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Strategic Air Command (SAC) was both a United States Department of Defense (DoD) Specified Command and a United States Air Force (USAF) Major Command (MAJCOM), responsible for Cold War command and control of two of the three components of the U.S. military's strategic nuclear strike forces, the so-called "nuclear triad", with SAC having control of land-based strategic bomber aircraft and intercontinental ballistic missiles or ICBMs.
North American Aerospace Defense Command, known until March 1981 as the North American Air Defense Command, is a combined organization of the United States and Canada that provides aerospace warning, air sovereignty, and protection for Canada and the continental United States. Headquarters for NORAD and the NORAD/United States Northern Command (USNORTHCOM) center are located at Peterson Space Force Base in El Paso County, near Colorado Springs, Colorado. The nearby Cheyenne Mountain Complex has the Alternate Command Center. The NORAD commander and deputy commander (CINCNORAD) are, respectively, a United States four-star general or equivalent and a Canadian Lieutenant-general or equivalent.
Offutt Air Force Base is a U.S. Air Force base south of Omaha, adjacent to Bellevue in Sarpy County, Nebraska. It is the headquarters of the U.S. Strategic Command (USSTRATCOM), the 557th Weather Wing, and the 55th Wing of the Air Combat Command (ACC), the latter serving as the host unit.
Minot Air Force Base is a U.S. Air Force installation in Ward County, North Dakota, 13 miles (20 km) north of the city of Minot via U.S. 83. In the 2020 census, the base was counted as a CDP with a total population of 5,017, down from 5,521 in 2010. Minot AFB is the home of two major wings: the 5th Bomb Wing and 91st Missile Wing, both of the Air Force Global Strike Command (AFGSC).
Continuity of government (COG) is the principle of establishing defined procedures that allow a government to continue its essential operations in case of a catastrophic event such as nuclear war.
The RCA 474L Ballistic Missile Early Warning System was a United States Air Force Cold War early warning radar, computer, and communications system, for ballistic missile detection. The network of twelve radars, which was constructed beginning in 1958 and became operational in 1961, was built to detect a "mass ballistic missile attack launched on northern approaches [for] 15 to 25 minutes' warning time" also provided Project Space Track satellite data.
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United States Strategic Command (USSTRATCOM) is one of the eleven unified combatant commands in the United States Department of Defense. Headquartered at Offutt Air Force Base, Nebraska, USSTRATCOM is responsible for strategic deterrence, global strike, and operating the Defense Department's Global Information Grid. It also provides a host of capabilities to support the other combatant commands, including integrated missile defense; and global command, control, communications, computers, intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (C4ISR). This command exists to give national leadership a unified resource for greater understanding of specific threats around the world and the means to respond to those threats rapidly.
The National Military Command Center (NMCC) is a Pentagon command and communications center for the National Command Authority. Maintained by the Department of the Air Force as the "DoD Executive Agent" for NMCC logistical, budgetary, facility and systems support; the NMCC operators are in the Joint Staff's J-3 (Operations) Directorate. "The NMCC is responsible for generating Emergency Action Messages (EAMs) to missile launch control centers, nuclear submarines, recon aircraft and battlefield commanders".
The Raven Rock Mountain Complex (RRMC), also known as Site R, is a U.S. military installation with an underground nuclear bunker near Blue Ridge Summit, Pennsylvania, at Raven Rock Mountain that has been called an "underground Pentagon". The bunker has emergency operations centers for the United States Army, Navy, Air Force and Marine Corps. Along with Mount Weather Emergency Operations Center in Virginia and the Cheyenne Mountain Complex in Colorado, it formed the core bunker complexes for the US continuity of government plan during the Cold War to survive a nuclear attack.
Hawes Radio Relay Facility was a United States Air Force installation built on the site of the former Hawes Airfield at Hinkley, California, USA at 34°55′1″N117°22′36″W. The site contained a 373.7-meter-tall (1,226 ft) guyed mast antenna and hardened underground facility used for the Strategic Air Command's AN/FRC-117 Survivable Low Frequency Communications System. Detachment 2, 33rd Communications Group at March AFB, ran the site until its inactivation in 1986.
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A Super Combat Center (SCC) was a planned Cold War command and control facility for ten NORAD regions/Air Divisions in Canada and the United States. For installation in nuclear bunkers, the command posts were to replace the last of the planned Air Defense Command Combat Centers to be built for vacuum tube AN/FSQ-8 Combat Control Centrals. The survivable SCCs were to use solid-state (transistorized) AN/FSQ-32 equipment which was to provide the Semi-Automatic Ground Environment for operators at 10 Air Divisions — 5 of the centers were to also serve as Air Defense Direction Centers ("SCC/DCs") for commanding ground-controlled interception in sectors of the 27th, 30th, 32nd, 33rd, and 35th Air Divisions. ADC's November 1958 plan to complete the hardened SCCs by April 1964 included fielding 3 additional AN/FSQ-32 systems above-ground for the Albuquerque, Miami, and Shreveport sectors.
An Air Defense Direction Center (ADDC) was a type of United States command post for assessing Cold War radar tracks, assigning height requests to available height-finder radars, and for "Weapons Direction": coordinating command guidance of aircraft from more than 1 site for ground-controlled interception. As with the World War II Aircraft Warning Service CONUS defense network, a "manual air defense system" was used through the 1950s Along with 182 radar stations at "the end of 1957, ADC operated … 17 control centers", and the Ground Observation Corps was TBD on TBD. With the formation of NORAD, several types of ADDCs were planned by Air Defense Command:
The Deep Underground Command Center (DUCC), sometimes also called the Deep Underground Command and Control Site (DUCCS), was a United States military installation that was proposed on January 31, 1962, to be "a very deep underground center close to the Pentagon, perhaps 3,000–4,000 feet down, protected to withstand direct hits by high-yield weapons and endure about 30 days in a post-attack period." The DUCC would have been built as "an austere 50-man … or an expanded 300-man version ". It was designed to withstand multiple direct hits of 200 to 300 Megaton weapons bursting at the surface or 100 MT weapons penetrating to depths of 70–100 feet. Based on Strategic Air Command's Deep Underground Support Center (DUSC) planned near the Cheyenne Mountain nuclear bunker, the DUCC plan was recommended to President John F. Kennedy for fiscal year 1965 funding shortly before his assassination, but the underground DUCC, SAC's DUSC, and NORAD's Super Combat Centers were never built.
The IBM 473L Command and Control System was a USAF Cold War "Big L" Support System with computer equipment at The Pentagon and, in Pennsylvania, the Alternate National Military Command Center nuclear bunker. Each 473L site included a Data Processing Subsystem (DPSS), Integrated Console Subsystem (ICSS), Large Panel Display Subsystem, and Data Communications Subsystem. The "System 473L" was an "on-line, real-time information processing system designed to facilitate effective management of USAF resources, particularly during emergency situations" e.g., for: "situation monitoring, resource monitoring, plan evaluation, plan generation and modification, and operations monitoring". In 1967, the 473L System was used during the "HIGH HEELS 67" exercise "to test the whole spectrum of command in a strategic crisis".
The ITT 465L Strategic Air Command Control System was a Cold War "Big L" network of computer and communication systems for command and control of Strategic Air Command "combat aircraft, refueling tankers, [and] ballistic missiles". International Telephone and Telegraph was the prime contractor for Project 465, and SACCS had "Cross Tell Links" between command posts at Offutt AFB, March AFB, & Barksdale AFB (SACCS also communicated with the Cheyenne Mountain Complex and Air Force command posts. The 465L System included IBM AN/FSQ-31 SAC Data Processing Systems, Remote and Simplex Remote Communication Systems, SAC Network Control Office, "4-wire, Schedule 4, Type 4B alternate voice-data operation", and one-way communication with "ICBM launch control centers" In addition to IBM for the "Super SAGE type computers", another of the 6 direct subcontractors was AT&T,
The National Military Command System (NMCS) was the federal government of the United States' Cold War command and control system that consisted of the National Military Command Center (NMCC) at The Pentagon, the Alternate National Military Command Center (NMCC) at Pennsylvania Raven Rock Mountain, 3 National Emergency Airborne Command Post (NEACP) aircraft on 24-hour ground alert, 2 National Emergency Command Post Afloat (NECPA) ships, "and interconnecting communications".
Continental Air Defense Command (CONAD) was a Unified Combatant Command of the United States Department of Defense, tasked with air defense for the Continental United States. It comprised Army, Air Force, and Navy components. It included Army Project Nike missiles anti-aircraft defenses and USAF interceptors. The primary purpose of continental air defense during the CONAD period was to provide sufficient attack warning of a Soviet bomber air raid to ensure Strategic Air Command could launch a counterattack without being destroyed. CONAD controlled nuclear air defense weapons such as the 10 kiloton W-40 nuclear warhead on the CIM-10B BOMARC. The command was disestablished in 1975, and Aerospace Defense Command became the major U.S. component of North American Air Defense Command (NORAD).
The Missile Warning Center (MWC) is a center that provides missile warning and defense for United States Space Command's Combined Force Space Component Command, incorporating both space-based and terrestrial sensors. The MWC is located at Cheyenne Mountain Space Force Station.
References
- ↑ Wainstein cites: Historical and Research Division, Strategic Air Command, History of the Strategic...1962
- ↑ Wainstein, L. (Part 1, Part 4, Project Leader); Cremeans, C.D. (Part 4); Moriarty, J. K. (Part 2); Ponturo, J. (Part 3) (June 1975). The Evoluition of U.S. Strategic Command and Control and Warning, 1945-1972 (Report). Vol. Study S-467. Institute for Defense Analyses.
- ↑ Wainstein cites: Deputy Secretary of Defense (5 February 1962), Deep Underground National Command Center (declassified "Memorandum for DDR&E"), Office of the Secretary of Defense and a Joint Chiefs of Staff [ verification needed ] "Draft Memorandum for the President": National Deep Underground Command Post, 7 November 1963, TOP SECRET.