Chinese Gates and Loose Nuke, 7 Months Later

What’s the rush? Maybe because China’s Foreign Ministry demands it. So the next question, who’s running the show? AND WHY ISN’T THIS NEWSWORTHY? Thanks to myway.com for this report:
Gates Orders Inventory of US Nukes
Mar 27, 7:10 PM
By LOLITA C. BALDOR
WASHINGTON (AP) - Defense Secretary Robert Gates has ordered a full inventory of all nuclear weapons and related materials after the mistaken delivery of ballistic missile fuses to Taiwan, the Pentagon said Thursday.
Gates told officials with the Air Force, Navy and Defense Logistics Agency to assess inventory control procedures for the materials and to submit a report within 60 days.
Earlier this week, Gates directed Navy Adm. Kirkland H. Donald to take charge of a full investigation of the delivery mistake in which four cone-shaped electrical fuses used in intercontinental ballistic missile warheads were shipped to the Taiwanese instead of the helicopter batteries they had ordered. [my bold]
It was the second nuclear-related mistake involving the military that has been revealed in recent months. In August an Air Force B-52 bomber was mistakenly armed with six nuclear-tipped cruise missiles and flown from Minot Air Force Base, N.D., to Barksdale Air Force Base, La. At the time, the pilot and crew were unaware they had nuclear arms aboard.
The electrical fuses were delivered in fall 2006, but the military did not fully realize the gravity of the blunder until last week. The revelation sparked sharp protests from China and forced President Bush to acknowledge the error in a phone call Wednesday with Chinese President Hu Jintao.
But China's Foreign Ministry spokesman Qin Gang said, in a statement posted on the agency's Web site, that China had sent a protest to Washington expressing "strong displeasure."
He said China demanded the U.S. investigate the matter and report back to China to "eliminate the negative effects and disastrous consequences created by this incident."[...] http://apnews.myway.com/article/20080327/D8VM2K400.html
This might explain the unbelievable use of violence against Tibetans demonstrating for self-determination in Greece, New York City, Chicago, Paris, anywhere outside of China. As left-wingers debate the "correctness" of showing support for the people of Tibet, China runs the show.

US Air Force: Above It All?

One of the exciting aspects of blogging breaking news comes when a topic you hit upon goes mainstream. Yesterday I was surprised to see a commercial on NBC, sandwiched between the talking heads, for the Air Force's new baby, the Cyber Command Center. Here's the link from my original blog coverage: February 14, 2008, Geek Warriers in Loose Nukes Country.
The commercial opens with an aerial view of the Pentagon as a man says something about this building being attached, oh, a billion times a day. Then after scaring the crap out of ya, they show the busy bees in the Barksdale Air Force Cyber Command HQ, toiling away for your liberty and freedom.
Here's the hype:

So, maybe I’m just nit picking, but what ever happened to the sixth nuke that left Minot, North Dakota on August 29 and just wasn’t there when they landed at Barksdale? Isn’t that newsworthy anymore? Are we so worn out that no one is able to pursue this story? I’m just saying, here they are advertising their unbelievably expensive new cyber tracking station AT THE VERY BASE WHERE THEY LOST A NUCLEAR WEAPON! Oh, I see. The dog ate it.

Geek Warriers in Loose Nukes Country

It is so interesting that Barksdale was the destination on Aug. 29 when six (6) nuclear warheads went on an unauthorized joy ride from Minot Airforce Base in North Dakota to this Barksdale base in Louisiana. Only five (5) arrived. What makes them think they can manage electromagnetic war any better? See previous posts for more links: November 1, 2007 Loose Nukes Cover Up , and October 21, 2007 Bent and Quivering Pinnacle
Welcome to Cyberwar Country, USA
BARKSDALE AIR FORCE BASE, Louisiana
[...] [William] Lord, boyish and enthusiastic, is a new kind of Air Force warrior -- the provisional chief of the service's first new major command since the early 1990s, the Cyber Command. With thousands of posts and enough bandwidth to choke a horse, the Cyber Command is dedicated to the proposition that the next war will be fought in the electromagnetic spectrum, and that computers are military weapons. In a windowless building across the base, Lord's cyber warriors are already perched 24 hours a day before banks of monitors, scanning Air Force networks for signs of hostile incursion.
[...] The Cyber Command was provisionally established on Barksdale's 22,000 acres in October, at the edge of a black lake stitched with swamp trees that narrow just above the water line. The placement was good news for Bossier, which took it as a sign that Louisiana would win the permanent command, too.
[...] To persuade the Air Force of Bossier's potential as a Deep South Silicon Valley, city officials broke ground last month on a "Cyber Innovation Center," a $100 million office complex abutting Barksdale. The consortium paid $4.7 million for a 64-acre parcel, and they've raised $50 million from state and local government and another $50 million from the federal government for a complex of buildings, starting with an $11 million, 120,000-square-foot cyberfortress. Renderings show a moat [to stop cyber wars?] and huge, silvery wedges of metal jutting outward from the building's base. There's a jet in the design, pointed toward the sky.
[...] Not everyone is enthusiastic about the reorganization. Defense expert John Pike, director of GlobalSecurity.org, says the Cyber Command's mission is murky. "There's been so much gee-whiz flackery to this," Pike says. "They've got the whole thing tarted up, and it's hard to tell what they're actually doing."
Pike says the Cyber Command may be part of a secret Air Force plan to prepare for war against China, already suspected of trying to hack Department of Defense networks. He says the new command's defensive mission is muddled and duplicative: The NSA already defends military networks. As for civilian infrastructures like the internet and power grid, they're privately owned, and the Air Force has no jurisdiction over them.
[...] Inside the Air Force Network Operations Center at Barksdale, a tan, windowless building in the northwest corner of the base, the cyberwar is in full pitch. But the internet jihadists and Chinese hacker troops the Cyber Command is expecting so far haven't materialized. Spammers are the enemy today.
http://www.thought-criminal.org/article/node/1271

Previous posts on this subject appear here:
November 6, 2007: Disappearing Nuclear Reactor! ; November 3, 2007: Only the Traitors Know , Who's Bombing Who?; November 1, 2007: Loose Nukes Cover Up ; October 21, 2007: Bent and Quivering Pinnacle , Betty Crocker Blue Ribbon Panel to Tests Nukes; October 10, 2007: The Loose Nukes Story Has a New Wrinkle ; September 13, 2007: This was No Accident: Nuclear Weapons are Different

Loose Nukes Cover Up

I can't let go of this story because from any angle, it's too scary. Call me a coward, but loose nukes, be they flying or grounded, freak me out:
Missing Nukes: Treason of the Highest Order
by Mahdi Darius Nazemroaya, Global Research, October 29, 2007
According to a wide range of reports, several nuclear bombs were “lost” for 36 hours after taking off August 29/30, 2007 on a “cross-country journey” across the U.S., from U.S.A.F Base Minot in North Dakota to U.S.A.F. Base Barksdale, near New Orleans, in Louisiana. [1] Reportedly, in total there were six W80-1 nuclear warheads armed on AGM-129 Advanced Cruise Missiles (ACMs) that were “lost.” [2] The story was first reported by the Military Times, after military servicemen leaked the story.
…In other words, unauthorized removal of nuclear weapons would be virtually impossible to accomplish unless the chain of command were bypassed, involving, in this case, the deliberate tampering of the paperwork and tracking procedures.
,,, Prior to the Missing Nukes Incident, Minot Airmen Meet with the President and the U.S. Air Force Chief of Staff
On June 15, 2007, George W. Bush Jr. met senior officers from U.S.A.F. Base Minot at U.S.A.F. Base McConnell in Wichita, Kansas during a visit to Boeing’s Integrated Defense Systems facility. Amongst them was Major Daniel Giacomazza of the 5th Operational Support Squadron.
…Citizens for Legitimate Government has pointed towards the involvement of the U.S. Air Force in a cover-up and has linked several deaths of U.S. servicemen to the incident. Lori Price has also stated for Citizens for a Legitimate Government that “you need about fourteen signatures to get an armed nuke on a B-52.
It gets uglier:
According to the Military Times, George W. Bush Jr. had been swiftly informed. This is a lockstep procedure. This illustrates the importance tied to the authorization needed for handling nuclear weapons. This is part of a two-way process in regards to authorization from the White House.
The commander of the 5th Munitions Squadron and the commander of the 5th Bomb Wing, Colonel Bruce Emig, have been replaced along with a series of other senior officers. This implies that the U.S. Air Force chain of command is directly involved in this event. None of these senior officers have been authorized to speak or make statements, according to U.S. military sources. Will any of these officers receive lucrative departure packages? Have they been reassigned?
This very detailed articled then shifts gears into serious conspiracy land. At least seven (7) deaths have occurred around the date of this fiasco, within months before or after. One is a suicide, almost all the rest are vehicular accidents.
Oh, by the way. Only FIVE nukes arrived at Barksdale.
… It is also worth noting that original reports from military sources talked about only five of the six nuclear warheads from Minot being accounted for in Barksdale.
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=7158

Here’s a report which attempts to sooth the public:
Nuclear warheads mistakenly flown on B-52, landing at Barksdale AFB
By Michael Hoffman
Military Times, September 4, 2007
http://www.thetowntalk.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070904/NEWS01/70904040
…Officials at Minot immediately conducted an inventory of its nuclear weapons after the oversight was discovered, and Thomas said he could confirm that all remaining nuclear weapons at Minot are accounted for.
I’m so glad they found the ones that were still there. In typically tortured military-speak, here Mr. Hoffman records the, sort of, explanation for the nuke that got lost from Minot to Barksdale:
Commander disciplined for nuclear mistake
By Michael Hoffman, Military Times
…It was originally reported that five nuclear warheads were transported, but officers who tipped Military Times to the incident who have asked to remain anonymous since they are not authorized to discuss the incident, have since updated that number to six.
Uh, okay. But wait! They're still trying to get to the bottom of it:
…Secretary of Defense Robert Gates has requested daily briefings from Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Michael Moseley on the progress of the investigation. Sen. Byron Dorgan, D-N.D., a member of the Senate Appropriations defense subcommittee, requested a full-classified briefing, not just the preliminary information being provided to lawmakers, to explain how a mistake of this magnitude could have happened.
Ya think that’d be a good idea?
…"I just can't imagine how all of this happened," said Philip Coyle, a senior adviser on nuclear weapons at the Center for Defense Information. "The procedures are so rigid; this is the last thing that's supposed to happen."
Exactly!
http://www.usatoday.com/news/military/2007-09-05-b-52_N.htm
There WILL be more to come on this. Count on it. For past posts on this topic, see: too tired, tomorrow...

Bent and Quivering Pinnacle

It's a Google-ie kinda day to cut & paste away. So much to choose from. Read on, citizens.
B-52 Nukes Headed for Iran, Not For Decommissioning:
Airforce Refused
Air Force refused to fly weapons to Middle East theater
By Wayne Madsen, Sept. 24, 2007, Author's website, (subscription only)
Global Research, September 27, 2007
Wayne Madsen Report (WMR)
WMR has learned from U.S. and foreign intelligence sources that the B-52 transporting six stealth AGM-129 Advanced Cruise Missiles, each armed with a W-80-1 nuclear warhead, on August 30, were destined for the Middle East via Barksdale Air Force Base in Louisiana.
However, elements of the Air Force, supported by U.S. intelligence agency personnel, successfully revealed the ultimate destination of the nuclear weapons and the mission was aborted due to internal opposition within the Air Force and U.S. Intelligence Community.
Yesterday, the Washington Post attempted to explain away the fact that America's nuclear command and control system broke down in an unprecedented manner by reporting that it was the result of "security failures at multiple levels." It is now apparent that the command and control breakdown, reported as a BENT SPEAR incident to the Secretary of Defense and White House, was not the result of a command and control chain-of-command "failures" but the result of a revolt and push back by various echelons within the Air Force and intelligence agencies against a planned U.S. attack on Iran using nuclear and conventional weapons.
The Washington Post story on BENT SPEAR may have actually been an effort in damage control by the Bush administration. WMR has been informed by a knowledgeable source that one of the six nuclear-armed cruise missiles was, and may still be, unaccounted for. In that case, the nuclear reporting incident would have gone far beyond BENT SPEAR to a National Command Authority alert known as EMPTY QUIVER, with the special classification of PINNACLE.
...WMR has learned from military sources on both sides of the Atlantic that there was a definite connection between Israel’s OPERATION ORCHARD and BENT SPEAR involving the B-52 that flew the six nuclear-armed cruise missiles from Minot Air Force Base in North Dakota to Barksdale.
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=6909

Heads Up re Stand Down

Maybe I’m overreacting, but I think it’s better to be prepared with TRUTH, JUST IN CASE we suffer another incident where our national defense goes AWOL, as it did on 9/11/01:
Langley jets grounded on Sept. 14
The stand down is scheduled so airmen can review safety procedures.
BY STEPHANIE HEINATZ | 757-247-7821, September 6, 2007

http://www.dailypress.com/news/local/hampton/dp-now-langley.0906,0,3833474.story

U P D A T E!!!

February 17, 2008

The Daily Press link is no longer available, and so I found an article from the Air Force Times which verifies that the Sept. 14th stand down was a reaction to the "missing nukes" story and questions around procedural , erh, problems:
ACC orders commandwide standdown Friday
By Bruce Rolfsen - Staff writer, Posted : Monday Sep 10, 2007
[...] Command boss Gen. Ronald Keys ordered the Sept. 14 safety standdown in the wake of the Aug. 30 nuclear incident at Minot Air Force Base, N.D., in which six cruise missiles armed with nuclear warheads were loaded onto a B-52H and then flown to Barksdale Air Force Base, La., without anyone on the ground or bomber realizing the nuclear weapons were on the plane. It was not until the B-52H was parked at Barksdale that ground crews discovered the cruise missiles were carrying real warheads.
[...] Just how serious Keys takes the lapse of regulations at Minot is reflected in the fact that the safety stand-down is the first commandwide safety day in recent memory. In the past, the command has singled out specific types of aircraft for safety days and in 1997 the Department of Defense held a departmentwide safety review day.
http://www.airforcetimes.com/news/2007/09/airforce_aircombatcommand_standdown_070807/