Doomsday

I read an article in Wired magazine (issue 17.10) about a still operational Soviet nuclear launch plan that would activate even after an apocalypse.  Apparently, Wired.com doesn’t post the newest issues as they are sent to home-delivery subscribers, so I can’t put up the link.  But I will quote and then bring it in to class on Tuesday so we can all have a look at it.

But if the line to the General Staff went dead, then Perimeter [the machine] would infer that apocalypse had arrived. It would immediately transfer launch authority to whoever was manning the system at that moment deep inside a protected bunker-bypassing layers and payers of normal command authority.  At that point, the ability to destroy the world would fall to whoever was n duty: maybe a high minister sent in during the crisis, maybe a 25-year-old junior officer fresh out of military academy.  And if that person decided to press the button…If/then. If/then. If/then. If/then.

Once initiated, the counterattack would be controlled by so-called command missiles  . . .  At that point, the machines will have taken over the war.  Soaring over the smoldering radioactive ruins of the motherlabd, and with al ground communications destroyed, the command missiles would lead to the destruction of the US.

The version of apocalypse in this feature is not so different from what we saw in “On the Beach.”

On a related note, I found this trailer on the Wired Web site.