You don't see one of these every day. It is the nuclear nose cone of a Titan II Intercontinental Ballistic Missile, in it's silo in Arizona. At one time nine of these silos, with missiles in them, were in a ring around Tucson. They were all fully staffed with a compliment of U. S. Air Force officers and men and women who lived there and were on duty around the clock. The logic was that the Russians could launch an atomic weapon, and if it made a direct hit on one silo, the silo and missile and crew would all be vaporized, but the other silos would all launch their missiles back toward Russia, thus destroying the enemy. There were other rings of silos around other cities in the U.S. Man who THOUGHT of this? Whew! What is cool is that when the Air Force decommissioned all of these sites, one aviation museum managed to preserve one of these sites, and an empty missile in its entirety, so that we could learn how crazy this all was.
3 comments:
It wasn't so crazy - MAD worked for over 40 years.
Hi Ken - Actually there were 18 (!) of these in the Tucson area. Seventeen were destroyed as part of SALT agreement with USSR, one allowed to be converted into the museum you toured... -Dean
Hi Dean: Thanks for this information. I *thought* I remember the tour guide saying there were 14, and I put that number in the caption, then checked online, and came up with only 9. It really is wonderful that they managed to save one of these silos. What incredible engineering, with the rooms supported on springs!
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