"Strangelove on the Square: Secret USAF Films Showed" Topic

… Airmen What to Expect if Nuclear War Broke Out

"The declassified Air Force film shows the crew of a U.S. B-52 bomber reaching its "Positive Control" ("fail safe") point on the way to its target in the Soviet Union. But instead of turning around as usual, they get an order to proceed to their assigned objective. Having received and authenticated a "Go Code" message from U.S. Strategic Air Command (SAC), the pilot announces, "We're going in," navigating the aircraft in low over mountains, lakes, fields, and forests to avoid Soviet air defenses. The dramatic soundtrack swells as the bomber nears its target, unleashes its nuclear payload, and then speeds away to create "separation distance" between itself and the effects of the resulting explosion. Undamaged by the thermal blast and shockwave, the aircrew heads back home, but not before flying through "the contaminated cloud of another bomb dropped 30 minutes ago" by a different SAC B-52.

While this dramatization of a U.S. nuclear strike is reminiscent of Stanley Kubrick's 1964 classic, Dr. Strangelove, it's actually the climactic sequence of a 1960 SAC training film recently declassified by the U.S. National Archives and Records Administration (NARA). Titled "Nuclear Effects During SAC Delivery Missions," the film's purpose is to familiarize SAC pilots and crew members with the devastating effects of nuclear weapons detonations and the detailed plans that the command had developed to help the crews evade the dangers of navigating through a nuclear battlefield. The narrator assures trainees that SAC had taken into account the effects of the blasts on U.S. aircrews and had prepared a "workable plan for every sortie to and from the target area." SAC crewmembers are advised that they can safely navigate the aircraft home "if you follow rigidly your flight plan."…"

Main page

link

Armand

All I had to do in the event of nuclear war was hide under my desk at school. We also used our very versatile desks to shelter from tornados and earthquakes.

We always went to the halls and knelt against the lockers. I guess they were worried about all the glass flying around. Great days!

No protection against Commie preverts except an M1 Carbeen

(smile)

Armand

By the time I was in school, there were no duck-and-cover drills. Everyone just accepted that we were in a major city, which would certainly be hit, and, if we were lucky, we would be killed instantly.

Glup!

Armand

Yup, I grew up in the middle of nowhere, and when I moved to Boston, I quit worrying about "the bomb."