Media, Politicians Maintain Silence On Flight Of, US Nuclear Bomber Options

[barney_rebel]

Media, politicians maintain silence on flight of US nuclear bomber
By Bill Van Auken
14 September 2007


When analyzing the US corporate-controlled media, it is often more important to take note of what is not reported than what is.

Such is clearly the case with the revelation earlier this month that a US B-52 Stratofortress bomber flew nearly 1,500 miles over the length of the United States with six nuclear-tipped cruise missiles fixed to its wings.

The flight took place August 30 between Minot Air Force Base in North Dakota and Barksdale Air Force Base in Louisiana.

The story was broken by Military Times, the web site of the weekly papers published by the Gannett Corporation for the different branches of the American military. It evinced only minimal interest from the major media outlets, which relegated it to news items buried deep in the inside pages of major dailies like the New York Times and the Washington Post, both of which uncritically regurgitated the official line of the Air Force that the flight represented a “mistake” that never represented any serious danger.

Since then, there has been only silence. No major newspaper or broadcast network has made any attempt to carry the story forward. No background pieces have been published analyzing the present state of the US nuclear war machine. And there is no evidence of any attempt to obtain more information from the Air Force officers who leaked the story to the Military Times.

The media blackout cannot be explained by any objective standard of the newsworthiness of this story. According to what is publicly known, it marked the first time that an American bomber armed with nuclear weapons has taken to the air in nearly 40 years.

Each of the missiles mounted on the pylons of the aircraft’s wings carried warheads that are 10 times as destructive as the first American atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima six decades ago. Given the death toll inflicted upon the Japanese city in 1945, a rough mathematical extrapolation would suggest that the plane was carrying weapons of mass destruction capable of killing five to six million people in a nuclear holocaust that would eclipse any single atrocity in the history of the planet.

The silence of the press has the earmarks of self-censorship in the face of what was in all likelihood a sharp admonition from the White House and the Pentagon that any public discussion of the event could endanger national security. There is an ample record of such suppression of news, including, for example, the admission by the New York Times last year that it had bowed to White House pressure to hold back a story on the National Security Agency’s illegal domestic spying program in the run-up to the 2004 elections.

It appears that the Bush administration’s ostensible political opponents in the Democratic Party are keeping their mouths shut for the similar reasons.

In the immediate aftermath of the revelations concerning the flight, several lawmakers issued statements expressing shock over the flight and acknowledging that the event was something that they had consistently been told could never happen.

Typical was that of Congressman Ike Skelton, the Democratic chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, who declared the development “deeply disturbing.”

“There is no more serious issue than the security and proper handling of nuclear weapons,” he said, adding, “This committee will continue to pursue answers on this classified matter to ensure that the Air Force and the Department of Defense address this particular incident and strengthen controls more generally.”

Yet, when contacted on September 13, more than a week after this statement, a spokesperson for Skelton’s committee said that no hearings have been scheduled on the nuclear flight.

“No decisions about that have been made,” she said. “We’ve been pretty busy the past week.”

The Senate Armed Services Committee likewise confirmed that it has called no hearings on the matter.

Skelton’s reference to his supposed intention to “pursue answers on this classified matter” strongly suggests that to the extent the Democratic Congress does receive any information, it will be kept secret from the public.

For its part, the Pentagon, as a matter of policy, refuses to confirm or deny that the plane was carrying nuclear warheads.

The Air Force is continuing an investigation into the matter—reportedly including daily briefings to Defense Secretary Robert Gates. It has scheduled a general mission “stand-down” for the US Air Combat Command on Friday, September 14, in which all units—including those that do not handle nuclear weapons—will review procedures.

A report from the Air Force apparently will be issued following this review, but it is almost certain to be classified.

The real questions are from whom are these secrets being kept and to what end?

The answer to the first question is self-evident; it is the American people who are being kept in the dark. Why this is being done cannot be stated with certainty, but it appears that both the silence and the initial account given by the Air Force that the nuclear-armed flight represented a “mistake” are aimed at covering up why this plane was really sent into the air.

One place where the event has been given extensive attention is on the readers’ forum page of the Military Times web site, which headlines the section “Mistake or message.” Some 500 items have been posted, in many cases by people identifying themselves as former Air Force personnel who were involved in the US nuclear strike force. A substantial share of these postings sharply question the official story floated by the Pentagon.

Former B-52 chief: “What the hell happened here?”

One correspondent, identifying himself as a “retired B-52 crew chief,” described the official account as “unbelievable.”

He wrote: “Back in 1979 we had to sign for nuclear weapons verifying serial numbers, the security folks posted two man guards at the aircraft, the cops enforced two man maintenance crews access to the aircraft, the 781s are annotated, maintenance job control was informed, the wing command post was informed, weapons were moved in an armed convoy, etc. How were the weapons removed from storage? Who was guarding the weapons, military troopers or contractors? How were they transported to the aircraft? How were the aircraft forms updated? How was the chain of custody broken? Did the flight crew and munitions maintenance OICs [officers in charge] verify weapons status? What the hell happened here?”

Someone self-described as a “former cruise missile troop” writes, “I do not see how this could have happened. If the ‘missile shop’ failed to download the heads before taking them to the flightline, the crew loading them on the plane has a checklist asking them to ‘verify no warheads installed,’ as do the pilots....”

Another correspondent questions claims that the weapons were merely being moved from one base to be decommissioned (destroyed): “When I was in the Air Force and worked on these types of missiles we never would have sent these missiles out on a B-52 for decommissioning. These missiles would have had their warheads removed and boxed for shipping and the missile body itself would have been boxed up and both items would have been shipped out [on a] C-5. This was the only way we...could have shipped them out, not on or in a B-52. This could not have happened, we are not being told the whole story, there has to be more to it!”`

Another posting reads: “I think everyone here is making an assumption that they didn’t know. This is an absurd assumption. As soon as those ACMs [advanced cruise missiles] hit the hard-mounts, the talkback between the computers instantly enabled. The crew knew they were carrying nukes long before they finished the checklist for takeoff.”

A correspondent who writes that he was an Air Force officer in the late 1970s describes the intricate procedures that are carried out before a nuclear weapon leaves the site where it was stored:

“A nuclear weapon can only be removed from an igloo upon written orders originating with a very limited number of senior base command officers and signed by at lease three other senior officers. Even then, the senior OIC of the arsenal site along with at least one junior officer will only order a weapon be retrieved and prepared for transfer after they both have verbally confirmed their written orders to do so with the base commander or his deputy. This is done using special limited access and encrypted telephone lines or in person, and verification is accomplished only after each party has correctly read a unique sequence of letters and numbers printed on their orders. A senior OIC along with at least one junior munitions officer will arrive at the arsenal site at the time designated in their orders to transport the weapon. They will have already verified their written orders with a very senior base command officer. Each pair of munitions officers can only sign and be responsible for a single weapon at a time, and they must be accompanied by a special highly trained munitions crew and by a squad of heavily armed security police officers. After the two arsenal site officers and the two munitions officers have each visually verified the serial number of the weapon being transferred matches the serial number typed on both sets of their orders, all four must sign both sets of orders indicating the transfer has been verified and completed. A maximum of four nuclear weapons can be transferred to the flight line in each convoy, but each weapon must have their own team of officers with verified orders, munitions specialist, and a security detail. Also, the printed orders for the OIC of each munitions team indicate exactly which aircraft will receive that weapon and exactly where every weapon is to be mounted. Everyone involved is trained to repeatedly triple check everything for accuracy.”

He goes on to detail similar procedures for the flight crew, which he notes “can easily and clearly view a weapons display that electronically verifies every weapon system installed on their aircraft. That display also clearly identifies every weapon as being a practice, conventional or nuclear weapon.”

The former officer concludes: “Therefore the only conclusion I can come up with is that this event must have been concocted by someone to appear as an accident. And, because nuclear weapons were said to be involved, orders approving such an event most certainly came from the White House.”

The present administration in Washington has repeatedly boasted that it maintains “all options on the table,” including the use of nuclear weapons, in its global war on terror and its confrontations with supposed “rogue states.” In 2002, it drafted a Nuclear Posture Review that for the first time enunciated a preemptive nuclear first-strike policy against non-nuclear nations.

In 2006, it was revealed that the Bush administration had drawn up plans for attacks on Iran, including the use of “tactical nuclear devices” to wipe out the country’s fledgling nuclear program as well as its security forces and much of its infrastructure.

And, more recently, two leading British military analysts published a report on US preparations for an attack on Iran in which they note “clear evidence that nuclear weapons use [against Iran] is being given serious political consideration” in Washington. (See “British academics warn US is preparing ‘shock and awe’ attack on Iran”)

Under these conditions, the flight of the nuclear-armed US bomber has the most ominous significance. The silence of the media and the politicians is aimed at concealing the dire implications of this event from the people of the US and the world.

See Also:
Why was a nuclear-armed bomber allowed to fly over the US?
[7 September 2007]

http://www.wsws.org/articles/2007/sep2007/nuke-s14.shtml

[André]

We all want to know what is going on here, and we can only speculate, but I believe this is a power struggle between the White house and the military. Possibly they where trying to push Cheney out of office and this was reaction...Nixon did something similar during his impeachment, anyway I believe it's something along those lines, maybe (IMG:http://pilotsfor911truth.org/forum/style_emoticons/default/dunno.gif)



9/11 Synthetic Terror: Made in USA

It was clearly essential that measures be taken to keep the fingers of Bush, Cheney, and the increasingly desperate neocon fascist madmen away from the nuclear button. During Watergate, when Nixon had called his infamous 1973 worldwide nuclear alert as a result of the October 1973 Middle East war, British Prime Minister Ted Heath had seen the entire stunt as a manufactured diversion from Nixon’s Watergate troubles at home. As the Bush administration disintegrates, it is clear that conditions today are similar. On October 28, 2005, when special counsel Fitzgerald presented his indictment of the neocon fanatic Irv Lewis Libby, Bush simultaneously made a raving speech branding Iran and Syria as outlaw states with whom his patience was exhausted. Many cable networks showed Fitzgerald and Bush, along with Cheney, as parts of the same split screen. There it was: wag the dog, in real time. Kissinger and Haig, sociopaths though they were, had taken measures to supervise Nixon’s access to the football, the briefcase containing the nuclear launch codes. In the last weeks of Watergate, Defense Secretary Schlesinger had issued a standing order to combat commanders telling them to ignore any and all
orders by Nixon to launch attacks unless and until they were confirmed by himself or by
Kissinger. In today’s White House, there are no figures to look to who might impose similar restraint: quite the contrary. Faced with looming indictments of many of their clique, the neocons tended towards a mood of Götterdämmerung and apocalypse. The neocons would doubtless prefer a new world war to life behind bars; like the SS in Berlin during the last days, they would think nothing of letting the river water into the subway tunnels where their insufficiently martial fellow citizens were hiding.

This post has been edited by André: Sep 14 2007, 04:40 PM

[André]

B52 Nuke: Minot Air Force Base Airman DEAD . . .


September 14th, 2007

Remember the one about the B-52 bomber that, according to legend, had six nuclear weapons loaded onto it by accident, which, of course, could not have happened—by accident—for a dozen different reasons, or more.

Airman 1st Class Todd Blue was assigned to the unit that provides security for that bomber wing at Minot Air Force base. He died while on leave in Virginia. No further details have been released.

Coincidence?

Was he on duty when those nuclear weapons were loaded onto the B-52, “by accident”? If anyone has any further information on this, please let me know.

I expected to see many more deaths of Minot and Barksdale Air Force personnel in the wake of this incident.


http://cryptogon.com/


http://www.kfyrtv.com/News

This post has been edited by André: Sep 15 2007, 02:05 PM

[painter]

I expected to see many more deaths of Minot and Barksdale Air Force personnel in the wake of this incident.

Apparently there are four deaths. Two prior to the incident and two subsequently. See this thread at DU:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discu...ess=389x1814496

[Devilsadvocate]

SH*T!!!
Four "accidents" all related to the same base like that are a wee bit fishy, one should think.
Are there any reports like these relating to Barksdale AFB ?


Edit:
1)- Captain John Frueh, reportet dead September 9th.;
2)- Airman 1st class Todd Blue, died September 10th.;
3)- Adam Barrs, killed September 4th.; the driver Stephen Garrett is in hospital (but seems unrelated to Minot)
The last one, 1st. Lieutenant Weston Kissel- B-52 pilot, died July 17th., according to the relevant article in the "Bismarck Tribune" dated July 20th.:

http://www.bismarcktribune.com/articles/20...tate/136489.txt

This is not just a wee bit fishy- this reeks of rotten fish all over!

Edit: It would be interesting to find out exactly *what aircraft* 1st. Lieutenant Kissel was assigned to before his death.

This post has been edited by Devilsadvocate: Sep 15 2007, 03:43 PM

[Devilsadvocate]

Apparently, the 5th. Operations group at Minot AFB received a new commanding officer on July 10th. - Collonel Parker Northrup;
the new Chief Master Sergeant Mark Clark assumed his position by July 15th.

1st. Lieutenant Weston Kissel died on July 17th. in a motorcycle-accident;
he graduated from the USAF Academy in 2004:

http://64.233.183.104/search?q=cache:qt41F...lnk&cd=13&gl=ie

(Under 'Squadron 5', about halfways down the page righthand side)

Picture here:

http://www.minot.af.mil/photos/index.asp?page=3

[LizzyTish]

OMG - The two deaths in September is quite a coincidence, isn't it. This administration scares the hell out of me. And I suppose Congress will again be too busy next week to look into it.

Did we ever get an answer as to whether there were 5 or 6 nukes when the plane left North Dakota?

[Devilsadvocate]

OMG - The two deaths in September is quite a coincidence, isn't it.  This administration scares the hell out of me.  And I suppose Congress will again be too busy next week to look into it. 

Did we ever get an answer as to whether there were 5 or 6 nukes when the plane left North Dakota?

At this point, i think it may have been a printing-error on the part of the Navy Times which they corrected.
An article at Rense.com stated that there had been *two* statements, by personel at Minot *and* Barksdale; but i'm not fully convinced- unless Rense.com had direct access to the Airforce people involved, which seems somewhat unlikely to me. At least, i hope that that's all there is to it.

These accidents are a somewhat different thing altogether.
One of the soldiers involved seem to have been attached to the security-detail stationed at Minot- the base were that B-52 took off; i'm not sure what position Captain John Frueh held; he was found dead on September 9th., and last spoke to his family on August 30th.- the day that B-52 took off.
Adam Barrs was a Senior Airman with the 5th. Aircraft Maintenance squadron at Minot:

http://www.minot.af.mil/shared/media/photo...F-3564M-001.jpg


Weston Kissel died some time before the entire incident; his death may not be related at all, but it's still a strange coincidence.
That Airforce-base seems to have an extremely high mortality-rate.
That the 5th. operations-group received a new CO shortly before the B-52 incident again may mean nothing; but it could also be argued that the loading of nuclear weapons could not take place without specific orders, which would very much point towards the new CO, Colonel Northup.
I would also think that the new Chief Master Sergeant Clark would be a key-person without which the transfer of missiles would have been impossible.
In other words- both of these two took up their positions shortly before the B-52 incident took place- which is highly suspicious.

A correspondent who writes that he was an Air Force officer in the late 1970s describes the intricate procedures that are carried out before a nuclear weapon leaves the site where it was stored:

“A nuclear weapon can only be removed from an igloo upon written orders originating with a very limited number of senior base command officers and signed by at lease three other senior officers. Even then, the senior OIC of the arsenal site along with at least one junior officer will only order a weapon be retrieved and prepared for transfer after they both have verbally confirmed their written orders to do so with the base commander or his deputy. This is done using special limited access and encrypted telephone lines or in person, and verification is accomplished only after each party has correctly read a unique sequence of letters and numbers printed on their orders. A senior OIC along with at least one junior munitions officer will arrive at the arsenal site at the time designated in their orders to transport the weapon. They will have already verified their written orders with a very senior base command officer. Each pair of munitions officers can only sign and be responsible for a single weapon at a time, and they must be accompanied by a special highly trained munitions crew and by a squad of heavily armed security police officers. After the two arsenal site officers and the two munitions officers have each visually verified the serial number of the weapon being transferred matches the serial number typed on both sets of their orders, all four must sign both sets of orders indicating the transfer has been verified and completed. A maximum of four nuclear weapons can be transferred to the flight line in each convoy, but each weapon must have their own team of officers with verified orders, munitions specialist, and a security detail. Also, the printed orders for the OIC of each munitions team indicate exactly which aircraft will receive that weapon and exactly where every weapon is to be mounted. Everyone involved is trained to repeatedly triple check everything for accuracy.”

(Quoted from Andre's first post above; link is provided there)

Someone put Northup and that other character in charge; whatever has been going on there *must* therefore have been decided by whoever is responsible for putting Northup in charge- this is not just some underling who decided to take on a life of his own.

Edit:
I have two questions:
1) Is there any way to find out the registration-number of the plane which carried the missiles?

2) Is there any way to find out which aircraft (again- registration-number!)Lieutenant Kissel was assigned to?

This post has been edited by Devilsadvocate: Sep 15 2007, 07:10 PM

[Devilsadvocate]

That place must be cursed:

http://www.minot.af.mil/photos/index.asp?page=9

Killed in a carcrash on March 25th.

http://www.airforcetimes.com/news/2007/03/...n_minot_070326/


Edit: Another one...

http://www.airforcetimes.com/news/2007/03/...notdeath070309/

http://www.minot.af.mil/photos/index.asp?page=11

These are in all certainty just what it says- carcrashes; but just how many of these guys can get killed in accidents in just a few months- with four of them occurring just around the time someone is playing around with six nuclear missiles?
They are allowed to handle nuclear weapons- but they can't drive a bloody car without crashing it ???

This post has been edited by Devilsadvocate: Sep 15 2007, 10:21 PM

[LizzyTish]

Geesh! Maybe that's where they put all the heavy drinkers or something! I was only concerned about the two who died afterwards as far as a 'coincidence' goes. I doubt this plan went back months before that (except in Cheney's dreams)

Thanks for the explanation - interesting. I had a friend who spent several years on a Trident submarine. I'm not sure how he was chosen, but he wore a key on a chain around his neck at all times. The commanding officer had the other key. Had there been the need to fire nuclear missiles, both of them had to insert the keys (like you do a safe deposit box in the bank) to open a door which revealed a safe knob. At that point, the President would have been in contact with them to give them the combination for the knob. No way a mistake could be made with a process like that (well, unless Bush were president (IMG:http://pilotsfor911truth.org/forum/style_emoticons/default/wink.gif) )

[Devilsadvocate]

Geesh! Maybe that's where they put all the heavy drinkers or something! I was only concerned about the two who died afterwards as far as a 'coincidence' goes. I doubt this plan went back months before that (except in Cheney's dreams)

I know; i mentioned the earlier ones because with every one of those accidents the likelihood of the sheer mass of them just being that seems to dwindle somewhat.
As i said- those earlier ones are in all certainty just that- accidents;
The other four mentioned may well be another thing altogether, because they happened either shortly *before* or shortly *after* that B-52 incident.

I don't want to end up kicking loose one of those internet-avalanches which are just a storm in a papercup; but this is extremely strange.
Incidentally, i just found out something about Captain John Frueh:

http://boards.courttv.com/showthread.php?threadid=310229

John Frueh was with the Special Operations Command Center at Hurlburt Field, Eglin AirForce Base in Florida.

He had just recently joined Majors in Special Ops.

I found this out from the Eglin website.

In other words- he is not directly connected to Minot; in how far the Special Operations Command Center he was attached to may have something (if anything at all) to do with Minot or that B-52 flight i'm not really qualified to answer. Maybe there is someone out there who can answer that question.
If this one is unrelated, it would leave the other three.

[waterdancer]

Doesn't look like the Barksdale couple who died made has it into the DU thread yet. Anyone want to add that in?

Caddo Parish sheriff's deputies worked a wreck this morning in which two people from Barksdale Air Force Base were killed

http://www.shreveporttimes.com/apps/pbcs.d...NGNEWS/70915012 archive

[Devilsadvocate]

"................."

Either they are really incapable of driving a car (or even a bike), or someone connected to the USAF was involved in any recent discoveries of ancient Egyptian tombs and brought the wrath of the Pharaos home with him... (IMG:http://pilotsfor911truth.org/forum/style_emoticons/default/blink.gif)

This post has been edited by Devilsadvocate: Sep 15 2007, 10:55 PM

[waterdancer]

I dunno the IDs on this couple in a heli crash near Barksdale yet...

Helicopter crashes in rural Caddo Parish (may have taken off from Barksdale)
http://www.katc.com/Global/story.asp?S=7068344

[Devilsadvocate]

Let's hope it's not related...
This is starting to be ridiculous. But not in a funny way.

[Cary]

Ridiculous don't begin to describe this clusterfuck.

[Devilsadvocate]

Aye...
I took the liberty of checking the sites of a number of bases connected to CONUS Air Combat Command (i.e., Continental United States);
I was working on the premise that it might be common practise to publish pictures or obituaries of recently deceased soldiers on those sites, as a traditional form of respect.
This is what i found in the "pictures"-section of those sites:

Holloman AFB - 483 pics - 0 deceased;
Moody AFB - 425 pics - 1 KIA/Iraq, 1 KIA/ Afghanistan;
Mountain Home AFB - 552 pics - 1 "passed away" (probably natural causes);
Nellis AFB -471 pics - 1 unspecified car crash, picture shown as
part of a program against drunken driving;
Offutt AFB - 54 pics - 0 deceased;
Seymour Johnson AFB -153 pics - 1 Master Sergeant died in a stabbing incident;
non-fatal accident outside base involving a
civilian driver who survived unhurt;
Shaw AFB - 681 pics - 0 deceased;
Whiteman AFB - 276 pics - 0 deceased;


Minot AFB - 425 pics - 1 missing off Guam since January,
5 killed in various accidents between March
and now.
Barksdale AFB - 34 pics - ???

If this is anything to go by, then Minot not only holds the absolute record for fatalities due to car-accidents of all of those.
In fact, it would mean that Minot is the only Base with any accidents...
apart from the one at Barksdale...
Reading the captions under some of those pictures (...one site has the caption "Ready to fight!" underneath various pictures over and over), i'm beginning to wonder wether those people realise just *how* bloody dangerous their job can really be.
I hope to god that there are no more accidents...

This post has been edited by Devilsadvocate: Sep 16 2007, 08:25 PM

[Devilsadvocate]

These are the relevant links:

Holloman AFB- http://www.holloman.af.mil/photos/
Moody AFB- http://www.moody.af.mil/photos/
Mountain Home AFB- http://www.mountainhome.af.mil/photos/
Nellis AFB- http://www.nellis.af.mil/photos/
Offutt AFB- http://www.offutt.af.mil/photos/
Seymour Johnson AFB- http://www.seymourjohnson.af.mil/photos/
Shaw AFB- http://www.shaw.af.mil/photos/
Whiteman AFB- http://www.whiteman.af.mil/photos/
Minot AFB- http://www.minot.af.mil/photos/
Barksdale AFB- http://www.barksdale.af.mil/photos/

Additional info:

http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/facility/afb.htm