Cold war special forces jumped with backpack nukes
 

OK - loosely mil aviation related, but I kid you not.
They got pushed out the back with a bucket of instant sunshine strapped to them.
Here's the story - from Stars and Stripes - about the B-54 mine.

I'm appalled, but not surprised. When I found out many years ago, that the FSC codes contain nuclear depth charges (FSC1120) and nuclear demolition charges (FSC1125), I rapidly understood just how much the Americans had miniaturised nukes.

I don't know if just hiding behind a wall a few hundred metres away, when blowing a bridge, would be a good idea, if you were handed nuke demo charges. :eek: :)

One small nuke is a hell of a lot easier than trying to lay charges
on buildings in a plant, plus of course the fact that you don't
actually need to enter said target.

But as has been pointed out, I wouldn't put much hope on getting
out alive on a mission like that.

The other thing that was obvious in the article was actually getting
to the target with the thing on your back. Heavy packs with odd
shaped things do not make for either quiet tactical movement or fire
and movement if contacted.

Training in the use of 'Atomic Demolition Munitions' continued at the NATO Special Weapons system School - now the NATO School Oberammergau until c 1975. The majority of students were US Army Engineers, but a number of British military students attended these otherwise US-only courses. My understanding - having corresponded with students who attended these courses, ADMs were designed to be pre-placed during TTW, as a denial weapon - eg airfields, rail yards and bridges. . I just hope they've all been accounted for...

I don't know which was the craziest part of it; that somebody came up with the idea, or that somebody else said, hey good one, let's do it.

Right up there with nuclear-tipped SAM - airspace denial weapons (eg NIKE Hercules, issued, inter alia, to the Luftwaffe AA units!

From having spoken to people who know these things, there are a very large number of non-atomic demolition charges still out there from WW2, including quite a few in Southern England.

Hang on, I'll check my loft - might still have one up there...

No, it's only a box of Compo rations, Menu D. Best before WW3

Almost as deadly...

A Nuke in a Back-Pack.....were there any 'training' accidents, or 'Unauthorised Discharges' (or whatever they were called then)....Did they affect the Night Enhancement Devices....

:eek: He mentioned Menu D !!! I'll be in therapy for weeks now! :eek:

At least they put them in metal tins. Our lot would have used a big cardboard tube.

Seems awfully risky. As in there in risk that the charge wouldn't get to the target, let alone the risk to those doing it. Why not simply use a missile or air-dropped bomb? Or even artillery. Such things exist(ed). Or pre-place them.

Short of putting one in a beer barrel to get it into the Kremlin, I can't see a use for these that other weapons systems couldn't do a more reliable and less risky job of.

well if they were pre-positioned - even by an hour - you'd definitely take out the target whereas Artillery or airstrike is always somewhat iffy - especially in fast moving operation

you'd just have to hope that SPETZNAS weren't there to start with

Remember there are still a number of mines buried in Flanders and The Somme which did not explode when required.

I'm not sure if this was ever a good idea :hmm:

Davy Crockett

2,100 of them were produced :eek:

Remember this?

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedi...cropped%29.jpg

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedi...nternal%29.jpg

I heard they were placed underground at bottlenecks where the Warsaw Pact armoured columns were expected to break through, like the Fulda Pass.

Apparently they were sensitive to the cold. So scientists had to think of how to heat up the mines for such a long period of time. Electrical batteries wouldn't last, so he best source of heat they came up with is a thousand chickens with enough food and water!

Which also had a much less well publicised surface-to-surface mode.

YS

Or indeed nuclear AAMs

AIM-26 Falcon - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

AIR-2 Genie - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The latter at least was test fitted to a Lightning

I broadly understand the rationale behind an unguided nuclear-armed AAM to defeat hordes of Soviet bombers (eg AIR - 2 Genie), but wtf have a nuclear tipped PGM AAM such as the AIM - 26 Falcon?

Yellow-Sun (name says it all) - tell me more about the Nike-Hercules SSM role. I've never seen any reference to this mode.

I read an account about a US Army SF training exercise that required the SF Team to Infil a Hydro-Electric Dam in North Carolina that was being guarded by Infantry forces. They left behind the Back Pack Nuke per the Plan and safely Ex-filed. Shortly afterwards there was a short but REALLY HUGE Panic.....as the thing was the real deal and was now unattended but stashed in an out of the way spot inside the now unguarded Dam.

The Lads what dropped the thing off went back and collected the thing....allowing everyone "In the Know" to breathe a really HUGE sigh of relief and continue to serve until they could collect their Pensions.

I cannot attest to the veracity of the account....but I would not be the least bit surprised it could have happened some how.

Good thing they did not have the codes to arm the thing....or else it might have been discovered in a more public manner.

North Carolina had some experience with the Military attacking it with Nukes over the Years.


Whoops: Atomic Bomb dropped in Goldsboro, NC swamp, Neuse River Basin, HUC 02 | Restoration Systems