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Power Failure Shuts Down 50 US Nuclear Missiles
Pickens writes "The Atlantic reports that a power failure at F.E. Warren Air Force Base in Wyoming took 50 nuclear intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs), one-ninth of the US missile stockpile, temporarily offline on Saturday. The 90th Missile Wing, headquartered there, controls 150 Minuteman IIIs. According to people briefed on what happened, a squadron of ICBMs suddenly dropped down into what's known as 'LF Down' status, meaning that the missileers in their bunkers could no longer communicate with the missiles themselves. LF Down status also means that various security protocols built into the missile delivery system, like intrusion alarms and warhead separation alarms, were offline. The cause of the failure remains unknown, although it is suspected to be a breach of underground cables deep beneath the base, according to a senior military official."
are offline!
Our stockpiles are ruined! how can we protect ourselves with only 5463 warheads?
In other news, the Underminer was heard telling other evildoers at a sleazy subterranean bar that "The test run has been a total success" and "Soon, I shall be more notorious than Kim Jong Il."
His claim was immediately disputed by five carnivorous giant rats. At press time, it was not quite clear who had survived the ensuing bar fight (our photographer, sadly, had not).
But-- but-- what about the Mine Shaft Gap?
What one fool can do, another can. (Ancient Simian Proverb)
"Gore, I don't care about the penguins. Order the damned launch."
The ______ Agenda
But-- but-- what about the Mine Shaft Gap?
The mine collapsed a few weeks ago. It was in the news.
The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
Do the nukes each have an ip address? what happens if I do a port scan? (besides having several 3 letter agencies show up and get a room at Gitmo?
A room at Gitmo isn't enough? What, you want to actually launch something? Greedy bastard.
The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
Well perhaps you're forgetting the provisions of plan R, sir.
Plan R?
Plan R is an emergency war plan in which a lower echelon commander may order nuclear retaliation after a sneak attack if the normal chain of command is disrupted. You approved it, sir. You must remember. Surely you must recall, sir, when Senator Buford made that big hassle about our deterrent lacking credibility. The idea was for plan R to be a sort of retaliatory safeguard.
A safeguard.
I admit the human element seems to have failed us here. But the idea was to discourage the Russkies from any hope that they could knock out Washington, and yourself, sir, as part of a general sneak attack, and escape retaliation because of lack of proper command and control.
Sent from my PDP-11
"The cause of the failure remains unknown, although it is suspected to be a breach of underground cables deep beneath the base, according to a senior military official."
Mole People working for Al Qaeda! How else can this act of sabotage be explained?
Just a little test run of Israel's NEW version of the Stuxnet.
But I'm (almost) sure that Israel will ALLOW the US to launch a couple missiles when the time comes.
Maybe.
This sounds an awful lot like a "swamp gas and reflections from Saturn" explanation.
This is a terrible thing to be on the news as far as security is concerned. Did they just say f***k wikileaks, we'll leak it ourselves?
Minecraft is educating our citizens wrt the benefits of living underground as we speak!