Professional Documents
Culture Documents
BY MAJOR DON CLAWSON, USAF, RETIRED
During the early 2000’s my youngest daughter and her family hosted
students from foreign countries including Sonja Remetic from Tuzla, Bosnia and
Herzegovina. She had a friend in the program named Ekaterina Polykova from
Russia. When I was introduced to her I inquired about her home. She replied that
she was from Saint Petersburg (formerly Leningrad). This sent a sharp jolt through
me, since as I explained to Ekaterina, I was an aircraft commander in the Strategic
Air Command’s (SAC) 43rd Bomb Wing at Tucson, Arizona beginning in the mid
1950’s through to 1960.
My crew and I spent many hours on Alert, with a B‐47 loaded with a
thermonuclear weapon that if we were given the proper instruction, we were to
drop it on the center of Leningrad, destroying most of the city. Had this occurred,
there would not have been this beautiful young lady, since her family would have
undoubtedly been killed, and I would have caused it. When deployed to Guam one
of my alert targets was the center of Shanghai, with an 18 MT weapon with 7 million
people in the blast area alone.
The use of the thermonuclear weapon would have caused devastation far
worse than all of the conventional weapons dropped by the Royal Air Force, under
“Bomber” Sir Arthur Travers Harris during his criminal crusade to reduce all
German cities to rubble. Of course the destruction of German cities had nothing to
due with destroying military capabilities. It had to do with responding to the blood‐
thirsty Churchill. The following paragraph vividly illustrates the degree of
degradation of the British moral fibre:
On 14 February 1942, a week prior to Harris’ new appointment as
Commander‐in‐Chief, Bomber Command would take effect, the British
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Cabinet issued a new directive to Bomber Command that ordered the
bombing campaign to “be focused on the morale of the enemy civilian
population and in particular the industrial workers” That was to be Bomber
Command’s “primary object”. Thus, as B. H. Liddell Hart observed,
“terrorization became without reservation the definite policy of the British
Government, although still disguised in answer to Parliamentary questions”
After all, as Churchill remarked, “There are 65 million Germans—all of them
killable.” Quoted from Institute for Historical Review.
The above paragraph is in complete accord with the manner in which the
British have conducted themselves since at least the 1700’s in North America, when
they massacred the Pequot tribe. They developed a tactic to which we have become
accustomed to in the 20th century: deliberate attack on noncombatants to terrorize
the enemy. The English way of war had no limit or scruple or mercy.
Harris once told an English policemen, who had stopped him for driving too
fast and explained that he might kill someone, that he killed thousands every night,
bragging about it.
Iit has been claimed that the U. S. Army Air Forces did not intentionally target
urban areas devoid of military related facilities until late in the war when they did
target urban areas to kill people. Even before the intentional targeting there was
terrific collateral damage (euphemism for killing civilians). But as the war in
Europe ended, the same people who had planned the targeting in Europe were now
sent to the Far East. People like Curtis LeMay, Thomas Power, and Orvil Anderson
were now free to destroy Japan, inch by inch. Fire Bombing with incendiary bombs
containing napalm with delayed fuses in the High Explosive weapons dropped
intermixed with the napalm bombs. These men deliberately killed over 80,000
civilians in one night.
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International Treaties and laws prohibited deliberate attacking of non‐
combatants. The My Lai massacre differed only in the magnitude of the evil done.
Even this evil was eventually ignored.
The primary personalities involved in the use of the XXI Bomb Command
were General Curtis LeMay and General Thomas Power. LeMay has made
statements concerning the stability of Power, that he was “kinda crazy”. These
officers actually fought against dropping the Atom bombs on Japan because they
could see that a large force would not be needed in the future, using nuclear
weapons. Incidentally, I am not one who believes that the use of the nuclear
weapons at the end of the war was justified. It sounds as if it was done to prove the
viability of the system, not to stop the war.
These two officers went on to have an enormous impact on the development
of the Strategic Air Command (SAC). Power became Commander‐in Chief of SAC
when LeMay became Chief of Staff of the Air Force, now the two of them had the
whole system. Training began for the B‐52 Airborne Alert prior to the Congress
being notified. The development of the concept of continuous B‐52’s flying with
nuclear weapons was done surreptitiously before any civilian leadership was
informed.
Now that I have had time to reflect on what went on over the years, I believe
more thought should be given to how the Military, Industrial, Intelligence Complex
affects decisions made by our National leaders. A very powerful case is made by
James W. Douglass in his book “JFK and the Unspeakable” for a widespread
conspiracy in connection with the Kennedy assassination. It is possible to connect a
lot of dots.
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COLD WAR
The enormous build up of U. S. and NATO forces after the Korean War,
dubbed the “Cold War” was primarily due to the Military‐Industrial‐Intelligence
Complex (MIIC) going into high gear. The large defense contractors had made so
much money during WWII and the Korean War, that they had to show that a
grandiose threat existed from the Soviet Union when in fact there was not. Each
large war contractor had established facilities where they could obtain classified
material from the U. S. Government and were then free to analyze the material and
come up with threats that they propose to counter using products from the
contractors as a result of no‐bid contracts. This goes on today. When this gravy
train was put in, or thought to be, put in jeopardy, the three components of the
Complex coalesced and conspiracies set in motion.
Elements of the Defense Department, in particular the United State Air Force
were advocating an immediate attack on the Soviet Union’s nuclear capability. Such
a proposal came from Major General Orvil Anderson, the first commandant of the
Air University Air War College. Anderson was famed for a balloon ascent made to
72,395 feet on November 11, 1935. He also was infamous for his presentation in
1950 to a civic group in Montgomery, Alabama of a proposal to preemptively strike
the Soviet Union’s nuclear capabilities. He was immediately relieved of his
command and retired shortly thereafter. He remained in the Montgomery area
selling insurance and being invited back to the Air University to repeat his mantra,
“If I had the weapons and the means of delivery, I would not wait until tomorrow,
we would go tonight”. I was in the Squadron Officers Class in the Fall of 1955, and
this is what I heard. If what he had said got him fired, why was he invited back for at
least five years to champion the very same activity ?
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CUBAN MISSILE CRISIS
When it was discovered that the Soviet Union had almost completed the
deployment of nuclear‐armed missiles in Cuba, the military went into the pre‐
emptive mode again. The JCS, with General LeMay the most vocal, pushed President
Kennedy to immediately strike the missile complexes in Cuba, knowing that many
Soviet armed forces personnel would be killed. Instead, Kennedy started intense
back channel communications with both Castro and Khrushchev and if he had not
been assassinated would have probably reduced the American presence in Vietnam,
restored relations with Cuba, and ended the cold war.
In addition to the above, Kennedy had been tricked into the Bay of Pigs
debacle and as the enormity of the disaster came home to him he said to one of the
highest officials of his Administration that he wanted to splinter the C.I.A into a
thousand pieces and scatter it to the winds.. He also had a very low opinion of the
entire JCS and at times instructed his aides to keep them away from him.
All of the above were unacceptable to the MIIC and with Richard Bissell of the
CIA and the main force responsible for the ill conceived and poorly executed
invasion of Cuba and the Bay of Pigs hatred of Kennedy boiled over. Bissell was
incensed that President Kennedy refused to support the invasion, which Kennedy
had inherited from the previous Republican administration. Bissell was Deputy
Director of Plans at the CIA and in November, 1961 issued orders to his longtime
associate, William Harvey, to develop an assassination program known as
“ZR/RIFLE”, and to apply it to Cuba. The rest of the assassination programs were
overseen by James Jesus Angleton. By the time President Kennedy travelled to
Dallas that fateful day, Bissell and the other two highest ranking members of the CIA
had been fired by Kennedy..
Given the fear the MIIC had of being marginalized and the armed forces being
reduced, thus cutting into the enormous profits being made by the defense industry,
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it is not hard to consider a conspiracy with regard to the assassination. Oswald and
Ruby had been at least part time employees of the CIA and the case for a conspiracy
is well made by James Douglass in his book ” JFK, and the UNSPEAKABLE.”
UNSUNG HEROES OF THE STRATEGIC AIR COMMAND
The Strategic Air Command went to great lengths to claim complete control
over the forces under their command. This turns hollow when the Positive Control
procedures for making sure the nuclear weapons would not be used without proper
authority are exposed. The requirement for execution of the Single Integrated
Operations Plan when the B‐52’s were airborne with nuclear weapons was for the
three primary crew members to copy a message sent in the clear over SSB HF or
UHF radio, in the proper format (the format was in a checklist), and it had to
authenticate. Once this message was received properly, there was no recall. Any
one of the three crew‐members could have constructed the message, authenticated
it and broadcast it over HF. The War would then start.
The primary crew‐members of the SAC B‐52 Airborne Alert missions were
never given any credit for the manner in which they performed before, during and
after the Cuban Missile Crisis. The procedures for control and execution of the
Single Integrated Operations Plan were conceived under protection of classified
rules established to prevent widespread knowledge of their inadequate safe guards
to prevent an unexpected execution of the force. Generals Power and LeMay were
hawks of the first degree, General Power saying that if we had a nuclear exchange
and one person was left on our side with no one on the other side, we won, is
indicative of their cavalier approach to a nuclear exchange.
General LeMay was incensed that WWIII was not started as a result of the
Cuban Missile affair. The procedures used by SAC throughout the force were all
vetted to a degree that not much was overlooked. The SAC Positive Control
procedures were so poorly vetted, it looks as if it was intentional and the idea was
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for someone to execute the force to fulfill the urgings of M/G Anderson and others.
Anderson’s ideas were not entirely his own. Every SAC base had a large sign at the
main gate reading, “Peace is our Profession”. Actually when the powers that be were
considering what to put on the signs, their first choice was “War is our Profession”,
but it was not politically correct and the lie was told. The crews should have been
recognized for their performance , but never were.
CONCLUSION
. If the Warren Commissions findings were so conclusive that Lee Harvey
Oswald acted alone and without any known motive, why have the notes and
background evidence been cloistered under an umbrella of secrecy and no one is
going to have access to any of it until at least 2017, 55 years after the event? This
alone presents damning indications of cover‐up at the minimum and a conspiracy to
assassinate the President, involving perhaps the MIIC as a very good possibility.
James W. Douglass book, “JFK and the UNSPEAKABLE” is a very scholarly
effort to present information as facts based on an enormous amount of research and
interviews with some of the participants at the time, both inside the government
and in the private sector.
The background of the military personalities, especially the Air Force in
being so outspoken in their support of military action involving the use of nuclear
weapons and their support for the Industrial and Intelligence complexes makes the
thought of ending the Cuban debacle and the Cold war, thus reducing the war
material makers profits, unacceptable.
President Kennedy was well on his way, through back channel
communications with both Castro and Khrushchev to ending the Cuban Embargo
and closing down the Cold War. He was also intent on dismembering the CIA.
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No one in the government has explained the apparent contradictions about
who Lee Harvey Oswald was, what his motivation for the act he was accused of and
why Jack Ruby sacrificed himself to keep Oswald from talking. The U. S.
Government has been silent about the story presented by James W. Douglass in his
book, “JFK and the UNSPEAKABLE.” Many of the characters described in the book
have disappeared or turned up dead under unexplained circumstances.
The Air Force allowed and encouraged M/G Orvil Anderson to propose the
most hideous plan of preemptively attacking the Soviet Unions nuclear capability to
young, future commanders of the Air Force. It is a miracle that just one of those
thousands of lieutenants and captains, who like me were later to command or crew
a Strategic Air Command B‐52 aircraft participating in the Airborne Alert (CHROME
DOME) during the Cuban Missile Crisis carrying a tremendous load of nuclear
weapons did not believe he would be doing the world a favor by disarming the
Soviets. If that crew member was one of the three primary crew members, aircraft
commander, co‐pilot or radar navigator he could have constructed a message in the
proper format and authenticated it, and pushed his microphone button and
broadcast it to the entire Airborne Alert force. In spite of the reasoning cited for use
of aircraft vs. missile as being capable of recalling the aircraft, it was not possible
under the rules of Positive Control of the Airborne force ONCE A VALID MESSAGE
HAD BEEN RECEIVED.
The above thoughts are not as a result of hindsight, the crews were aware of
this capability at the time, but to their credit, which none was ever given, they did
not violate their trust.
The crucial lesson to be learned from the above is that our innovative and
creative minds must be applied to the problem of discovering industries for
products that will attract the capital now being funneled into the defense industry.
The products must be of such that the profits and volume of sales will soak up all the
capital that otherwise is placed with these ingenious groups of people that construct
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weapons of such devastating effect that countries around the world bid for them
and they then cause widespread death and destruction.
BIBLIOGRAPHY:
Mellmoyle, Gerald C., B/G USAF, Rtd., Remembering the Dragon Lady,
Memories of the men who shaped history in support of the U-2
Spy Plane, McDowell Publishers, 2008
Grayling, A. C., Among The Dead Cities, the History and moral legacy of
the WWII Bombing of Civilians in Germany and Japan, Walker &
Company, N. Y., 2006
Lutton, Charles, His Masters Voice: Air Chief Marshal Sir Arthur Travers
Harris, 1892-1984, Institute of Historical Review, undated
Nalty, Bernard C. & Berger, Carl, The Men who bombed the Reich (Men and
Battle)
Cotton, Bruce, The War Lords of Washington, Greenwood Press, Inc. 1948
Douglass, James W., JFK and the UNSPEAKABLE, Why He Died and Why it
Matters, Orbis Books, 2008
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