Editing Strategic Air Command (section)

== Nuclear missiles, aircrew readiness, airborne alert, and strategic reconnaissance ==
[[File:Missile Combat Crew on alert.jpg|thumb|Minuteman ICBM crew on alert in a [[launch complex]] at [[Minot Air Force Base]], North Dakota]]
[[File:US Air Force U-2 (2139646280).jpg|thumb|SAC received its first [[Lockheed U-2]] aircraft in June 1957. ]]After SAC's [[1st Missile Division]] was activated on 18 March 1957, SAC HQ established the Office of Assistant CINCSAC (SAC MIKE) at the [[Air Force Ballistic Missile Division]] in California on 1 January 1958. SAC MIKE was responsible for missile development liaison,{{r|Clark}} the intermediate range [[Jupiter (missile)|Jupiter]] and [[PGM-17A Thor|Thor]] missiles having been transferred to SAC for alert in 1958.<ref name=Condit>{{cite report |last=Condit |first=Kenneth W. |year=1992 |orig-year=1971 classified vol |chapter=Chapter 4: The Weapons Revolution and Service Functions |title=The Joint Chiefs of Staff and National Policy: 1955–1956 |volume=VI of <u>History of the Joint Chiefs of Staff</u> |publisher=Historical Office, Joint Staff |location=Washington, DC }} (Condit's footnote 41 on p. 294 cites:<br />JCS Hist Div, ''Chronology of Significant Events and Decisions Relating to the U.S. Missile and Earth Satellite Development Programs'' (1957), p. 76 and passim. ''Semiannual Report of the Secretary of Defense, 1 Jan-30 Jun 58'', pp. 283–284.)</ref>

Beginning on 1 February 1958, a SAC Liaison Team was also located at the [[NORAD]] Command Post at [[Ent AFB]], Colorado, and the two commands agreed that direct land line communications should connect SAC bases with NORAD's [[Air Defense Direction Center]]s.{{r|NORAD1959A}}  Also in the late 1950s, SAC continued to enhance its intelligence collection activities and develop innovative means of improving the survivability of its forces to surprise attack.  From 1958 to about 1967, a SAC Detachment (TUSLOG Det 50) operated at [[Incirlik AB]], Turkey, monitoring Soviet missile telemetry from the [[Kapustin Yar]] and [[Tyuratam]] launch complexes. In 1959–60,  SAC evaluated deploying [[Minuteman (missile)|Minuteman I]] ICBMs via civilian railroad tracks on [[Minuteman Mobility Test Train|USAF-operated locomotives and trains]].

President Eisenhower approved the first [[Atlas (missile)|Atlas]] ICBM launch by a SAC crew for 9 September 1959 at Vandenberg AFB.<ref>{{citation |type=typewritten record at Eisenhower Archives with 6/19/79 date at top |date=9 September 1959 |title=handwritten memorandum to the President |author=[[Neil McElroy|Secretary of Defense]]}}</ref>

While missile operations continued to ramp up, robust training for flight crews to ensure survivability for strike missions also continued.  In some instances SAC bombers would oppose ADC fighter-interceptors simulating Soviet interceptors.  Conversely, SAC assisted ADC readiness by simulating Soviet bomber threats to the continental United States that ADC fighters would respond to.  However, following a mid-air collision between an ADC [[F-102]] and a SAC [[B-47]] during a 17 December 1959 Quick Kick exercise, simulated NORAD fighter attacks were prohibited against SAC bombers.<ref name=NORAD1959B>{{Cite NORAD Historical Summary |version=1959b |access-date=2013-04-30}} "On 19 December 1959, NORAD and SAC informed their unlts that, for the interim, no [mock] fighter attacks against bomber aircraft would be allowed. The order was issued as a result of a mid-air collision on 17 December between an F-102 and a B-47 engaged in exercise [[Quick Kick]]."</ref>{{rp|63}}

On 18 March 1960, SAC intercontinental missiles began alert at Maine's [[Snark Missile Launch Complex]] adjacent to [[Presque Isle Air Force Base|Presque Isle AFB]]. The following month, on 22 April 1960, SAC turned over the last British-based [[PGM-17 Thor]] IRBM to the [[Royal Air Force]].<!--705th Strategic Missile Wing WIKIARTICLE <ref name=7AD1960/--> This was soon followed by SAC's first [[HGM-25A Titan I|Titan I]] ICBMs at [[Lowry AFB]]'s [[Titan I Missile Complex 1A]] in Colorado being placed on alert that June.

Beginning in November 1959, in order to counter Soviet [[surface-to-air missile]] threats, SAC began adding low-altitude bombing training for its manned bomber force as an adjunct to its legacy high-altitude training.  Use of low level flight route corridors known as "Oil Burner" routes (later renamed "Olive Branch" routes in the 1970s),<ref>{{cite news |newspaper=The Cherokeean |location=Rusk, Texas |date=28 December 1961 |url=http://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth150424/m1/7/zoom/ |title=Jet Bombers To Descend Near Alto For Series of Mock Air Attacks |access-date=2013-09-18 |format=UniSv of Tennessee archives |quote=Strategic Air Command will begin flying missions on 1 Jan. against simulated targets near Greenville, Miss. They will use a low-level entry point near Alto. ... Low level bombing and navigation training has been conducted against fixed sites under the code name "Oil Burner" since November 1959... The RBS train will carry about 65 Air Force personnel. ... The RBS Express...has 10 cars...consisting of existing U.S. Army stock from the Odgen General Depor}}</ref> and the first of three SAC [[RBS Express|RBS trains]] were utilized starting in 1960. On 30 June 1960, SAC had 696 aircraft on alert in the Zone of Interior, also known as the ZI (referred to today as the Continental United States, or [[CONUS]]) and at overseas bases.  These 696 aircraft were 113 B-52s, 346 B-47s, 85 KC-135s, and 152 KC-97s.  SAC's [[Emergency War Order]] (EWO) required the first aircraft to be airborne within 8 minutes and all aircraft to be airborne within 15 minutes after notification.<ref>{{Cite report |publisher=Headquarters, Strategic Air Command |title=History of the Strategic Air Command, 1 January 1960 – 30 June 1960 |page=135}} (quotation and citation from ''Evolution of U.S. Strategic Command and Control and Warning'': Part 2)</ref>

During the mid-1950s, having recalled numerous World War II USAAF and Korean War USAF combat veteran pilots, navigators, bombardiers and aircrewmen from inactive reserve status back to various lengths of active duty, SAC took the lead in integrating the Air Force's reserve components into the overall SAC structure.  By the beginning of the 1960s, SAC had also engineered the assignment of [[KC-97 Stratofreighter]] aerial refueling aircraft to [[Air National Guard]] groups and wings and having them fall under SAC's operational claimancy.

On 11 August 1960, President Eisenhower approved the creation of the Joint Strategic Target Planning Staff (JSTPS), co-located at SAC headquarters at [[Offutt AFB]].<ref>{{cite report |last=Adams |first=Chris |year=2001 |title=Ideologies in Conflict; A Cold War Docu-Story |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=FBOt6m-XCyYC&q=strategic+air+command |publisher=Writers' Showcase |access-date=2013-09-15}}</ref>) JSTPS also included non-SAC agencies tasked with preparing the [[Single Integrated Operation Plan]], or [[Single Integrated Operation Plan|SIOP]], and the National Strategic Target List for nuclear war.<ref name=Rosenberg1983>{{cite journal |last=Rosenberg |first=David A |title=The Origins of Overkill: Nuclear Weapons and American Strategy, 1945–1960 |journal=International Security |number=4 |volume=7| date=Spring 1983 |pages=3–71 |publisher=University of Southern California |place=Los Angeles |jstor=2626731|doi=10.2307/2626731 |s2cid=154529784 }}</ref>{{rp |62}}

On 1 July 1960, a SAC RB-47 with a six-man crew was [[1960 RB-47 shootdown incident|shot down]] in international airspace over the [[Barents Sea]] by a Soviet [[MiG-19]]. Four of the crewmen were killed and two surviving crewmen were captured and held in [[Lubyanka Prison]] in Moscow for seven months.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.nationalmuseum.af.mil/factsheets/factsheet.asp?id=1881 |title=Fact Sheets : RB-47H Shot Down : RB-47H Shot Down |access-date=2007-10-29 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071029173940/http://www.nationalmuseum.af.mil/factsheets/factsheet.asp?id=1881 |archive-date=29 October 2007 }}</ref>

On 3 February 1961, SAC's [[Boeing EC-135]] [[Looking Glass (airplane)|Looking Glass]], began operations<ref name=Deaile>{{Cite thesis |last=Deaile |first=Melvin G. |year=2007 |title=The SAC Mentality: The Origins of Organizational Culture in Strategic Air Command, 1946–1962 |url=https://cdr.lib.unc.edu/indexablecontent?id=uuid:2ad28821-8054-4890-804d-43af2737b85f&ds=DATA_FILE |type=Ph.D. dissertation |publisher=University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill |access-date=2013-09-16 |doi=10.17615/xvz8-0261 |quote=Although LeMay had designated Deputy Commanders in other theaters (SACX-Ray, Zebra, Victor, Yoke, and Oboe) ... [Looking Glass] has authority when the National Command Authority is no longer there to push the button."<sup>63</sup> ... SAC released balloons equipped with cameras in Norway, England, and Turkey, and retrieved them off the coast of Japan and Alaska... By presidential decree on 8 September 1955, Eisenhower announced that the ICBM would become America's chief focus in terms of the military arsenal.<sup>94</sup> }}</ref> as the [[Airborne Command Post]] for the Nuclear Triad and the [[Post-Attack Command and Control System]].  From this date and for the next {{frac|29|1|2}} years, until 24 July 1990, SAC would maintain at least one Looking Glass aircraft continuously aloft 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, with an embarked SAC [[general officer]] and battle staff, ready to assume command of all strategic nuclear strike forces in the event that SAC headquarters was destroyed in a Soviet first strike.{{r|GlobalSecurity}}

SAC's airborne alerts during this period also included [[Operation Chrome Dome]] for the bomber and tanker force.  Although ostensibly a peacetime mission, Chrome Dome placed heavy demands on flight crews and five B-52 aircraft were lost to airborne mishaps during the operation's eight-year period.

[[File:Boeing EC-135 62-3579 Ellsworth.JPEG|thumb|EC-135 Looking Glass aircraft]]
[[File:B-58 Hustler.jpg|thumb|[[Convair B-58 Hustler|B-58A Hustler]] supersonic bomber]]

On 11 May 1961, SAC took delivery of its first [[Convair B-58 Hustler|B-58 Hustler]] supersonic medium bomber, assigning it to the [[305th Bombardment Wing]] at [[Bunker Hill AFB]].  Optimized for high-altitude, high-speed penetration into Soviet territory prior to Soviet advancements in high-altitude surface-to-air missiles, the B-58 was expensive to operate and inefficient at lower altitudes.  Its service in SAC would be comparatively short, eventually being replaced by the [[General Dynamics F-111 Aardvark|FB-111]] by 1970.[[File:FB-111 Formation.jpg|thumb|An overhead view of two SAC <br />FB-111As in formation|alt=An air-to-air front overhead view of two FB-111As in formation]]

After an early 1961 development by SAC of a Radar Bomb Scoring (RBS) field kit for use in the [[U.S. Army]]'s [[Project Nike|Nike]] surface-to-air missile systems,<ref>{{full citation needed|date=September 2013}}{{cite web |title=title tbd |url=http://ed-thelen.org/WesternElectricNikeHerculesBrown.pdf |publisher=Ed-Thelen.org }}</ref> SAC aircraft flew several mock penetrations into [[Air Defense Command]] sectors in the 1961 [[Semi-Automatic Ground Environment|SAGE]]/[[Missile Master]] test program,<ref name=ASD1961>{{Cite report |date=December 1961 |title=A Survey and Summary of Mathematical and Simulation Models as Applied to Weapon System Evaluation |url=http://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/4298/4/bab9742.0001.001.txt |publisher=[[Aeronautical Systems Center|Aeronautical Systems Division]], USAF |access-date=2011-09-13 |quote=''the Phase II and Phase III [[NORAD]] SAGE/ [[Martin AN/FSG-1 Antiaircraft Defense System|Missile Master]] [program] employing SAC and [[Aerospace Defense Command|ADC]] aircraft ''[under]'' the NORAD Joint Test Force stationed at [[Stewart Air National Guard Base|Stewart AFB]].''}} (cites Miller 1961)</ref> as well as the joint SAC-NORAD [[Operation Skyshield|Sky Shield II exercise followed by Sky Shield III]] on 2 September 1962.<ref>{{Full citation needed|date=September 2013}}{{cite web |title=title tbd |url=http://www.atlasmissilesilo.com/Documents/SquadronUnitHistory/AtlasF/579thSMS/AF-D-O-579-99-RO-00009_6thBombWing_UnitHistory_1962_09_September.pdf |format=AtlasMissileSilo.com pdf file |access-date=17 August 2013 |archive-date=21 September 2013 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130921055807/http://www.atlasmissilesilo.com/Documents/SquadronUnitHistory/AtlasF/579thSMS/AF-D-O-579-99-RO-00009_6thBombWing_UnitHistory_1962_09_September.pdf |url-status=dead }} pdf p. 17</ref>

[[File:Boeing B-52D-70-BO (SN 56-0582) is refueled by Boeing KC-135A-BN (SN 55-3127) 061127-F-1234S-009.jpg|thumb|KC-135 refueling a B-52D in 1965, the year the last KC-135 was delivered to SAC.{{r|factsheets}}]]
[[File:B-52D dropping bombs.jpg|thumb|B-52D dropping bombs over Vietnam, circa 1970.]]
In 1961, following the [[Berlin Crisis of 1961|Berlin Crisis]], President [[John F. Kennedy]] increased the number of SAC aircraft on alert to 50 percent{{r|Worden}} and during periods of [[Defense Condition|increased tensions]] SAC kept some B-52 airborne in the event of a surprise attack.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.nukestrat.com/dk/alert.htm|title=the nuclear information project: the airborne alert program|work=nukestrat.com|access-date=15 May 2016}}</ref>

In 1962, SAC gained full control of the various "Q Areas" developed by [[Sandia Laboratories]] for nuclear weapon storage adjacent to Loring AFB ([[Caribou Air Force Station|Site E (Maine)/Caribou AFS]]), Ellsworth AFB ([[Rushmore Air Force Station|Site F (South Dakota)/Rushmore AFS]]), Fairchild AFB (Site G (Washington)/Deep Creek AFS), Travis AFB (Site H (California)/Fairfield AFS), and Westover AFB (Site I (Massachusetts)/Stony Brook AFS).  These adjunct sites were subsequently converted to USAF-operated and maintained weapon storage areas (WSAs) in the same manner as WSAs on other SAC bases.{{r|Weitze}}

The solid fuel [[LGM-30A Minuteman I]] was first deployed in 1962 and the [[LGM-25C Titan II]] reached operational service in 1963.{{r|Lloyd}} Project Added Effort phased out all first-generation ICBMs beginning on 1 May 1964 when Atlas-D were taken off alert at Vandenberg AFB's 576th SMS{{r|Fisher}} ([[LGM-30F Minuteman II]] replaced Minuteman I in 1965).

In October 1962, an SAC BRASS KNOB mission U-2 piloted by Major [[Richard S. Heyser]] detected [[Cuban Missile Crisis|Soviet intermediate range ballistic missiles in Cuba]].  BRASS KNOB operations involving multiple U-2 aircraft were subsequently commenced at a forward operating location at [[McCoy AFB]], Florida the same month.  On the morning of 27 October, a SAC RB-47H of the [[55th Wing|55th Strategic Reconnaissance Wing]], forward deployed to [[Kindley AFB]], Bermuda crashed on takeoff, killing all four crewmembers, while later that afternoon, a [[4028th Strategic Reconnaissance Squadron]] U-2 forward deployed to McCoy AFB for BRASS KNOB operations was [[Cuban Missile Crisis|shot down over Cuba]] by an [[SA-2 Guideline]] missile, killing the pilot, Major [[Rudolf Anderson]].{{r|Deaile}}

Throughout the early 1960s, the Kennedy Administration, under the aegis of Secretary of Defense McNamara, cancelled numerous SAC modernization programs.  This included the Mach 3 [[North American B-70 Valkyrie]] in 1961, the [[GAM-87 Skybolt]] missile in 1962, and the Rocky Mountain [[Deep Underground Support Center]] in 1963.  The B-70's demise came due to its design as a high-altitude bomber with very limited low-altitude performance, making it vulnerable to rapid advances in Soviet high altitude surface-to-air missile defense systems.  The following year, Skybolt, an air-launched ballistic missile, was cancelled following numerous test failures and the perceived greater reliability of land-based and submarine-based ballistic missile systems.  Although initially entering service in 1957, SAC's 2nd-generation aerial refueling aircraft, the [[KC-135 Stratotanker]], had reached sufficient inventory numbers to allow SAC to begin divestiture of its [[Boeing KC-97 Stratofreighter|KC-97 Stratofreighter]] tankers, transferring them to SAC-gained Air Force Reserve and Air National Guard units.  As the KC-135 became the primary aerial tanker in active service, SAC employed the aircraft for several non-stop B-52 and KC-135 flights around the world, demonstrating that SAC no longer needed to depend on Reflex stations at air bases in Spain and Britain.){{r|Tillman}}{{rp |108}}

[[File:Lockheed SR-71 Blackbird.jpg|thumb|right|SAC [[SR-71 Blackbird]]s & U-2s deployed to the [[Vietnam War]] and conducted "Lucky Dragon" surveillance along North Vietnam and China borders (later named "Trojan Horse", "Olympic Torch", "Senior Book", and "Giant Dragon"). ]]