/procedural statements I make here can be checked and I have no doubt that some readers will do just that.

For those in a hurry, here is a summary:

1) Nukes do not get accidentally loaded for transport. The orders required, procedures and security in place make it frankly impossible.
2) It is against US military regulations to transport nuclear weapons loaded in combat position on an aircraft over US soil and everyone who works in the chain of command with nuclear weapons handling knows this. If being transported by aircraft, they must be crated and carried in the hold of a transport plane which is specially built to carry such weaponry.
3) The aircrew must be made aware of what they are carrying and would have been.
4) ACM’s are not decomissioned at Barkesdale. This is done at Kirtland AFB, NM. There is no valid reason for flying nuclear-armed ACM’s for Barkesdale for decom.
5) The fact that the military even acknowledges this “mistake” is cause for conjecture and concern as to what actually happened.

Now the details.

Okay, to begin: there is no way nukes could be accidentally loaded for transport. Nukes on a base are stored separately from other ordnance, not just for security but because if they were stored with some conventional ordnance and that ordnance accidentally detonated (which has unfortunately happened on occasion), then while the nukes wouldn’t “go off” in a nuclear blast there would be the risk of dispersing radioactive materials and the subsequent fallout. (Pun intended. Sorry.)

Because nukes are stored separately the crews involved in removing them from storage would know darned well that they are moving nukes. It is their job to know this. And while it’s true that it’s not possible for the pilot or anyone else to see if an ACM is carrying a nuclear warhead, a dummy warhead or no warhead just from doing a walk-around, the loading crews will always make a visual check by shining a flashlight through a small “window” in the missile casing over where the warhead is located to check that it is what it should be. This is SOP. A dummy warhead is coloured yellow and blue whereas a nuke is red, with markers on it to identify it as such, along with tags ditto. But as the nukes had to be removed from a separate facility which is reserved only for them, a place that is guarded 24/7 and which you cannot even get near without proper authorization, then the visual check would confirm that they are indeed nukes. If they found an ACM in a nuke storage facility that should have been fitted with a nuclear warhead but was not fitted with a nuke and had a dummy warhead (or none) there would be hell to pay, because EVERY nuke is tracked and its location known and verified and it cannot be moved even within the storage facility without the correct authority and paperwork to back it up. This is not a Wal-Mart warehouse, it’s a nuke storage facility! There is NO WAY that nukes could be removed from it and transported to the flight line then up-loaded onto the bomber beneath the wings in combat positions without the orders to do so. Too many people are required for this process for such a “mistake” to occur. I found it astounding that people can believe that the AF would be so slack in procedures that they could remove, transport and upload nukes “by mistake”!

In any case, if nukes are to be transported by plane over US soil, they must be crated and transported in the holds of specially-built transport planes (not bombers) -- planes which are built with “hardened” holds that will protect the nukes in the event of the plane going down. You might lose the crew but the nukes’ integrity will not be compromised. This is the only way that these nukes are allowed be transported by air over US soil -- without breaching specific protocols that have been in place for many years and which were confirmed in a directive issued by C-I-C George Bush Snr in 1991.

Next: Nukes which are being moved from storage for transport are always under guard every inch of the way to their transport upload, and anyone who tries to even get near those nukes without proper authorization will at best be face down on the ground in seconds with guns at his or her head and at worst be face down with large bullet holes. These guards do not play around and you’d better believe it! Any failure in the protocol (eg a wrong password or failure to provide a password,) and the guards move in and the process is halted and cannot proceed until they are satisfied that there is not a risk of a security breach.

The crews who load nuclear weapons simply do not make mistakes of this magnitude. They have to be certified to the correct level, they must know every step of the procedure -- and even a slight breach will have them off those duties pronto. All errors, no matter how minor, must be reported. A serious breach will see the person decertified and possibly open to charges.

I repeat, there is absolutely no way that this is simply an error in the weapons-handling process. The loading crews have orders that specify precisely what their task is, and believe me, when it comes to loading nukes those orders include the paperwork with the serial numbers of the weaponry involved. It’s not just a case of going into the storage facility and choosing half a dozen ACM’s at random. The orders are specific and the whole process is based on the “two man” system, and those two people in charge will cross-check each other’s activities at every stage of the process. The weapons’ numbers are checked against these orders prior to being removed from storage (under armed guard), they are then transported to the flight line under armed escort and then checked again before they can even be uploaded, and they should be checked again upon arrival at their destination.

Reportedly, it was the checks at the LA base end that discovered the discrepancy: they were expecting ACM’s but not nukes…

The fact remains that it is against regulations to transport nukes loaded in combat position on an aircraft over US soil. It has been so for many years. The measures are in place to ensure that such a transport cannot and must not occur. Anyone involved in guarding, storing loading or transporting these weapons is well aware of this. So they could only have been moved under orders from very high up -- orders that all the same breached the specific protocols and the 1991 directive from the C-I-C.

I’m sorry if much of my text is repetitive. I think it is important to be sure that everyone understands two things. Nukes are guarded round the clock and cannot even be moved without the correct authorization and a crazy amount of paperwork. Ergo, the crews who loaded these nukes in combat position on that bomber knew darned well what the things were. Secondly, to not make certain that the aircrew knew what they were carrying would be negligence of catastrophic proportions. The crew had to know, because planes can have malfunctions or even collisions and go down. What if the plane had crashed enroute (over US soil, remember) and no-one in the SAR parties or the local region realized that it had been carrying nukes? I’m not talking about the risk of an actual nuclear detonation (as the odds of that happening under such a scenario are basically nil); I mean that in a crash-and-burn of such an aircraft, piling into the deck at perhaps 500+ mph (this bomber’s cruise speed is around 565 mph), there is a good chance that one or more of the nukes’ integrity could be compromised and plutonium released into the surroundings and perhaps into water supplies either surface or subterranean…or a warhead with its deadly contents could be left lying in a field for G*d only knows who to find…

I don’t know why this so-called “mistake” happened or why the military even acknowledged it when they could well have made a “no comment…national security” kind of response. I only know that if the military high-ups are willing to say “we made a mistake” it suggests they are selling us a dummy, because they almost never admit to “mistakes” (and even more rarely use that precise word), and certainly when we are talking about the movement of nukes -- which are classified and not for CNN et al to telecast -- it makes me think that there is a lot more to this story than meets the eye. In any case, Barkesdale is not the decommissioning point for ACM’s; that is Kirtland Air Force Base, NM, and seeing that the military do everything possible to reduce any and all risks when transporting nukes and therefore don’t transport them more than is absolutely essential, there is no good reason why they would fly them to Barkesdale LA, unload them, then upload them again either to another bomber or crate them for transport in a specially built transport plane (as they should have done in the first place!) to fly them to the actual decom location. Makes no sense. Therefore, if they really were nukes and it was not an op to flush out some “moles”, it suggests they were flown to Barkesdale because they were intended to be moved on from there to a destination outside of the US and needed to arrive in a state (ie not crated) that would enable them to be uploaded in combat position at short notice.

Which makes me wonder if this is the first time a transport of this precise nature has taken place. I am not suggesting this is the case, merely wondering.
I'll leave it with you.

Letadlo.

Good point, Tom. Regardless of whether that bomber was really carrying nukes or not, the fact is that the high-ups in the USAF have told us that it was. Even that admission (true or not) would not have been forthcoming without some very high-level decision making. However, the Iranians are not stupid, they know about the US protocols regarding such weaponry, and are also aware that if the US had any intent to deploy these G*d-awful things there is no way they would signal that publicly.

Consider this: If the US were to use such weaponry against the nation of Iran, it would be a scenario whose repercussions I shudder to contemplate.

As always there are wheels within wheels and I very much doubt we'll get the truth...Of course, the vast majority of the population have probably forgotten all about it already -- which the Powers That Be doesn't mind at all. The message (if there was one in all this) was not for them anyway.

Letadlo

Hi Howard,

I'm not really able to comment on the degree of Sandia's involvement but I think that we can draw some likely conclusions about the proximity of those highly-specialized facilities in Albuquerque to Kirtland.

I totally agree with what you say about changes in command, but not due to a screw-up as I (and many others)think that this is not what happened. (One thing I forgot to mention is that it's policy that ACM's and other missiles loaded in combat positions only for transport and not deployment are NEVER fitted with weaponry. The warheads, nuke or non-nuke, are carried separately, because of the remote risk of accidental launch of the missile.) The chances of a "mistake" of this magnitude are so remote that it is much more likely that it was all done on orders, whether there were really nukes involved at all or not. We've been told there were by the AF high-ups but of course we can't prove it. Regardless, it wouldn't surprise me if quite a few key personnel in the op received movement orders in the near future to various and widespread places -- or may have got them already.

If it was a "mistake" or a CO acting way way beyond his/her authority then that person should be relieved of duty forthwith and placed on charges at the very least. But like so many have said on hundreds of sites, everyone involved in moving nukes knows that regulations totally forbid them being transported in combat positions over US soil.

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