70 punished in accidental B-52 flight – U.S. Security – MSNBC.com
The Air Force said Friday it has punished 70 airmen involved in the accidental, cross-country flight of a nuclear-armed B-52 bomber following an investigation that found widespread disregard for the rules on handling such munitions.
The quesion on my mind regarding this story is why were these few missiles being sent to Barksdale in the first place. At the very end of the long article you get this:
The weapon involved was the Advanced Cruise Missile, a “stealth” weapon developed in the 1980s with the ability to evade detection by Soviet radar. The Air Force said in March that it had decided to retire the Advanced Cruise Missile fleet soon, and officials said after the breach that the missiles were being flown to Barksdale for decommissioning.
The Taking Liberties Blog has an excellent skeptical commentary about this tale.
Then there is this post about how the whole thing was to stage an attack on Iran.
found by Mark McCullough
The Taking Liberties article lives up to its name. According to this article the missiles were supposed to have had the warheads removed before transport. The scandal is that they weren’t. Yet the “Liberties” article talks as if the missiles were supposed to be armed and moved then dismantled.
not to mention his source link is now (as of my post) a 404 page.
The tin foil hat concession stand is now open
If 70 personnel are punished, doesn’t say there is no coverup?
Wouldn’t some of those seventy people come forward and say, that isn’t how it was?
It is also difficult for me to see why this whole charade is necessary. On the one hand, conspiracy theorists often theorize extremely capable and powerful secret arms of the govt., and on the other hand we have a situation where a elaborate charade is required to perhaps get a single nuclear weapon when the govt. owns thousands and thousands?
The simplest explanation of personnel being lazy about following procedures doesn’t sound that unlikely, in the absence of some good concrete testimony to the contrary, IMO.
I have just one question, why did you go to a Czech website to get a pic of a B52?
For a blog featuring the Flying Spaghetti Monster you sure are easily drawn to obvious whack-job conspiracy theories.
Very good, John. At the very least, the automatic apologists for lousy government, invading nations not approved by the Southern Baptist Convention and fools officially certified by the RNC – get to work overtime.
The only chuckle is that the neocon talking points don’t appear to be well distributed, yet; so, these copouts have to make their own excuses up on the spot. Just like Friday night at the American Legion Bar.
#2. exactly. if this all-powerful, super-competent government that conspiracy theorists believe in actually exists, why these constant screw-ups? And wouldn’t some of these people whose careers are now ruined speak up?
#6 Don’t forget that the real mission was to nuke an American city and blame the terrorists.
This story is the poster child for the tin foil hat club.
#8. what I like most about the plotters is that their schemes have such Byzantine complexity (using a missile instead of an airliner against the Pentagon on 9/11, forex) and involve hundreds of people (like those simulating passenger airphone calls from the flights that hit the WTC), but no one talks!
If they can pull this sort of stuff off – with only a few X-Files fans discovering their true roles – truly they deserve to be our New World Order Overlords.
But of late, they seem to be getting rusty. I mean, here we all are, alive and unnuked. What happened to that sinister, ruthless competence that we used to rely on?
What happened to that sinister, ruthless competence that we used to rely on?
It really is hard to get good help these days.
#3 – someday, when everyone hanging out here is really bored, someone will explain to you how Google Images works.
“WMR has been informed by a knowledgeable source that one of the six nuclear-armed cruise missiles was, and may still be, unaccounted for.”
If this is the case, your going to need a lot more than a tin foil hat for protection. For those here who think this was just a screw up by Beetle Bailey. That should trouble you just as much as the other scenario.
#2.” Wouldn’t some of those seventy people come forward and say, that isn’t how it was?”
Soldiers need to pay rent and provide for their families too. Whats troubling, is that our “Congressional leaders” dont look into this, dont even mention it. In the meantime they waste valuable time debating inane and irrelavant issues.
Go back to sleep.
#12. “Soldiers need to pay rent and provide for their families too.”
go public with proof that the US military was planning on nuking an American city and you will never want for food or shelter ever again. the book deal alone would leave you set for life.
“Go back to sleep.”
no thanks – the real world is interesting enough to keep one awake, even without the fantasy elements conspiracy theorists throw in.
Bizarre events? Followed by a difficult to believe (and easily countered) story to explain the events?
Naw, this has -never- happened before. You’re not proposing the government would (gasp!) lie to us, are you?
OK, so they expect us to believe that these flyboys skipped over dozens of security checks, and didn’t even notice that they were loading live missles? Oh, and that we are decommissioning state of the art stealth cruise missiles when we’ve got piles of strategic warheads left to destroy? And that they load missiles ready to be broken down into the racks rather than the cargo bay? And that they are decommissioning missiles at Barksdale? Last I checked, that was one of the jumping off points for the sandbox, and I don’t think they would have much time at that base for tearing apart weaponry.
Bear in mind, I have no idea why this happened, but it seems unlikely it was a ‘mistake.’ Generally, if the excuse someone gives you involves being so incompetent it seems unlikely they could even tie their shoes in the morning, then their offense must be much worse than being, in this case, a nuclear armed retard. And whatever that is, it must be pretty bad.
Hey Yall,
I do recall listening somewhere on the radio (AM) of the Iraqi Air Force catching the U.S. military (covert -{ that’s not to say any real AF personal doing that} ly) taking off in two Iraqi aircraft. They were caught by an Iraqi General and ordered back to base. That could possibly have been a pretext to flying to CONUS then returning to Iraq with *#g! God Forbid.
You have to remember that the fiscal budget is up in September 07. This is now a new year. The drumming for a need for cash usually begins by the Pentagon in early August and continues on until early November. I think the event did take place but I think the endless debate about it can only serve to increase the “standard” military+security budget of 700 billion from last year. The basic budget request was about 424billion for the general military.
Fiscal 2007 year breakdown: note: some numbers may need adjustments, but the general budget allocations should be correct.
* $699.0 billion (+4.0%) – Defense (budget for DOD was 424b)
* $586.1 billion (+7.0%) – Social Security
* $394.5 billion (+12.4%) – Medicare
* $367.0 billion (+2.0%) – Unemployment and welfare
* $276.4 billion (+2.9%) – Medicaid and other health related
* $243.7 billion (+13.4%) – Interest on debt
* $89.9 billion (+1.3%) – Education and training
* $76.9 billion (+8.1%) – Transportation
* $72.6 billion (+5.8%) – Veterans’ benefits
* $43.5 billion (+9.2%) – Administration of justice
* $33.1 billion (+5.7%) – Natural resources and environment
* $32.5 billion (+15.4%) – Foreign affairs
* $27.0 billion (+3.7%) – Agriculture
* $26.8 billion (+28.7%) – Community and regional development
* $25.0 billion (+4.0%) – Science and technology
* $23.5 billion (+0.0%) – Energy
* $20.1 billion (+11.4%) – General government
On a final note, this is not a rant against the DOD or the United States military…pretty much all agencies and SIG (NGOs) do this when it comes to getting government funding (spread FUD or threat services).
#15. I was unaware that the Iraqi Air Force had any operational fighters or bombers. And if they were ‘covert’ USAF, why are they following the orders of some Iraqi general? It is pretty well-established that any US military in Iraq (or Blackwater merc) can tell the Iraqis to go pound sand with impunity.
#17 I didn’t make that up KFI 640 AM L.A. This past week. I hope to God there is nothing to it #15
Hey why do you all keep attacking the messenger? I am just reporting on the event. Or blogging about it anyway.
And we cover the tin foil hat science here.
http://www.dvorak.org/blog/?p=3277
19. Deep down inside, you know, it all smells like tuna. At least we get some exposure to the story here, (tongue in cheek is better than nothing) unlike the mainstream, who doesnt deem it important enough to mention.