THREAD: Tomorrow afternoon—unlike in 1953, 1957, and 1961—nuclear weapons will not be featured in the post-inaugural parade down Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington, DC. And that's as it should be. But let's go to the wayback machine for a look at those past displays of firepower.
In 1953, a demonstration model of the massive M65 280-millimeter atomic cannon rolled down Pennsylvania Avenue and in front of the White House for President Dwight D. Eisenhower's inaugural parade. It was tested four months later at the Nevada Proving Ground.
Eisenhower's 1957 inaugural parade featured the Air Force's Matador and Snark cruise missiles as well as the Army's Corporal short-range ballistic missile.
President John F. Kennedy's 1961 inaugural parade included four nuclear missiles, all operated by the Army: the Pershing I intermediate-range ballistic missile, the Lacrosse short-range missile, the Nike Hercules air defense missile, and the Nike Zeus antiballistic missile.
Kennedy's parade also featured a float celebrating the Navy's new Polaris submarine-launched ballistic missile (whose first at-sea patrol was in November 1960) ...
as well as a float from Tennessee, home of the Oak Ridge National Laboratory, promoting Atoms for Peace. Ann Ellington, daughter of Governor Buford Ellington, waves to the crowd.

• • •

Missing some Tweet in this thread? You can try to force a refresh
 

Keep Current with Stephen Schwartz

Stephen Schwartz Profile picture

Stay in touch and get notified when new unrolls are available from this author!

Read all threads

This Thread may be Removed Anytime!

PDF

Twitter may remove this content at anytime! Save it as PDF for later use!

Try unrolling a thread yourself!

how to unroll video
  1. Follow @ThreadReaderApp to mention us!

  2. From a Twitter thread mention us with a keyword "unroll"
@threadreaderapp unroll

Practice here first or read more on our help page!

More from @AtomicAnalyst

19 Jan
Between them, Wyoming and Texas have 34 Minuteman III ICBMs and about 100 warheads (plus 20,000 plutonium cores from retired warheads stored at the Pantex Plant in Amarillo). What would happen to these if secession actually happened? rawstory.com/republicans-se…
ICBMs can't be relocated and moving 20,000 plutonium cores anywhere else would be a logistical and security nightmare, if not altogether impractical. Plus, Pantex is the only US facility for assembling, disassembling, and maintaining nuclear bombs and warheads.
In fact, In fact, except for 44 ICBMs in Colorado and 72 in Nebraska, all US land-based and air-based nuclear weapons are in solid "red" states: Louisiana, Missouri, Montana, and North Dakota have 600 warheads/bombs, 300 Minuteman III ICBMs, 200 ALCMs, 46 B-52Hs, and 20 B-2As.
Read 6 tweets
18 Jan
Okay boys and girls, it's time to play "Who Will Be the 2020 Inauguration's Designated Survivor?" If protocol from 2017 is followed, as I expect it will, there will actually be two. The first will be 87-year-old Sen. Charles Grassley (R-Iowa), president pro tempore of the Senate.
But wait, you say. The Democrats control the Senate now, so why isn't Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vermont), the longest-serving Democratic member, president pro tem? Because the Democrats don't actually control the Senate yet. That will happen after Georgia officially certifies ...
the results of the January 5 runoff election, won by Jon Ossoff and Raphael Warnock, and they are formally sworn in, making the count 50-50, with Vice President Harris breaking the tie in the Democrats' favor. Certification isn't likely to happen until later on Wednesday, ...
Read 7 tweets
11 Jan
OTD in 1975, a USAF board of inquiry ruled 38-year-old Maj. Harold Hering, a decorated pilot with 20 years of service, be discharged because two years earlier—during ICBM combat crew training at Vandenberg AFB—he asked how he would know a launch order came from a sane president.
After Hering sought that assurance from from superiors in 1973, the Air Force disqualified him from missileer duty, citing the rules of its personnel reliability program. In March 1974, it moved to discharge him for, inter alia, "having a defective attitude toward his duties."
Hering was ultimately forced out of the Air Force in November 1975. He subsequently became a long-distance truck driver before spending 19 years with the Salvation Army counseling and helping the indigent and unhoused. You can read more about him here: washingtonpost.com/history/2021/0…
Read 5 tweets
8 Jan
THREAD: Now would be a good time to revisit what senior military leaders have said on the record about how they would respond if Donald Trump were to order them to launch one or more nuclear weapons—which, to be clear, he can do at any time on his own authority.
At a hearing of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on November 14, 2017, retired US Strategic Command commander Gen. Robert Kehler testified that if ordered to use nuclear weapons outside of the legally-vetted, pre-planned options available to the president, he would say ...
“I have a question about this … and I’m not ready to proceed.” Watch (starting at 49:05): c-span.org/video/?437317-…
Read 8 tweets
6 Jan
January 6, 2021

A date which will live in infamy. ImageImageImageImage
Unreal: ImageImageImageImage
"We're storming the Capitol. It's a revolution!"
Read 4 tweets
22 Nov 20
Today, the United States officially withdrew from the 1992 Open Skies Treaty, having given notice of its intentions on May 22, citing fictitious Russian "violations." In less than four years, Donald Trump and his unilateralist wrecking crew of an administration have abandoned ...
the 2016 Paris Agreement on climate change, the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (the Iran nuclear deal), the 1987 Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty, and the OST. And New START—the last treaty constraining US and Russian nuclear arsenals—expires on February 5, 2021.
In a final slap at the innovative, multilateral, functioning, confidence-building Open Skies Treaty, the Trump administration is taking steps to make it physically impossible for future administrations to participate in the agreement:
Read 4 tweets

Did Thread Reader help you today?

Support us! We are indie developers!


This site is made by just two indie developers on a laptop doing marketing, support and development! Read more about the story.

Become a Premium Member ($3/month or $30/year) and get exclusive features!

Become Premium

Too expensive? Make a small donation by buying us coffee ($5) or help with server cost ($10)

Donate via Paypal Become our Patreon

Thank you for your support!

Follow Us on Twitter!