For Nearly Two Decades the Nuclear Launch Code Was 00000000
todayifoundout.com
todayifoundout.com
or...
You lock yourself out of your own nukes during a crisis because you have a big fancy launch-code-management system and it falls apart because key people are confused and/or dead.
In related news, handguns with fingerprint sensors and other electronic locks will protect you in case a criminal breaks in and steals your gun from you - and yet they're not very popular among gun owners.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duck_and_Cover
The short versions is this: in most of the area where a nuclear blast can kill you, there are simple things you can do to reduce its effects and survive. A building will protect from much of the blast wave, and even a blanket can greatly reduce the amount of skin burning. Nukes are not unstoppable bringers of universal instadeath.
Reality is better than fiction.
The only thing preventing me from not blowing out my fucking brains is living is slightly cooler than not existing.
I do need someone to talk to, but I've given up on people. I'm too scared and fragile to even try at this point. Burnt out. Need to move to the country side.
Wrote this awhile back: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6007364
Honestly I think it's because I know so much about the world and have been so many places I have nothing "grand" to look forward to.
My grandmothers LIFE goal was to dip her toes in the ocean. What's mine? I've seen images of Earth from space, I've read thousands of stories of corruption, I see poverty, I've made loads of money, I've read hundreds of enlightening books. We've set the bar so high to please ourselves it's impossible to go any further unless you go into hard drugs, a universe of its own.
That couples with my massive ego and narcissism is a terrible combination, so I'm just praying I have an excuse to die soon because I won't do it myself.
Your number one goal right now should be to get professional help. If you have made loads of money and still have savings, medical care shouldn't be impossible to get, so do it.
From my own experience (I probably have something minor that's been undiagnosed for more than a decade now), it is almost impossible to do anything at all when you are in that state. Or, in my case, to do anything other than the absolute necessities (I am still able to work, barely).
In your case, your symptoms seem to be worse than mine by several orders of magnitude (I don't want to set the world on fire). If that's so, then professionals will be able to recognize them and help you.
And it really does help. You may or may not require medication. If you do, you may have to take them for a time, or may never get rid of them. In any case, they need a while to work (on the order of weeks) so, if prescribed, follow the treatment as is and don't stop.
If you have someone close to you who can help (family? friends?) then get them to help, no matter what. I know that sometimes minor things such as calling doctors and setting up appointments require more energy than what's available, so get someone else to do it for you - and drag you to the doctor's office if need be.
Once you get better and your thoughts clearer, then reevaluate your goals.
Oh, and try to reduce your news consumption. I find that they resonate too much with my brain when I am not feeling well.
Good luck, and take care.
Please take yourself seriously and establish a professional relationship to someone to resolve these things. It doesn't have to be like this.
http://businessofsoftware.org/2013/11/developers-entrepreneu...
Especially if it was known. The idea behind the nuclear deterrent is that a response can and will be launched immediately, after a threat is detected. That is key. If someone out there knows that something prevents US from launching quickly they now have an advantage so to speak. So it is absolutely imperative for others to know that launch response will be total and prompt.
So making the system safe and secure from unauthorized launches has to be balanced by not making it harder to launch if needed (and of course letting the adversary know about this). Thinking of this, they could have actually had secure codes set BUT broadcast to the world that somehow a mistake was made and all codes are 0000000.
/obligatory
It's how I imagine the commanders get the code.
1) Being the party/person who started another world war; 2) Being nuked without ability to retaliate (in case the executive branch is wiped out)
Most incredibly stupid decisions were made rationally, under extreme perception of the reality.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dead_Hand_(nuclear_war)
Its purpose was to actually two fold -- ensure the ability to launch a retaliatory attack after a "surgical" nuclear strike and (and this follows from the first) ensure that hot headed generals or future leadership wouldn't be too quick to press the trigger on the very first warning (which might be a false alarm, and these have happened in the past).
That is a pretty nice system come to think about it.
So on first ever threat the #1 thing to do is enable this system. Then decide what to do, knowing, it would be possible to retaliate.
Note, what is interesting, they didn't broadcast to the world that they had it. Which is interesting. From a game-theoretic point of view, shouldn't they have broadcasted its existence as that would have discouraged a first strike?
Though, you are right about the danger of the perception of reality. (that why it's good, some time, to go back to the first principles)
If they thought they could deliver a knock-out blow to the majority of your arsenal, they'd do it. The real question, I feel, is more to do with what the window for that blow would be:
Can they achieve sufficient synchronism across their various platforms that the bombs will all arrive at more or less the same time - preventing the destruction of some components of the system from warning others?
Can they avoid your long range systems picking up their launches several minutes out?
Is the window, from detection to response, in other words, small enough that they can hit you fast enough that you don't have time to respond?
In that arena I don't think a few seconds one way or the other, to input a more complex launch code, would make much difference. It seems to me like if they can get close enough not to be picked up at long range, if they can launch with synchronous on target timing, then they should overshoot your response time by a long way. And if they can't, then they shouldn't come anywhere near it.
2) A first strike may be intended to decapitate the leadership, decimate the enemy nuclear capabilities, destroy the entire army, or obliterate the whole country; the same goes for a second or third strike. It should also be noted that the Soviets implemented the "dead-hand" system so that any surviving installations would automatically retaliate even in the event of a successful first strike.
3) There are a variety of first strike scenarios, mostly involving SSBNs near the enemy coast, and stealth bombers since late in the cold war, as they give the shortest response window. Synchronizing a first strike would likely only be between one type of platform (i.e. all stealth bombers or SSBNs launching simultaneously); which is not too challenging.
4) First strike requires less than 15 minutes of notice, though even this may be too much. Soviets feared that the stealth bombers or a missile shield would encourage an American first strike exactly because the first would provide no response window, and the second would make any response futile.
5) Above.
6) Maybe.
This all misses the basic point, which is that MAD made nuclear strikes even more pointless than they had previously been. Simply put, what is the point of destroying the enemy, and irradiating their territory (especially their most valuable assets) with a strike? Why would you put yourself at risk to achieve a goal of no benefit to you, except relieving paranoia, under MAD?
2. A locking system in place does not make much of a difference if there is no war, and much of the deterrent factor would probably still be there. If there is a nuclear attack, well, even if you are able to respond things will look quite grim, so it doesn't really make such a great difference (and it has to be seen how easy it is for your opponent to block retaliation).
http://www.bbc.co.uk/pressoffice/pressreleases/stories/2007/...
For most of the Cold War, the RAF's nuclear bombs were armed by turning a bicycle lock key.
"The Royal Navy argued that its officers could be trusted and: 'It would be invidious to suggest... that senior Service officers may, in difficult circumstances, act in defiance of their clear orders.'"
I suspect not. I think someone would have noticed the mess.
"Dr. Blair . . . decided to outline it for the public in this 1977 article where he described how just four people acting in tandem could easily activate a nuclear launch in the silos he had worked in. Further, amongst other things, the PAL system McNamara had touted was barely in operation and thus launches could be authorised by anyone without Presidential authority . . . It is, perhaps, not coincidence that the PAL systems were all activated and the codes changed the same year this article was published."
Is this for real? Its like putting a lock on your car steering wheel, while all wheels and radio has been stolen overnight.
This was utterly irresponsible, and from the sounds of it in direct violation of presidential orders. Isn't disobeying orders in the military quite a big thing?
Curtis Lemay, head of the Strategic Air Command, made his own plans for a pre-emptive strike on the Soviet Union. Lemay also clashed with Kennedy during the Cuban missile crisis.
And Truman had to recall Macarthur when the latter refused to obey presidential directives.
The whole point behind MAD is to show that you refuse to play the game of "I have the bigger army" and to literally level the playing field by making the game lose-lose.
Then (as sister comment says) neither side was playing the game right in the cold war.
I object to the way the game is set up in international relations - If we actually had a system to enforce international law it would be much much harder to justify having unilateral armies at all! My views on this are somewhat unconventional, though, so don't worry if I sound crazy; I may well be.
Nope, according to the article it was listed in the instructions handed out to the soldiers who manned the silos. If there had been post-it notes back then, they probably would have stuck one right on the console with the code.
Interesting story, crazy popup ads (mobile device).
They changed them to 12345678 didn't they?