fdelano Posted July 27, 2011 Share Posted July 27, 2011 (edited) Cold War Fifteen, six-man crews on alert in bunker for two-week stint, playing chess, reading, bored. Klaxon sounds, jolting each to his feet, moving en masse to board their assigned truck. Speeding to the parked aircraft, signaling guard to get well clear as they scoot up the ladder. Helmets on first, then strapping into ejection seat, pilot signaling ground crew to fire engine one. Radar navigator and electronic warfare officer copy message from command post. Go code! Pilot releases brakes after confirming four digit code agrees with his own plastic sealed card that screams GO. Tower voice directs the line of fifteen B-52 bombers, two H-bombs lying cradled in each closed bomb bay. Takeoffs thirty seconds apart down the exhaust filled runway, radio silence eerily maintained for hours to the IP. On intercom only for duties as the plotted route is followed without any talk unnecessary to the task. Electronic warfare officer monitoring threat scopes, watching the blips for SAMs, surface to air missiles dubbed Fan Song. Descending to low level, the pilots draw thermal shields across windshields, reverting to trust in radar and cameras. First and only target inside the Moscow defense ring receives both weapons, ten seconds apart, aircraft climbing for its life. Gunner downs a MIG-21, and crew cheers. White missiles fly by and explode, not close enough for shards to enter the plane. Exiting Russian territory, still nothing on radios, the crew left to wonder What are we going back to? Franklin -- From 1950s until I retired in 1974, what could have been. Edited July 27, 2011 by fdelano Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tonyv Posted July 29, 2011 Share Posted July 29, 2011 Great perspective of "what could have been," Franklin. The effective title draws the reader in, and the poem captures the era and its "state of mind" very well. Tony Quote Here is a link to an index of my works on this site: tonyv's Member Archive topic Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Benjamin Posted July 29, 2011 Share Posted July 29, 2011 (edited) Horrifyingly hypothetical read Franklin. It's hard to imagine the pressures of living constantly with this sort of responsibility for any length of time. Brings back memories of newspaper reports of our own planes flying over us (in England) with open bomb doors on maneouvres. Check out the clip "Major Kong rides the bomb" from the end of the film satire Dr. Strangelove. The world is now a different but still very dangerous place. Currently reading Tom Clancy's "Against all enemies" among other stuff. I like to keep informed. Geoff. Edited July 29, 2011 by Benjamin Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fdelano Posted July 29, 2011 Author Share Posted July 29, 2011 Thanks, Tv and G. Dr. Strangelove was banned from military theaters for a year or more. We who then were flying these airborne alert missions found the movie to be both hilarious, chilling and a lot of the technicalities accurate. As the movie started and credits ran, a KC-135 tanker and a B-52 bomber were trying mid-air refueling. The boomer controller in the tanker could have been training because he kept fumbling the hose around the bomber's open receptacle. The background music was "Try a little tenderness." I spilled my popcorn from laughing. Geoff, you likely remember the song at the end, after the H-bomb exploded. It was a wartime British song, I think, something to the effect that we'll meet again some summer day. Worth watching again to find out. I think Peter Sellers played three or four roles. Genius. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
David W. Parsley Posted July 30, 2011 Share Posted July 30, 2011 Isn't that the movie that taught people how to break into the change box on a coke machine? Speaking of which, it seems like Slim Pickens could have used a bottle to accompany him on his ride. And then there was the not-previously-announced doomsday machine - "You know how he likes surprises." Back to the poem: if there is a movie it summoned for me, it would be "Failsafe." Those were rough days indeed and this piece brings some of that back. The choppy rhythm enhances the sense of urgency, of standard ops transitioning into battlefield response in situ. Might want to clean up a few grammar/diction problems (i.e. substitute "the" or a blank for "their" in L6). Nice job. - Dave Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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