Emily Watson

Museum Exhibit: “Delete Time Slots and Leave the Rest to Us” The Mission of the Airborne Launch Control System (ALCS): To provide a highly reliable alternate launch method for the Minuteman missile system. ALCS-equipped aircraft have the ability to launch Minuteman missiles using a UHF radio signal: • If the ground launch crews are destroyed or relinquish control • If all the underground cables going to a particular missile site are severed and the missile is isolated from ground control When on nuclear alert, the aircraft carry the launch code for the entire Minuteman fleet. Communications connectivity to the Minuteman missiles is tested regularly from the air. The first and most famous example of SAC Airborne Command Posts (ABNCP) was a modified C-135 aircraft and crew, call sign “Looking Glass”. When it first launched on February 3, 1961, it began a story that lasted almost thirty years – airborne alert 24/7 over the central United States with an Air Force general and battle staff. This survivable system later expanded into the Post Attack Command Control System (PACCS), which provided a fleet of EC-135 aircraft and crews forming an airborne communications chain from Washington, DC, to all missile fields. By the mid-1960s, the improved accuracy of Soviet ballistic missiles had increased the vulnerability of our buried Minuteman launch control centers (LCC). SAC’s answer to this challenge was the Airborne Launch Control System (ALCS), which gave us a highly survivable, alternate launch capability for the Minuteman missile. The aircraft assigned to the 4th Airborne Command Control Squadron (4ACCS), along with the aircraft assigned to the 2nd Airborne Command Control Squadron (2ACCS) at Offutt AFB, NE< were now the only aircraft in the United States Air Force (USAF) capable of launching any or all of our 1,000 Minuteman missiles. Preface to the Junior Missileer Handbook In 1957, Americans trembled in fear as the Soviet Union launched the first ever man-made satellite into orbit. Why was this so terrifying? Satellites are great for communications, but they could also be used to spy on your enemies. And if you can put a satellite on a rocket and launch it into space, what else could you put on the rocket? Atomic bombs, like the ones the United States dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki during World War II. President John F. Kennedy was elected president in 1960, and he emphasized the need to close the “missile gap” that existed between the United States and the Soviet Union. If the Soviet Union really was turning out “missiles like sausages”, the threat of nuclear attack was never higher. We needed to have enough of our own missiles in order to defend ourselves and “deter” our enemies from thinking of attacking. We already had some missiles being developed, but most of them used a liquid fuel. This made them very unstable and dangerous, and they took longer to launch because they had to be fueled right beforehand. They used too much money, too many people, and too big of a facility to make them work. The first Minuteman missile was launched on February 1, 1961, from Cape Canaveral, Florida, turning out to be a complete success. What made it better than the other missiles? It was smaller, more accurate, easier and faster to launch, and used a solid fuel which was very stable and not as dangerous. Now, America had a powerful missile that could compete with anything the Soviet Union came up with. Within six years, America had built over 1,000 missile sites to house their Minuteman missiles and 100 Launch Control Centers to launch them from if the threat arose. Today, America still has 400 Minuteman missiles on alert that continue to defend the United States, although we would hope we never have to use them. The missiles have served to encourage peace and prevent World War III. It is up to us to continue to preserve that peace. As a junior missileer, it is your mission to be “on alert” and to help protect America by learning about the history of the United States and its special places. Social Media Post January 25, 1995: One of the closest moments the world came to a nuclear war after the Cold War had officially ended. Just six years after the fall of the Berlin Wall and four years after the signing of START (Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty), the United States and Russia were still wary and distrustful of each other. So when the Russians at the Olenegorsk early-warning radar station in Murmansk Oblast detected a launch of a potential nuclear weapon, they went on high alert. Their "nuclear football" or "nuclear briefcase" was even brought to President Yeltsin, who now had to decide how to respond to this potential nuclear attack by the United States. Russian observers finally were able to determine that this supposed launch had actually been of a Black Brant XII rocket by Norwegian and American scientists from the Andøya Rocket Range off the northwestern coast of Norway, their purpose being to study the northern lights. But the rocket flew along the same trajectory that a Minuteman missile launched from Minot AFB would have taken, and its altitude and flight pattern also mirrored that of a Trident missile. The Russian military was finally able to determine that this was not an attack by the US military, and any response was called off. Although the scientists had taken the precaution to warn thirty countries, including Russia, this information had not been passed down to Russian military and radar technicians. For such an innocent and harmless scientific endeavor, this is also the first and only known time that a nuclear weapons state has activated its nuclear briefcase and prepared for launching a nuclear attack. Social Media Post People of Minuteman #6: Bob Hicks After our post about the incident at Lima-02, we feel that Bob Hicks needs more recognition. Bob Hicks was just nineteen when he enlisted, coming from Somerset, TX, and a family of thirteen children. Less than two years later, he was serving at Ellsworth AFB as a maintainer for the Minuteman missiles. He was one of two airmen who received a call on December 5, 1964, that "the warhead is no longer on top of the missile.” They got pulled over by a state trooper, but they didn't tell him specifically why they were in such a hurry, and he didn't question it. But he did warn them that there was smoke coming from one of the rig's wheels. Turned out to be a bad brake line, so they fixed it before speeding off again. Upon arrival, they found a crowd of officers and maintenance personnel standing around, still unsure what to do moving forward. They had confirmed there were no radiation leaks, and that the warhead was sitting in its reentry vehicle at the bottom of the launch tube. The team chief told Bob Hicks and the other maintainer that someone needed to go inside the launch tube to safe the missile, which Bob volunteered to do. He climbed down into the equipment room, installed the work cage, and put the safing pins between the missile's fuel stages. These metal rods break the electrical connections between the rocket stages so that they can't be fired. When Bob finally emerged from the underground, it was now time to figure out how to retrieve the warhead from 80 feet down at the bottom of the launch tube. He was the one to suggest using cargo nets to haul it out. They followed his suggestion, and after a few days of practicing, the warhead was rolled into cargo nets with layers of padding in between. It took them two hours to haul the warhead up eighty feet. Due to concerns about static electricity and a damaged missile loaded with solid fuel, they took extra time and precautions. The next day, Bob drove the RV-GC van in the transport convoy bringing the warhead back to base. It took a few months (and the specific details of the incident were not disclosed), but Bob Hicks was named Maintenance Man of the Month in his division. He was also awarded the Air Force Commendation Medal. Some more of Bob's accomplishments: 1) Guam, during the Vietnam War, disarming bombs that failed to release from the B-52s 2) Special Investigations Unit in the USAF 3) Retired from USAF 1980s 4) Came back as a civilian OSI 5) Retired again in 2005 6) And let's not forget: marrying his wife Janet and having two sons Our hats are off to you, good sir, and thank you for your service!