What was strategic air command

During the Cold War the Strategic Air Command SAC kept its bomber and missile forces at high alert, with strategic bombers adjacent to runways slated for rapid launch. Yet tight secrecy controls shrouded the mechanics of these processes while the cryptological nature of the actual launch and execution messages made them inaccessible.

This expanded to include ground alert in the U. Airborne alert tests began in January using Bs, and by included Bs. The Chrome Dome airborne alert program was approved on 6 November and ended after the crash of a nuclear-bomb-laden B near Thule, Greenland, in January H-hour served as the absolute start time for all operations.

As the RBs were configured primarily for ELINT collection their chief mission would be to detect the operational electronic signatures of hostile forces. By early the Atlases would be retired, rendered obsolete by the quick-launch Minutemen. Perhaps the most significant part of the checklist is the recap of EWO messages. The former, known as Red Dot messages, were for use when war was imminent or underway. This directed the bombers to their positive control point.

In the event of gradual escalation, bombers reached and orbited at their PC points in the expectation that their highly visible presence would convince the Soviet leadership of U. In this event the bombers proceeded directly to their targets without pausing at their PC point or requiring an additional execution message.

Red Dot 6 may have been a placeholder reserved for an unspecified contingency plan. The airborne and ground alert operations discussed earlier were keyed into the DEFCONS, which corresponded to different levels of international tension. Base security was heightened and flying operations were restricted to a four-hour radius from the base.

ICBMs not on alert or undergoing maintenance would be generated and placed on alert using a hour work schedule. Except for airborne alert missions underway, airborne command post operations, and test aircraft, all flying would stop so that the bomber force could be readied for use.

Moreover, officers would distribute Combat Mission Folders stipulating routes and targets to crews to permit briefings and folder review. Moreover, launch crews prepared themselves to go to the next level of readiness. All non-critical flying ceased and aircraft undergoing maintenance were made sufficiently flyable to carry out an EWO strike. Should U. Crews would then shut down the engines and remain in their airplanes.

Missiles were a separate case. Note: The author wishes to acknowledge the efforts of George Cully in acquiring this document, and comments by William Burr and David Rosenberg. The document and the commentary are illuminating and brought to mind my experience with SAC nuclear operations during the following decade. A Red Dot 1 message would not have been used to change the alert posture of U. By it instead would have ordered the strategic forces to carry out their wartime missions — in other words, execute the Single Integrated Operational Plan SIOP.

We are in bad shape. Once again LeMay broke down the problem into its parts. First, he began cleaning house, and sent out a call for the best people he had worked with in the past.

LeMay was cold-blooded in the way he went about his work. A lot of people were fired in that opening phase. LeMay was one of the few Americans who understood how the nature of war had changed in just two years. He also understood that World War II could no longer serve as the model for any future conflicts—especially in regard to the Air Force.

Nuclear weapons, along with jet planes and rockets, had changed the paradigm. The old world, in which the United States was protected by its two great oceans, was over. Unlike some, LeMay did not lament this. He always viewed technology as an ally that could advance his goals. But what made him immeasurably more effective was this ability to inject his past experience—when relevant—into this new realm. This new form of warfare would allow for no second chances. So LeMay had to create the state of readiness that was necessary to capitalize on that first and only chance to strike, should it ever be needed.

To do it, he had to change the way people in SAC thought. So that if actually we did go to war the very next morning or even that night, we would stumble through no period in which preliminary motions would be wasted. We had to be ready to go then.

LeMay completely redefined SAC along with its mission. LeMay did not accomplish this for himself or because he wanted to coax the Soviet Union into an all-out war as some have suggested. LeMay had a rock solid belief in the Constitution of the United States, which placed the military under civilian control. In spite of what his detractors said and wrote, the Strategic Air Command was under the absolute and complete control of the commander in chief of the military, not SAC. LeMay never questioned this.

He performed well so the president could deal with adversaries from a position of power, which was, LeMay believed, the only way of dealing with adversaries. From to his last day at SAC in , LeMay managed to stop the hemorrhage of men and equipment that he inherited at the start.

In there were 51, people at SAC—5, officers, 40, airmen, and 6, civilians. Morale was low and living conditions were appalling. When LeMay took over Strategic Air Command in , the accident rate was sixty-five major accidents per , hours—a dismal record. We went into the matter from every angle. We were going to find out how the accident happened and why. Nobody was beyond doing this. In response, Gen. Curtis E. LeMay assumed command of SAC and set about building a credible airborne fighting force.

A pragmatic leader, LeMay prepared SAC for a war that could begin at any time and for air combat and bombing missions that would have to be deployed immediately.

By , when the Soviets exploded their first atomic bomb, SAC had mobilized its resources and crew competence to levels sufficient to meet this new challenge. In the wake of the Soviet nuclear detonation, the beginning of the Korean War, and new initiatives detailed under NSC, the National Security Council's blueprint for waging the cold war, the role of SAC in the worldwide defense of American interests grew. As cold war relations deteriorated and both the United States and the Soviet Union developed thermonuclear weapons, SAC expanded its role in providing strategic defensive and offensive capabilities.

In June SAC accepted delivery of the first B, the jet bomber that became its trademark symbol. In January SAC headquarters moved to a new control center. From a two-tiered building, comprised of a threestory aboveground administrative structure and a three-story belowground war command center, SAC coordinated its global presence, controlling both bomber and missile systems.