The World of American Drama: From the Los Angeles Patrol

Chapter 1516 The Fall of Olympus (Thirteen)

Generally speaking, a modern strategic missile base consists of two parts: the administrative area and the operational area. The administrative area is generally responsible for management and personnel living quarters, while the operational area mainly includes the launch control center and missile silos.

A typical missile base has 15 launch control centers located 12-30 meters underground. Each launch control center consists of two ellipsoidal underground facilities and one surface control building, with at least two officers on duty in each facility.

Their responsibility is to control the 10 missile silos of their squad, and they can also take over control of the launch of at least 50 intercontinental ballistic missiles of the entire squadron at any time should one of the control centers be destroyed or lose contact.

To prevent human error, such as a brain-dead officer deciding to take the whole world with him, the launch command must be issued simultaneously from two control centers, and the activation command within a single control center must be issued by two officers simultaneously turning the activation key.

However, even with such safety measures, during the Cold War, there were still accidental missile launches between the United States and Russia. The Russians launched an R39 missile carrying a one-megaton hydrogen bomb warhead toward the Kamchatka Peninsula, which is within their own territory.

Fortunately, the nuclear program was not unlocked, and the hydrogen bomb warhead only created a large crater upon landing and did not successfully detonate.

The situation in the US was even more outrageous: a Hercules intercontinental ballistic missile on standby exploded in its silo with a warhead having a yield of ten million tons.

Fortunately, the hydrogen bomb safety mechanism also kicked in that time. After the shockwave from the explosion lifted the 540-ton manhole cover, the deadly warhead flew more than 100 meters into the air before finally crashing into an open area more than 30 meters away from the launch silo.

It was precisely these fatal accidents that led to the creation of the Cerberus system.

This system is designed to ensure that, under any circumstances, even if an intercontinental ballistic missile carrying a nuclear warhead has already left the atmosphere, it can use an emergency command to lock the warhead safety after it re-enters the atmosphere and breaks through the blackout.

To achieve this, it is essential to ensure that the permissions of this emergency command system are above all other permissions.

There are two such high-privilege control terminals in total: one is in the "PEOC" in the White House underground bunker, and the other is located in the North American Aerospace Defense Command inside Cheyenne Mountain.

With Kate's explanation, Jack roughly understood the whole story. The mastermind had been working on this system all along. Once the "Samaritans" cracked the last set of codes, they could bypass the "nuclear football" through the "Cerberus" and obtain the intercontinental ball launch command.

Then, through pre-bribed moles, they are "always vigilant" to launch at least 10 Minuteman III intercontinental ballistic missiles with nuclear warheads at predetermined targets around the world in one go, and in the worst case, 50.

Kate hasn't found out who the mysterious person is yet, but he must have a very high status in the federal government or military, because most of the active-duty AC130 gunships are deployed overseas, and there are usually only a few for maintenance and backup within the Federation.

The AC-130 gunships that previously attacked Washington, D.C., came from Tyndall Air Force Base in Florida, which has a centralized intermediate maintenance facility.

The original flight plan was to fly to Vandenberg Air Force Base in California, where it would refuel and resupply before being deployed to Kadena Air Base in Okinawa, Japan.

According to the Air Force’s initial investigation, the bodies of the 12 crew members of the AC130 were found earlier in a swamp outside Panama City, Florida, and the cause of death was poisoning.

The credentials of the pilot, co-pilot, a strategist, and a gunner were found to have been used fraudulently to enter Tyndall Air Force Base. This may also explain why the 105mm howitzer on the gunship had not been fired earlier, as this "airborne cannon" requires at least three gunners for manual loading and firing, while there were only four people on board at the time.

If the organization "Always Vigilant" was able to turn against and devour "Desima" with the help of a mysterious figure, and then secretly establish a training camp in South Africa and build a simulated enemy building modeled after the White House for repeated drills, Jack was not too surprised.

It is not difficult to understand that a group of qualified "death warriors" could be selected and trained with the help of the "Samaritans".

But the fact that they were able to steal an AC-130 gunship from an air force base was truly astonishing; by comparison, bribing two duty officers in the missile force seemed less surprising.

After all, as the importance of land-based intercontinental ballistic missiles has declined, the federal missile forces have become increasingly neglected. Not only are aging rockets like the Minuteman III still serving beyond their service life, but the quality of personnel is also rapidly declining.

Scandals such as alcoholism, sexual assault, domestic violence, cheating on training exams, falsifying maintenance records, and even mass drug use are so frequent in missile units that they are no longer news.

Even the Pentagon was exposed for diverting $1 billion from the Minuteman III intercontinental ballistic missile upgrade and maintenance project to modify Air Force One, which the former president had extorted from Middle Eastern tycoons.

Although this was only Finch and Kate's speculation, Jack felt it was necessary to be cautious. While having Kate give the NSA a bunch of numbers related to the duty officers of the 90th Strategic Missile Wing, he also shared the relevant intelligence with Rossi.

It's never too late to mend the fence after the sheep are lost. The launch procedure of intercontinental ballistic missiles has multiple safeguards. Once the enemy's intentions are discovered, as long as the guarantor does not make a mistake, even if the "Samaritans" obtain control over the "nuclear football," it will be of no use.

Moreover, Kate has already gained a firm upper hand in the battle between the two artificial intelligences.

Just as Jack had learned before, the war between the two AIs ultimately comes down to computing power.

Tonight, almost all of Shangri-La's software, whether web pages, social media, or short video apps, are in a semi-paralyzed state.

From California and Texas to Montana, and even data centers in Europe and Southeast Asia, all are operating at high capacity.

Power grids across the United States experienced anomalies in turn, with unexplained power surges paralyzing countless power facilities and even causing fires at some substations.

When "Samaritan" realized he was no match for Kate, he chose to target the electric grid directly.

However, this did not have much effect. Instead, Kate found out the data centers where multiple of its backups were located and "strangled" them one by one.

Kate concluded, "The servers inside 'PEOC' are the last hideout of 'The Samaritan,' Jack. I need you to shut it down for me."

(End of this chapter)