Titan Missile Silo
2006 August 8, Tuesday
Anyone remember the Cold War? It was not a Great War, or even a Good War.
But it certainly had Potential, and this is embodied in the Titan Missile
Museum, a decommissioned silo housing a formerly lethal atomic weapon.
It is hard to realize how Potential was Possiblity -- nay, Probability -- to
the men (and a few women) who lived at the Silo. Their only, ONLY, function
was to wash, shave, dress, and feed the missile. For years. This thing, at
any given time, once activated, was 30 seconds away from Certainty.
Our tour guide was the former commander of the facility, the guy who would
turn the key once the proper codes were verified. And he let Deb activate
the Titan Missile.
Klaxons rang, lights flashed, and the dogs of war were let loose. Ah, but
the Cold War is over now. It's all just a demonstration. A demonstration.
There were funny stories about drunken Indians dancing on the hatch and
such. But really, the deadly seriousness of the entire enterprise was
undeniable and unavoidable.
The engineers of death didn't get their day with the Titan missile, or its
sister missiles in the Union Formerly Known as Soviet.
deb