I grew up in the middle of missile country; it was about 40- or so miles from my hometown to the nearly of North Dakota’s 330 Minuteman III missile silos.
Former Minuteman III silos in eastern North Dakota. These were all dismantled (actually, imploded) in the ’90s, as part of a nuclear missile reduction program with the Russians. The ones in the northwest part of the state remain.
And in my teens and twenties, at the height of the Cold War, I was genuineliy ambivalent about having children, ever, while the world seemed on the brink of nuclear war.
And after the fall of the USSR, in the early ’90s, it seemed we were on the brink of being past all that; both the US and Russia took their bombers off the alert they’d been on for decades, and began stepping back.
Well, nothing good ever lasts; the US nuclear force is stepping up its alert level again:
Fake news.
Fun Fact: From about 1964 until 1985, if North Dakota had been a separate world power, it would have been the third largest in the world, due to the number of both missles and B52 bombers based there. At least, that’s what the GFAFB Base Information Officer told us during our base orientation. Of course, he also told us that they didn’t worry about us going AWOL for 3 weeks, because they could still see us running.
Boss, I’m guessing that they figured you wouldn’t be able to find many trees to hide behind!!
The question is whether we can do it right. I seem to remember that a couple of years back, President Obama removed a LOT of people who were manning those silos for various reasons. Friend of mine in the National Guard was sure that these reasons were, to be blunt about the matter, quite inconsistently applied, and for political reasons.
Scott,
Exactly! That and the fact that the terrain is flat for miles. 😀