Word: commands
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Tensions escalate. The military goes on alert. A Soviet-American showdown seems probable. When a nuclear attack upon the U.S. is considered imminent, authority to use nuclear weapons is automatically "predelegated" to various military commanders. For a nation that mistakenly assumes only the President's finger is ever on the button, this little-known fact will come as a disconcerting discovery. In his first novel, State Scarlet (Putnam; $18.95), David Aaron, a top staffer at the National Security Council during the Carter Administration, uses fiction to show how the nation's command, control and communications system, known...
...stealing a backpack-size nuclear bomb and threatening to detonate it unless the President withdraws nuclear forces from Europe. When the Kremlin hears about this, it activates its own crisis machinery, and the two sides inexorably proceed toward a macho nuclear confrontation. The chief of the Strategic Air Command warns that the C 3 system can absorb only a couple of hundred "hits" and still function. The National Security Adviser, who wants to prepare American missiles for launch even without the President's approval, argues, "If the Soviets strike first at our command and control, we may not be able...
...realize, Mr. President," an aide says, "that you're not the only one who can release nuclear weapons." Launch authority devolves on the President's 15 constitutional successors (including, ultimately, the Secretary of Housing and Urban Development and the Secretary of Transportation) and also on the National Military Command Center, the Strategic Air Command, and a "looking glass" airborne command center. "They all can launch if you're incapacitated," the aide tells the President. Then, ominously, he adds, "As a practical matter, sir, they can also launch even...
...nuclear age: how to limit access to the nuclear button yet make sure it can still be pushed if something suddenly happens to the President. The novel also gets to the heart of a debate over nuclear strategy: Does it make sense to target the Kremlin and other Soviet command centers? That might serve to destroy Moscow's war-fighting capability, but it could also eliminate its ability to de- escalate a crisis once the shooting begins. This strategy is known as "nuclear decapitation," and Aaron likens it to "two headless chickens" in a fight...
Although public attention has widely focused on arms-control schemes, many experts feel it is far more important to find ways to reshape the military strategies of both nations to make it less likely that a nuclear crisis will spin out of control. If either nation feels that its command structure is vulnerable, it is more likely to get an itchy finger on its button. One way to prevent this is to establish crisis-control centers to prevent misunderstandings. Another is for the U.S. to make its C 3 system more survivable -- and to avoid causing the Soviet command...