So this is the classic information security problem, it isn’t that the technology is that complex or ninja, it’s that most people are dumber than a bag of hammers. Case in point - the nuclear launch code of the US Minuteman Missiles was 00000000…for 20 years.
The one that always scares the shit out of me was Able Archer 1983.
We got THAT close and almost nobody knew about it.
Came down to one guy, Lieutenant Colonel Stanislav Petrov, who was supposed to report the launch warning to superiors and ignored it as a the computer error it was. He was reassigned, took early retirement and had a nervous breakdown.
“ludicrous speed…NOW!” :dance3:
"Lonestar, I see your shwartz is as big as mine "
S.M.
My dad was a Missileer at Vandenberg AFB in the early '60s. Tension was high in the Strategic Air Command during those days.
One of his launches, the first ICBM salvo made by the United States.
Notice as the far LGM-30 passes the smoke ring blown from the silo of the near Minuteman. I was two years old at the time.
I recall reading about that one, there were many other near misses I’m sure we don’t even know about half of them, pretty scary really . . .
Red Star Rouge: http://www.amazon.com/Red-Star-Rogue-Submarines-Nuclear/dp/1416527338
March 7, 1968: Several hundred miles northwest of Hawaii, the nuclear-armed K-129 surfaces and then sinks; all of its crewmen and officers perish at sea. Who was commanding the rogue Russian sub? What was its target? How did it infiltrate American waters undetected? Navy veteran Kenneth Sewell, drawing from newly declassified documents and extensive confidential interviews, exposes the stunning truth behind an operation calculated to provoke war between the U.S. and China – a nightmare scenario averted by only seconds. In full, authoritative detail, Red Star Rogue illuminates this history-shaping event – and rings with chilling relevance in light of today’s terrorist threat.
Vasili Arkhipov: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vasili_Arkhipov
