How PALS Help Secure Nuclear Weapons

Hugh Pickens writes "The BBC reported last week that until 1998 no code or dual key system was required to arm British nuclear weapons. Bombs were armed by inserting a bicycle lock key (video) into the arming switch and turning it 90 degrees. Permissive Action Links (PALs) were introduced in the 1960s in America to prevent a mad General or pilot launching a nuclear war on their own and to control nuclear weapons that were at least partially controlled by other nations but as late as 1974, when an armed quarrel broke out between two members of NATO, Greece and Turkey, the Secretary of Defense learned that many tactical nukes were still not equipped with PALS. It has been reported that PALs have been installed on Pakistan's nuclear weapons to disarm or disable their triggering mechanism if the wrong code is entered or if the bomb is tampered with in any manner."

Comments

Quite sensible

[niceone]

It's because British people are inherently sensible and would not start Armageddon without a jolly good reason. Unlike all you mad foreigners.

Rumor had it...

[b0s0z0ku]

that the PALs on quite a few US tactical nukes at the height of the Cold War were set to 0000 or something similar.

-b.

Re:Rumor had it...

[ais523]

According to Wikipedia, this is actually true, so I don't know why it was modded 'Funny', maybe because it's true and funny; Wikipedia gives http://www.cdi.org/blair/permissive-action-links.cfm as the source. The combination was actually 00000000, but that isn't really much safer. (They apparently changed this rule about 30 years ago, so you can't take advantage of it nowadays.)

Re:Rumor had it...

[ducomputergeek]

On the minuteman ICBM's, one of the last launch procedures up until the late 1970's was to set the PAL's to 00000000.

I've spoken to former Silo men and they've confirmed at this was the case and the reasoning behind it was to make sure that people did not forget the codes (al la in the heat of the moment they freeze and forget) or to prevent some beurcractic mix up and SILO 123 got SILO 456's PAL codes, etc..

And apparently this was done on the quiet. Not that it was a big secret as much as they just didn't talk about it.

Sigh of relief

[DigiShaman]

has been reported that PALs have been installed on Pakistan's nuclear weapons...

I've always wondered. Given the state of Pakistan and all that, I can truely sleep better at night knowing this. I just hope we're not deluded into a false sense of security.

Bicycle lock key

[Anonymous Coward]

So, in other words, the British nukes could have been armed by anyone possessing a Bic pen.

Yes Minister!

[Hemogoblin]

Jim Hacker: Prime Minister
Sir Humphrey: Cabinet Secretary
---

Sir Humphrey: "With Trident we could obliterate the whole of Eastern Europe."
Jim Hacker: "I don't want to obliterate the whole of Eastern Europe."
Sir Humphrey: "It's a deterrent."
Jim Hacker: "It's a bluff. I probably wouldn't use it."
Sir Humphrey: "Yes, but they don't know that you probably wouldn't."
Jim Hacker: "They probably do."
Sir Humphrey: "Yes, they probably know that you probably wouldn't. But they can't certainly know."
Jim Hacker: "They probably certainly know that I probably wouldn't."
Sir Humphrey: "Yes, but even though they probably certainly know that you probably wouldn't, they don't certainly know that, although you probably wouldn't, there is no probability that you certainly would."

the PAL system was neutered by US generals

[SuperBanana]

Permissive Action Links (PALs) were introduced in the 1960s in America to prevent a mad General or pilot launching a nuclear war on their own

Wow, that glosses over reality very nicely. The codes were all zeros until the 80's, because said generals refused to implement a system that would prevent them from "hitting back".

He rightly insisted on Permissive Action Links for the US Strategic Air Command Minuteman missiles and bombs - so that they could only be armed and detonated by the the correct codes from the President or the rest of the chain of command. However, it turns out, that whilst McNamara was nominally in charge, that SAC decided to secretly order all the PAL codes to be set to eight zeros, so that there would not be any delays caused by communications problems during a nuclear war.

(From http://yorkshire-ranter.blogspot.com/2006/03/how-not-to-write-about-uk-nuclear.html)

What's hilarious is that there were extensive efforts to implement PAL securely; all sorts of tamper-proofing and obfuscation in the weapons to make it such that you'd have to have a fair bit of training to have any hope of setting one off. Roughly the equivalent of installing high-security deadbolts throughout your property, and leaving the key in the front door lock.

Re:the PAL system was neutered by US generals

[SnowZero]

Wow, that glosses over reality very nicely. The codes were all zeros until the 80's, because said generals refused to implement a system that would prevent them from "hitting back". The keys were all set by 1977, and the "all 0's" codes were only used on ICBMs stationed in the US by that time. It's worth noting that US ICBMs required dual-activated keys, so it was still secure against a single compromised person (but not two due to the bad codes). Bombs overseas had proper codes once they got PALs (which did take too long to deploy). So, while it took far too long to deploy proper security, lets at least get our facts right.

There isn't a really good reason the British should take 21 years longer than the (already late) US to deploy PALs with proper codes, and over 40 years later to use a dual-key initiation. "Someone else was late doing it" is not an excuse, especially when you are twice as late.

Pakistan DOES NOT have PALS

[d2_m_viant]

There's conflicting information about whether the Pakistani's have PALS. According to a recent article in the New York Times, the Pakistani's do not have it:

In the end, despite past federal aid to France and Russia on delicate points of nuclear security, the administration decided that it could not share the system with the Pakistanis because of legal restrictions.

And furthermore:

In addition, the Pakistanis were suspicious that any American-made technology in their warheads could include a secret "kill switch," enabling the Americans to turn off their weapons.

Likewise with Clinton:

While many nuclear experts in the federal government favored offering the PALS system because they considered Pakistan's arsenal among the world's most vulnerable to terrorist groups, some administration officials feared that sharing the technology would teach Pakistan too much about American weaponry. The same concern kept the Clinton administration from sharing the technology with China in the early 1990s.

Re:If you REALLY want to be safe

[d2_m_viant]

What a bunch of nonsense. A county is threatening us with nuclear weapons, and our salvation rests in the fact that their citizenry isn't "happy" with their government? How the hell is that going to save American lives? You may be willing to stake your children's life on that, but I'm not.

We just have to take that risk if we really believe in freedom

No, we don't. Since when are "freedom" and "defending yourself" mutually exclusive terms? The most important figures in our country's history have been willing to fight and die for what they believed in, not the least of which was the notion of being free.

Having bombs on standby does not really help anyone, it just increases the chance of everyone killing each other.

Actually, quite the opposite, it dramatically decreases the chances that bombs will be used.