NUCLEAR MISSILE SILO

This guy lives in an abandoned nuclear missile silo in Texas.

Bruce Townsley in the corrugated steel quonset hut that is one of the few above-ground structures on the site.


Head south of Abilene, Texas, cross a couple of intersections, look for a small lump in the road with mailboxes sprouting out of the ground, and you’re there. At the end of the driveway, an American flag and array of solar panels provide the only evidence of habitation.




Bruce Townsley built his house in an abandoned Atlas F missile site. During the Cold War (a.k.a. "The Good Old Days" - S.L.) Atlas missiles were stored vertically in their underground silos, with attached living quarters for the missilieers. More than 30 years after it was deactivated, Townsley bought the property in 1997 for $99,000; a 2,200 sq ft. fixer-upper.


A missile heads down the ICBM highway in central Texas on it’s way to a silo. During the early 1960s it wasn’t uncommon for motorists to pass these weapons of mass destruction on America’s interstate highways.


Construction of an Atlas missile silo. Circa 1960.


Two giant overhead silo doors cover the 185-foot hole in the ground where a missile armed with a nuclear warhead used to be. Townsley managed to get one of these massive doors up and running; with a lot of helping hands and a rented crane, he finally cracked it open.




Living in a missile silo means lots and lots of stairs:

Townsley takes the stairwell down to the first level of his house; the old crew quarters.

A set of 6,000-pound blast doors keep occupants safe during a nuclear attack. The doors curve inward to offset the vacuum effect of a blast – keeping everything inside from being sucked out:


The white “latticed” debris door is an added safety feature to keep whatever an explosion carries into the tunnels from making it to the control room.


All four of the doors are still fully functional – impressive in their size and precision, they take little more than a gentle shove to swing open.



Townsley’s living space is about 1,100 square feet and completely round. The room is essentially a concrete bubble suspended from the large column in its center.



When the site was an active missile base, this room “floated” on massive springs. This let the room move both up and down and side to side, which would absorb a bomb blast in the event that the Russians managed to get a shot off.

Every room in the structure revolves around the center pillar like a clock — kitchen, living room, office, bedroom — all separated by short partition walls built by Townsley.


Townsley has a clean aesthetic. His tastes in furnishings have a simple, feng-shui vibe.

Clutter disturbs the chi when you live in a round, totally open room.



“The hardest part was learning how to drywall on a curve.” It took some time adjusting to the subterranean lifestyle; “You have to get used to living without windows,” he says. “But I have a TV monitor [hooked up to] an aboveground video camera.” Another thing he didn’t expect was quietness. “It’s intensely quiet,” he says, “and I’m a quiet freak. But there was a time when I had to keep a fan on all day just to have some noise.”

Townsley’s James Bondian home includes a much, much larger feature – the 185 foot-deep missile silo.


To get to the silo requires navigating another set of blast doors and a corrugated steel tunnel.


When the silo was operational, this tunnel led to a fully fueled, nuclear warhead equipped Atlas F missile:

At the time it was being lowered into its silo, this Atlas F was the most advanced missile in the U.S. arsenal.

Some men tinker in the backyard shed or putter around the garage. Townsley has strung lights up in a 185-foot hole in the ground and has enough space and tools to tinker for the foreseeable future.

Seen from below, the giant silo doors give little hint that there’s a blue sky beyond. Such substantial doors required Townsley to get a little creative to prop it open:

“It’s your standard hydraulic lift,” Townsley says. “It’s just really big.”

Decades ago the lifts were a crucial part of the operation. Before the missile could be launched, the multi-ton, three-foot thick doors had to swing outward and allow an elevator to raise the missile toward the sky as quickly as possible. If an enemy attack was really underway, every second counted.

An Atlas F missile, flanked by the massive silo doors, is fully raised and ready to launch.


Concrete slabs and giant doors cover very deep holes in the ground, somber mementos of a time when many Americans felt that the end of the world as they knew it was just the push of a button away.


Many of the Atlas missiles were eventually launched, but instead of weapons for the Cold War they became tools of the space race, carrying satellites into orbit.


Photos: Jim Merithew/Wired.com

Read more about converted Cold War nuclear shelters HERE

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THE PUEBLO INCIDENT

USS Pueblo (AGER-2), a Banner-class technical research ship (US Navy Intelligence), was boarded and captured by the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) on 23 January 1968. The Pueblo Incident became one of the major incidents of what is now considered the "Second Korean War".

North Korea stated that she strayed into their territorial waters, but the United States maintains that the vessel was in international waters at the time of the incident.

Pueblo, still held by the DPRK today, officially remains a commissioned vessel of the United States Navy.[1] It is currently located in Pyongyang, where it is used as a museum ship. It is the only ship of the U.S. Navy currently being held captive.


THE TAKE DOWN

On 5 January 1968, Pueblo left Sasebo, Japan on January 11, 1968 headed northward through the Tsushima Strait into the Sea of Japan with specific orders to intercept and conduct surveillance of Soviet naval activity in the Tsushima Strait and to gather signal and electronic intelligence from North Korea.

On 21 January a modified Soviet style sub chaser, SO-I class, passed within two miles (4 km) of the Pueblo.

The next day two DPRK fishing trawlers (Lenta Class) passed within 25 yards (23 m) of Pueblo. That day, a North Korean unit made an assassination attempt against South Korean leadership targets, but the crew of Pueblo were not informed.

According to the American account, the following day, 23 January, Pueblo was approached by a sub chaser and her nationality was challenged; Pueblo responded by raising the U.S. flag. The DPRK vessel then ordered her to stand down or be fired upon. Pueblo attempted to maneuver away, but was considerably slower than the sub chaser. Additionally, three torpedo boats appeared on the horizon and then joined in the chase and subsequent attack. The attackers were soon joined by two MiG-21 fighters. A fourth torpedo boat and a second sub chaser appeared on the horizon a short time later. The ammunition on Pueblo was stored below decks, and her machine guns were wrapped in cold-weather tarpaulins. The machine guns were unmanned, and no attempt was made to man them.

U.S. Naval authorities and the crew of the Pueblo insist that before the capture, Pueblo was miles outside North Korean territorial waters; the North Koreans claim the vessel was well within the DPRK's territory. The mission statement allowed her to approach within a nautical mile (1.852 km) of that limit. The DPRK, however, claims a 50-nautical-mile (90 km) sea boundary even though international standards were 12 nautical miles (22 km) at the time.

The North Korean vessels attempted to board Pueblo, but she maneuvered to prevent this for over two hours and a sub chaser opened fire with a 57 mm cannon, killing one member of the crew. The smaller vessels fired machine guns into Pueblo, which then signaled compliance and began destroying sensitive material. The volume of material on board was so great that it was impossible to destroy all of it. The crew inside the security space on board the Pueblo had over an hour to destroy sensitive material before the ship was boarded.


"NO ONE CAME AT ALL"



Commander Lloyd "Pete" Bucher in 1967


Radio contact between the Pueblo and the Naval Security Group in Kamiseya, Japan had been ongoing during the incident. As a result, Seventh Fleet command was fully aware of Pueblo's situation.

Commander Lloyd M. Bucher, Commanding Officer of the Pueblo, bitterly recalled that commanders had failed to come to his aid.

"The U.S. at that time had enormous military forces in the western Pacific within five minutes flying time of us," Bucher told The Associated Press in 1988. "I would have thought something could be mustered to come to our aid. But everybody just forgot we were there."

"The U.S. at that time had enormous military forces in the western Pacific within five minutes flying time of us," Bucher told The Associated Press in 1988. "I would have thought something could be mustered to come to our aid. But everybody just forgot we were there."

More likely, no one wanted to take responsibility for an attack on North Korean vessels attacking Pueblo. By the time President Lyndon Johnson was awakened, Pueblo had been captured and any rescue attempt would have been futile.

Pueblo followed the North Korean vessels as ordered, but then stopped immediately outside North Korean waters. She was again fired upon, and a U.S. sailor, Fireman Apprentice Duane Hodges, was killed. The ship was boarded by men from a torpedo boat and a sub chaser. Crew members had their hands tied, were blindfolded, beaten, and prodded with bayonets.


CAPTIVITY, ABUSE, AND RESISTANCE

The Pueblo was taken into port at Wonsan and the crew was moved twice to POW camps, with some of the crew reporting upon release that they were starved and regularly tortured while in North Korean custody. This treatment was allegedly worsened when the North Koreans realized that crewmen were secretly giving them "the finger" in staged propaganda photos.

The conduct of Commander Bucher and the crew of the Pueblo while in captivity is held to this day as the epitome of prisoner-of-war resistance, amongst military survival schools and college psychology courses alike.

Bucher was brutally tortured and put through mock executions in an effort to make him confess. Eventually the Koreans threatened to execute his men in front of him, and Bucher relented. None of the Koreans knew English well enough to write the confession, so they had Bucher write it himself. They verified the meaning of his words, but failed to catch the pun when he said "We paean the DPRK. We paean the Korean people. We paean their great leader Kim Il Sung". (The word "paean" sounds identical to the term 'pee on'.)

Bucher's 'Final Confession' is a classic of disinformation and doublespeak; a masterpiece of the Cold War, it deserves close inspection.


REPATRIATION


Crew of USS Pueblo upon release on 23 DEC 1968.


Following an apology and written admission by the U.S. that Pueblo had been spying, and an assurance that the U.S. would not spy in the future, the North Koreans released the 82 remaining crew members. On 23 December 1968 the crew was taken by buses to the DMZ border with South Korea and ordered to walk south one at a time, fifteen seconds apart. Exactly 11 months after being taken prisoner, Pete Bucher led his crew across the "Bridge of No Return" to freedom. The U.S. then verbally retracted the ransom admission, apology, and assurance. Meanwhile the North Koreans blanked out the paragraph above the signature which read: "and this hereby receipts for 82 crewmen and one dead body".


A gaunt Pete Blucher receives the Purple Heart medal after shortly after repatriation in December of 1968.


Bucher's surrender of his small ship, loaded with intelligence information, was harshly criticized by a Navy Court of Inquiry convened in Coronado. The court recommended Bucher face a general court-martial for allegedly failing to defend the Pueblo, allowing the ship to be searched and other offenses.

Navy Secretary John H. Chafee turned down the court-martial, saying crew members "have suffered enough."


THE LEGEND OF THE USS PUEBLO

A literal blip on the radar screen, the Pueblo Incident represents a significant event of the Cold War - such was the power of symbols during the fifty year struggle between Communism and the Free World. The Saga of the USS Pueblo was immortalized in song; 'Ride, Captain Ride' is played to this day on radio stations across the USA, yet few Americans realize the true meaning of the popular 70's song by Blues Image:

COMIN' AT YA ! ! !

Czech Hind-D.

I remember the first time I saw a flight of these babies for real - some airbase in the Czech Republic, back in the early nineties; the Cold War was over and I was going in and out of the Balkans like the place had a revolving door - I kept looking and looking and looking at them, shaking my head and thinking to myself "I can't get used to this . . ." - S.L.

WE OWE THEM NOTHING.

President Obama gave a speech to the 'Muslim World' today at Cairo University. He repeated the same "Blame America First" themes we heard during the "America Apologizes" European tour, predictably enough, and threw in some exaggerations. He compared the Nazi Holocaust against the Jews to the Palestinian refugees' (read: terrorists) situation - they serve as a willing foil to the Arab states against Israel.

Will somebody please remind me; why is it we need to reach out to the Muslim World? Why do they hate us? What are our transgressions against Muslim people?

A little review is in order:

We gave aid, arms & training to the Mujahadeen, gave them the edge required to liberate Afghanistan from the Soviets.

Millions of Muslims were liberated when the Soviet Union collapsed; entire Muslim nations emerged - Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan - thanks in no small part to U.S. efforts during the Cold War. Thousands of Americans died in this forty-year endeavor.

In Kuwait we liberated millions from the rape & rampage of Saddam Hussein's forces. We took casualties along the way.

We fed the starving people of Somalia. American soldiers were killed and dragged through the streets.

In Bosnia we halted the brutal slayings of Muslims at the hands of the Serbs and the Croats, when the United Nations proved unable to do anything except accommodate the Serbs in the massacre of Srebrenica.

We liberated the Kosovars from their Serb oppressors. American soldiers came under fire; Americans were captured and brutalized by former Communists in Belgrade.

We liberated millions in Afghanistan, and Iraq, at great cost of American lives and treasure.

The United States is directly responsible for any and all advancement the Palestinians have made toward statehood over the past thirty years. And yet when the Twin Towers crashed to the ground killing thousands of Americans, the Palestinians danced in the streets.

WE OWE THEM NOTHING.