Did someone at Barksdale try to warn that the Bush Administration is staging nukes for Iran?

[Postman]

http://noquarterusa.net/blog/2007/09/05/staging-nukes-for-iran/#more-817

Why the hubbub over a B-52 taking off from a B-52 base in Minot, North Dakota and subsequently landing at a B-52 base in Barksdale, Louisiana? That’s like getting excited if you see a postal worker in uniform walking out of a post office. And how does someone watching a B-52 land identify the cruise missiles as nukes? It just does not make sense.

So I called a old friend and retired B-52 pilot and asked him. What he told me offers one compelling case of circumstantial evidence. My buddy, let’s call him Jack D. Ripper, reminded me that the only times you put weapons on a plane is when they are on alert or if you are tasked to move the weapons to a specific site.

Then he told me something I had not heard before.

Barksdale Air Force Base is being used as a jumping off point for Middle East operations. Gee, why would we want cruise missile nukes at Barksdale Air Force Base. Can’t imagine we would need to use them in Iraq. Why would we want to preposition nuclear weapons at a base conducting Middle East operations?

His final point was to observe that someone on the inside obviously leaked the info that the planes were carrying nukes. A B-52 landing at Barksdale is a non-event. A B-52 landing with nukes. That is something else.

Now maybe there is an innocent explanation for this? I can’t think of one. What is certain is that the pilots of this plane did not just make a last minute decision to strap on some nukes and take them for a joy ride. We need some tough questions and clear answers. What the hell is going on? Did someone at Barksdale try to indirectly warn the American people that the Bush Administration is staging nukes for Iran? I don’t know, but it is a question worth asking.

[populistdriven]

1. perhaps it was to warn the rest of the military....

[dipsydoodle]

2. I just dread to think

exactly who would've been blamed in the unfortunate event of an accident.

[caligirl]

3. this is what i was thinking as well.

[CGowen]

4. They still have Conplan 8022

The Defense Department is upgrading its nuclear strike plans to reflect new presidential guidance and a transition in war planning from the top-heavy Single Integrated Operational Plan of the Cold War to a family of smaller and more flexible strike plans designed to defeat today’s adversaries. The new central strategic war plan is known as OPLAN (Operations Plan) 8044. Former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Richard B. Meyers described some of the planning changes in April 2005 Senate testimony: “ has revised our strategic deterrence and response plan that became effective in the fall of 2004. This revised, detailed plan provides more flexible options to assure allies, and dissuade, deter, and if necessary, defeat adversaries in a wider range of contingencies.”

“One member of the new family is CONPLAN 8022, a concept plan for the quick use of nuclear, conventional, or information warfare capabilities to destroy—preemptively, if necessary—”time-urgent targets” anywhere in the world. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld issued an Alert Order in early 2004 that directed the military to put CONPLAN 8022 into effect. As a result, the Bush administration’s preemption policy is now operational on long-range bombers, strategic submarines on deterrent patrol, and presumably intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs).


http://www.nukestrat.com/us/stratcom/globalstrike.htm

http://www.uspoliticsonline.net/military-debriefing/28032-global-strike-conplan-8022-a.html

[Bitwit1234]

5. There should have been nothing unusual about nukes at Barksdale

In the 1970's I personally saw up close, the nuclear missle silos at Barksdale. And I could not understand why they had picnic tables in the grove where they were. My son was stationed there, we stayed on the base and went for a picnic there, because we had a dog and could on get carry out to eat. After my son told me what they were, and said that not to worry they were activated at the time. I did not care and I never went back to that picnic area again. I was absolutely scared to death to even stay on the base. I was glad when my son shipped out.