SecDef makes surprise calls to missile alert officers

by Josh Aycock
341st Missile Wing Public Affairs

2/1/2014 - MALMSTROM AIR FORCE BASE, Mont. -- Flying back to Washington D.C. from the Munich Security Conference aboard an E-4B aircraft, Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel made a series of surprise phone calls to six officers currently pulling alert in three of the 341st Missile Wing's launch control centers.

In a series of candid conversations that lasted approximately one hour, Secretary Hagel relayed his confidence in their ability to carry out the nuclear mission to members of the 10th, 12th and 490th Missile Squadrons. He also took time to listen to their concerns and relayed that he deeply appreciates their critical service to the nation.

"Secretary Hagel asked how I felt about everything that's going on and I told him the workload has increased and it's hard to see friends involved," said 1st Lt. Jordan Seibert, 12 MS missile combat crew commander. "It was really humbling, and it showed that our mission is on his mind."

The officers relayed to Secretary Hagel that they hoped the nuclear review he ordered will result in improvements for the ICBM career field.

"I was able to express to him personally that I feel optimistic about potential changes in how we're tested," said Capt. Adam Ross, 490 MS missile combat crew commander. "More importantly, I'm optimistic about how we can find new ways to interpret the results of our testing."

Secretary Hagel thanked the missileers for dealing with a higher operational tempo and more time on alert given the ongoing investigation. He encouraged them to continue carrying out their mission in support of strategic deterrence.

"The SECDEF showed concern for the crew force's personal life impacts, with the understanding that we are being called upon to complete a higher ops tempo to complete our mission," said 1st Lt. Tracie Davis, 10 MS missile combat crew commander said. "It really showed interest in us for him to take his personal time to connect with the force. He absolutely achieved his goal to connect and show concern for this mission and its people."

For one member, it was definitely an alert to remember.

"The call was surprising and really cool," said 2nd Lt. James Hunter III, 10 MS deputy missile combat crew commander who was in the midst of completing his first alert. "It's something I will never forget. Eye opening."a

US concerned about China's new hypersonic strike vehicle.

BY: Bill Gertz
January 28, 2014 2:22 pm

China’s recent test of a new ultra-high speed strike vehicle highlights growing concerns that Chinese military advances will overtake those of the United States in as few as five years, a senior Pentagon official told Congress Tuesday.

Frank Kendall, undersecretary of defense for acquisition, technology, and logistics, said during a House Armed Services Committee hearing that he is concerned by large-scale cuts in U.S. defense spending that are undermining efforts to maintain U.S. military superiority.

“On hypersonics, this is a good example of an area of technology that is going to move forward whether we invest in it or not,” Kendall told a hearing on the United States shift toward Asia. “China is doing work in this area.”

The Pentagon is investing some resources in two forms of hypersonic arms: a ballistic missile boost glide vehicle and a jet powered, atmospheric cruise missile, he said.

Kendall said the threat of such hypersonic vehicles to the United States is that they are difficult for missile defenses to counter. The vehicles travel and maneuver while flying at speeds of up to Mach 10 or 7,680 miles an hour.

“The high speed of these systems makes it much more difficult for air defenses to engage,” he said.

Kendall, in testimony on the Obama administration’s so-called “pivot” to Asia, said the Chinese development of hypersonic strike weapons is an area of technology that is likely to outpace U.S. efforts in the future.

“When I spoke earlier about feeling reasonably comfortable where we are today [with arms technology] but not necessarily so comfortable five or 10 years from not, this is one of the technologies that would be on that list of things that in five or 10 years we might have a much bigger problem with then,” Kendall said.

The comments followed questioning from Rep. Trent Franks (R., Ariz.), who said he shares the concerns about the Chinese hypersonic glide vehicle development and testing.

“My purpose here is to try to elevate that concern because I think it is a significant one, especially since given time, it will manifest,” Franks said.

The Washington Free Beacon first disclosed China’s Jan. 9 flight test of a hypersonic glide vehicle that the Pentagon has called the WU-14.

The experimental weapon is a new strategic strike capability China’s military is developing that is designed to defeat U.S. missile defenses. China could use the vehicle for both nuclear and conventional precision strikes on targets, including aircraft carriers at sea.

U.S. officials said that, while the glide vehicle test was not an intelligence surprise, it showed China is moving much more rapidly than in the past in efforts to research, develop, and test advanced weaponry.

Adm. Samuel Locklear, commander of the U.S. Pacific Command, noted that the hypersonic test demonstrated China’s ability to move quicker than the United States in developing some advanced arms.

“The Chinese, as other nations are, are pursuing hypersonic technologies,” Locklear said last week at the Pentagon. “This is just one of many, you know, highly technical militarized systems that whether the Chinese are developing them, or we’re developing them, or Europeans are developing, that will continue to complicate the security environment with high-technology systems.”

“We will have to figure them into the calculation of how we’re going to maintain a peaceful security environment in the future,” he added.

Committee Chairman Rep. Buck McKeon (R., Calif.), along with subcommittee chairmen Reps. Randy Forbes (R., Va.) and Mike Rogers (R., Mich.), described the hypersonic test in a statement as the Chinese military “leaping ahead of us” in arms development.

“The Asia Pacific is fast becoming a powder keg,” the lawmakers said. “Allowing nations that do not share our respect for free and open avenues of commerce to gain a strategic advantage over the United States and her allies only brings us closer to lighting the fuse.”

Vice Adm. Frank Pandolfe, director of strategic plans and policy for the Joint Staff, said during the hearing that he would only discuss the Chinese hypersonic test in a closed-door hearing.

READ MORE AT THE WASHINGTON FREE BEACON 

Remembering Challenger

click to enlarge 

There's a framed patch on the wall in my monitoring post that I treasure. It was given to me a few years ago by a friend who worked at NASA - just one of the network of space and aviation contacts I had made over the years.

I rarely glance at it and sometimes forget it's there - until the sad anniversaries come along and reminds me exactly where I was and what I was doing at the moment of the Apollo One fire, Challenger explosion and (of course) the loss of Columbia along with Amarillo's astronaut Rick Husband and Lubbock's Willie McCool.

Today is one of those days - and as always I think about where I was when Challenger exploded killing all onboard.

Back in 1986 I was working at the Amarillo Globe News as a photographer, and even way back then I was deep into radio monitoring.

We had personal darkrooms back then and in mine (no surprise here) I had a scanner for listening to the local police and such.

One day I made a discovery (quite by accident and as it would turn out fortuitously) that hidden in the false ceiling of my darkroom was a coiled up run of antenna coax that led to the abandoned radio transmitter tower on top of the AGN.

Back in the day - the antenna (which I think is still there) was used as a AM radio transmission cable for KGNC AM - which (if you didn't know) used to be owned by the Amarillo Globe News - in fact the call letters GNC (in KGNC) stood for the Globe News Company.

Having discovered the cable (and being the radiohead I am) I decided to tap into it and see if it still worked.

One night I smuggled in my huge Panasonic RF-4900 shortwave receiver (a multi-band monster) into my darkroom when the newsroom was rather empty.

RF 4900 

I hooked it up to the coax and was surprised to see it not only worked but worked amazingly well. That established, I kept the radio in my locking closet normally used as a photographic paper safe that only I had the key too.

For some reason, I didn't want the editors to know that in my downtime I was back in my darkroom with headphones on scanning the shortwave bands, listening to ship-to-shore telephone calls, international aeronautical transmissions and military HF stations.

January, 28, 1986 was a slow news day - and I knew a space shuttle launch was scheduled so I turned on the red safelight - locked my darkroom door, hooked up the shortwave and donned a pair of Koss headphones.

I tuned to 10.780 MHz USB also known as "CAPE RADIO" a shortwave link used to communicate with SRB (rocket booster) recovery ships off the coast of Florida.

The atmospherics were just right and the communications came in loud and booming as if they were local. NASA rebroadcast the UHF shuttle communications and countdown on that channel so recovery teams could listen in.

And then there was this long silence - and garbled communications and the words "We've obviously had a major malfunction" which (at the time) I hadn't realized what that truly meant. I knew something went wrong but there was nobody saying "Challenger had blown up."

Then after what seemed an eternity of silence, the recovery ships began talking to each other - panicked warnings went out that debris was falling from the skies and the ships and helicopters in the recovery area needed to evacuate the area as soon as possible.

And then that's when it hit me what had happened. A sinking feeling went through my entire body.

I flew out my darkroom and into the newsroom and shouted, "the Space Shuttle has just blown up."

Everyone looked at me strange as if I had finally inhaled too many darkroom fumes or I was joking. One reporter even laughed.

I then went over to the TV in the newsroom and turned it on. I flipped through the channels and there were no bulletins - no special reports just game shows and commercials.

And then it happened: "We interrupt this program for a Special Bulletin."

I also remember at that same moment the urgent bulletin bell began ringing wildly on the AP teletype machine.

A video replay of Challenger coming apart filled the screen.

And then the newsroom went crazy.

Later on, I had to to explain how I knew before anyone else and I had to reveal the secret of what I was really doing in my darkroom.

After that the radio became a permanent (open) fixture and a part of my job - Steve Douglass - photographer/radio monitor.

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Terrorist Hunt: Suicide bombers threatening Olympics

SOCHI, Russia — Russian security officials are hunting down three potential female suicide bombers, one of whom is believed to be in Sochi, where the Winter Olympics will begin next month.

Police leaflets seen by an Associated Press reporter at a central Sochi hotel on Tuesday contain warnings about three potential suicide bombers. A police letter said that one of them, Ruzanna Ibragimova, a 22-year-old widow of an Islamic militant, was at large in Sochi.


A U.S. congressman who was in Sochi on Tuesday to assess the situation said he was impressed by the work of Russian security forces but troubled that potential suicide bombers had gotten into the city, despite all of the extraordinary security measures.

“We know some of them got through the perimeter,” Rep. Michael McCaul, chairman of the U.S. House Homeland Security Committee, told The Associated Press. “She’s for real. What we don’t know is how many more black widows are out there.”

Russian authorities have blamed the so-called “black widows” of slain insurgents for previous suicide attacks in the country.

The Black Sea resort town will host the games amid concerns about security and potential terrorist attacks.