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CLEAR AIR FORCE STATION, BALLISTIC MISSILE EARLY WARNING SYSTEM SITE II One mile west of mile marker 293.5 on Parks Highway, 5 miles southwest of Anderson Anderson vicinity Yukon-Koyukuk District Alaska
PHOTOGRAPHS
WRITTEN HISTORICAL AND DESCRIPTIVE DATA
REDUCED COPIES OF MEASURED DRAWINGS
HISTORIC AMERICAN ENGINEERING RECORD National Park Service
U.S. Department cf the Interior 1849 C St. NW
Washington, DC 20240
HAER No. AK-30-A
HISTORIC AMERICAN ENGINEERING RECORD
CLEAR AIR FORCE STATION, BALLISTIC MISSILE EARLY WARNING SYSTEM SITE II
HABS No. AK-30-A
Location: Clear Air Force Station, Alaska
Quad/UTM: Faribanks/6.393744.7131097 (North American Datum 1983)
Construction Date: 1958-61
Present Owner: United States Air Force
Present Use: Inactive
Significance: The Ballistic Missile Early Warning System
Historian:
(BMEWS) was constructed in 1958-61 in response to the threat of a potential Intercontinental Ballistic Missile (ICBM) attack from the Soviet Union (demonstrated by the October 1957 launch of Sputnik) . BMEWS Site II at Clear AFS in Alaska was one of three radar sites (the others were located in Greenland and Britain) that covered the polar regions. Although BMEWS was an expansion of existing radar technology rather than a significant innovation, it represented a major engineering achievement. BMEWS was an important part of the deterrence strategy (Mutual Assured Destruction) developed by both sides in the Cold War. It provided a minimum of fifteen minutes advance warning for a nuclear counterstrike, but not a missile defense. BMEWS remained in operation throughout the remainder of the Cold War, although the technology became increasingly antiquated and difficult to maintain in later years.
John F. Hoffecker
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
List of Acronyms
Executive Summary
Chapter I. Cold War Origins and the Development of the Soviet ICBM Threat
Origins and Early History of the Cold War (1945-53) Development of the Soviet ICBM Threat (1954-57)
History of Rocketry (1903-45) Ballistic Missile Development in the Soviet Union (1945-57)
Chapter II. Ballistic Missile Early Warning System at Clear AFS, Alaska
3
4
5
6 12 12
15
22
Origins and Development of BMEWS 23 Radar and Early Warning Systems (1922-59) 24 Origins of BMEWS (1954-57) 30 Construction of BMEWS (1958-63) 38
BMEWS Site II at Clear AFS, Alaska 45 Construction of Clear AFS and BMEWS Site II (1958-61) 46 Description of Facilities; Clear AFS and BMEWS Site II 48 Clear AFS and BMEWS 54
Chapter III. Ballistic Missile Early Warning System at Clear Air Force Station, Alaska and the Cold War 60
BMEWS Site II History of Operations (1961-89) 61 BMEWS and the Cold War: An Assessment 72
Bibliography 76
13MWS AAC AB ABM AC&W ADC AFB AFS AL CAN ARDC BMEWS BOSS CSMR DEW DSP ECM FD GE GOR IBM IOC ICBM IRBM km kW MAD MIDAS MIP MIT MW MWOC MWS NATO NORAD NSC PAR PAVE PAWS
RCA RF RNII SAC SAGE SDI SEWS SLBM SPO TOR TsAGI WACS
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List of Acronyms
13th Missile Warning Squadron Alaskan Air Command Air Base Anti-Ballistic Missile Aircraft Control and Warning Air Defense Command Air Force Base Air Force Station Alaska-Canada Air Research and Development Command Ballistic Missile Early Warning System BMEWS Operational Simulation System Central System Monitoring Room Distant Early Warning Defense Support Program Electronic Countermeasures Frequency Diversity General Electric General Operational Requirement International Business Machines Initial Operating Capacity Intercontinental Ballistic Missile Intermediate Range Ballistic Missile kilometers kilowatts Mutual Assured Destruction Missile Defense Alarm System Missile Impact Prediction Massachusetts Institute of Technology Megawatts Missile Warning Operations Center Missile Warning Squadron North American Treaty Organization North American Air Defense Command National Security Council Perimeter Acquisition Radar Perimeter Acquisition Vehicle Entry Phase
Array Warning System Radio Corporation of America Radio Frequency Jet Scientific Research Institute Strategic Air Command Semi-Automatic Ground Environment Strategic Defense Initiative Satellite Early Warning System Submarine-Launched Ballistic Missile Special Project Office Tactical Operations Room Central Aerodynamics Institute White Alice Communications System
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EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
The Ballistic Missile Early Warning System (BMEWS) was
constructed in 1958-61 in response to the threat of a potential
Intercontinental Ballistic Missile (ICBM) attack from the Soviet
Union (demonstrated by the October 1957 launch of Sputnik) .
BMEWS Site II at Clear Air Force Station in Alaska was one of
three radar sites (the others were located in Greenland and
Britain) that covered the polar regions. Although BMEWS was an
expansion of existing radar technology rather than a significant
innovation, it represented a major engineering achievement.
BMEWS was an important part of. the deterrence strategy (Mutual
Assured Destruction) developed by both sides in the Cold War. It
provided a minimum of fifteen minutes advance warning for a
nuclear counterstrike, but not a missile defense. BMEWS remained
in operation throughout the remainder of the Cold War, although
the technology became increasingly antiquated and difficult to
maintain in later years.
CLEAR AIR FORCE STATION BALLISTIC MISSILE EARLY WARNING SYSTEM SITE II
HAER No. AK-30-A (page 5)
Chapter :r
COLD WAR ORIGINS AND THE DEVELOPMENT
OF THE SOVIET :ICBM THREAT
The creation of the Ballistic Missile Early Warning System
(BMEWS), which was constructed by the U.S. Air Force during 1958-
61 to provide advance warning of an Intercontinental Ballistic
Missile (ICBM) attack from the Soviet Union, was a consequence of
geopolitical and technological developments of the preceding two
decades. Although these developments have deep historical roots,
they may be traced with particular clarity to the final year of
World War II. Between the summers of 1944 and 1945, it became
increasingly apparent that the United States and the Soviet Union
held conflicting objectives for postwar Europe-a disagreement
that ultimately gave rise to the Cold War.
During the same period, two technologies that acquired
fundamental strategic importance in the Cold War reached critical
milestones. In September 1944, the first ballistic missiles were
launched by Germany against enemy targets, and in July-August
1945, the United States tested and dropped the first nuclear
weapons. By the early 1950s, both the United States and the
Soviet Union were developing ICBMs that could deliver
thermonuclear warheads. In 1957, the Soviet Union demonstrated
its apparent lead in this technology by launching the first
satellites into Earth orbit. In the wake of this event, which
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generated a political uproar in the United States, the Air Force
was authorized to construct BMEWS.
Origins and Early History of the Cold War (1945-53)
The Cold War was a direct outgrowth of World War II, which
began as an effort by Britain and France to prevent German
domination of Eastern Europe. When diplomatic pressure failed to
halt the invasion of Poland in September 1939, Britain and France
declared war on Germany. Ironically, the war ended in 1945 with
Soviet domination of Eastern Europe, which provided the original
basis for the conflict between the United States and the Soviet
Union that lasted for more than four decades. The Cold War
ended-appropriately-with the withdrawal of the Soviet Union from
Eastern Europe in 1989. 1
President Roosevelt supported the efforts of Britain and
France to contain German expansion in the 1930s, but had to
contend with strong isolationist sentiment in the United States
After his re-election in 1940, Roosevelt provided military aid to
Britain through the Lend-Lease program. In June 1941, Germany
invaded the Soviet Union, which then became an ally of Britain.
Following the Pearl Harbor attack in December, Germany joined
Japan in its declaration of war on the United States. Roosevelt
then began to provide military aid to the Soviet Union as an
ally. 2
The Soviet Union played a critical role in the defeat of
Germany, and the United States continued to send military aid
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until the end of the war. The situation on the Eastern Front
shifted decisively in favor of the Russians after the battle of
Kursk in July 1943. Following the collapse of the German central
army group in June 1944, the Soviet Union was ready to advance
into Poland, and in August they began to move into the Balkans. 3
Concerns about a Soviet presence in Eastern Europe were
outweighed by the potential effects of Soviet losses or reversals
on American and British forces on the Western Front. By the time
that the Allied leaders met at Yalta in February 1945, Soviet
forces were less than 100 miles from Berlin and had overrun most
of Eastern Europe. At the Yalta conference, Stalin agreed to
hold democratic elections in Poland, and not to impose Communist
rule over the East European nations occupied by Soviet armies. 4
However, within a few months it became apparent to the
United States and Britain that Stalin would not honor the Yalta
agreements. Pro-Soviet regimes were installed in many nations
occupied by Soviet troops, and no democratic elections were held
in Poland. In a March 1946 speech that many identify as the
starting point of the Cold War (a term apparently introduced by
the author George Orwell in late 1945) , 5 Churchill declared that
an "iron curtain" had descended across Eastern Europe. Stalin
characterized the speech as a "call to war" against the Soviet
Union. Some historians argue that the Soviet government, which
sought to neutralize Germany and create a protective wall of East
European buffer states, was motivated in part by legitimate
security concerns. 6 Others believe that Stalin made the same
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miscalculation with the United States in 1945-bellicose bluffing
that he had made with Hitler in 1940. 7
American policy was influenced by the "Long Telegram"
(authored by American diplomat George Kennan in early 1946),
which offered an informed analysis of the historical basis of
Soviet hostility to the Western nations. Kennan's message was
read by President Truman, and it became required reading in the
U.S. Department of State. 8 During 1947, the Soviet Union
continued to consolidate and even expand its control of Eastern
Europe. In August, elections were rigged and anti-Communist
elements purged in Hungary, while the Soviets supported a
guerrilla insurgency in Greece. The United States responded with
the Truman Doctrine and the Marshall Plan-economic aid to Western
Europe and military aid to Greece designed to help resist Soviet
influence and expansion. 9
In 1946-47, Soviet superiority in European ground forces was
more than counter-balanced by American possession of nuclear
weapons and long-range bombers. Despite the long-standing
emphasis of the Communist regime on science and technology, the
Soviet Union lagged behind the United States in most technical
fields. Impressed by the development of atomic bombs and
ballistic missiles by foreign powers, Stalin ordered intensified
research and development in these and other areas of advanced
military technology in 1945. Progress was accelerated by Soviet
espionage and the capture of foreign scientists and materials
during and after World War II. American B-29s forced to land on
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Soviet territory in late 1944 were seized and used as a prototype
for a long-range bomber, while German scientists were brought to
Russia in 1946 to help ballistic missile research. Atomic
secrets obtained by Soviet agents in America sped development of
nuclear weapons. By October 1947, the Soviet Union had tested a
long-range bomber (Tu-4) with a maximum range of 3,000 miles
(5,000 km) and a short-range ballistic missile (R-lA) based on
the German v- 2 . 10
The Cold War took shape during 1948-50, as the disagreement
between the United States and the Soviet Union over Europe
rapidly grew into a nuclear confrontation on a global scale. In
February 1948, the Soviets staged a coup against the elected
government of Czechoslovakia. The Czech foreign minister was
assassinated and a pro-Soviet regime was established. In the
wake of this shocking development, the U.S. Army commander in
Berlin warned of a possible Soviet military attack. In June,
after the Western powers announced formation of a West German
government, the Russians blockaded Berlin. The United States
countered with an airlift and deployed B-29s (widely associated
with the atomic bombing of Japan) in Britain. 11
In April 1949, the United States entered its first peacetime
military alliance with the signing of the North Atlantic Treaty
Organization (NATO) . 12 At the end of August, the United States
was stunned by the detonation of a Soviet atomic bomb, which had
not been expected until 1952. During the same year, the Tu-4
bomber went into service. 13 In October, China fell to Communist
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revolutionaries, and the world's most populous nation became an
ally of the Soviet Union. Several months later, the Truman
administration proposed a major expansion of U.S. military
forces, which was articulated in a National Security Council
memorandum (NSC 68). In June 1950, North Korean Communist forces
invaded South Korea, and Truman ordered American troops to the
Asian mainland. 14
Following the attack on South Korea, air defenses in the
continental United States and Alaska were placed on around-the
clock alert in case of a general war with the Soviet Union. 15
Truman received broad support for implementing NSC 68 and began
an unprecedented peacetime American military build-up. Following
General MacArthur's advance into North Korea during the autumn of
1950, Chinese Communist forces intervened and drove the U.S. Army
southward. The war finished in a stalemate, and an armistice was
signed in July 1953. 16
During the Korean War, the Soviet Union continued to develop
long-range bomber aircraft, and worked on the design of a
hydrogen bomb (initially started in 1946) . 11 An intercontinental
bomber (Tu-95) with a range of 7,500 miles (12,500 km) was test-
flown in November 1952. In January 1953, a faster jet-propelled
bomber (M-4) with a range of about 5,000 miles (8,000 km) was
successfully tested. In August of that year, the Soviet Union
exploded its first thermonuclear device (once again ahead of
American expectations), and the new bombers later went into
service armed with hydrogen bombs. 18
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Despite the advances in Soviet bombers and nuclear weapons,
the United States maintained strategic military superiority in
this phase of the Cold War. Continental air defenses were
significantly expanded and improved during and after the Korean
conflict with the development of new radars, fast interceptor
aircraft, and both surface-to-air and air-to-air missiles.
Despite American fears of a "bomber gap" in 1954-56, the Soviet
bomber fleet still comprised a relatively limited number of slow-
moving aircraft confined to bases in the Soviet Union. While
U.S. bombers-deployed at forward bases around the Soviet Union-
could deliver a swift and devastating nuclear strike, it appeared
unlikely that many Soviet planes would reach their targets. 19
In addition to the Korean Armistice and the Soviet hydrogen
bomb, other important events occurred during 1953, which marked
the end of the early Cold War. President Truman left office in
January, and Stalin died in March. New American and Soviet
leaders would pursue new policies. Because of their continuing
failure to match the strategic nuclear power of the United
States, the Soviet Union began to shift attention away from long-
range bombers and towards the development of ballistic missiles.
By 1953, it was recognized that thermonuclear warheads could be
miniaturized and deployed on ballistic missiles, and both the
United States and Soviet Union embarked on ICBM programs during
the following year. 20
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Development of the Soviet ICBM Threat {1954-57)
The decision of the Soviet Union to develop an ICBM had
important consequences for the Cold War. Because neither the
United States nor the Soviet Union ever designed an effective
defense against full-scale ballistic missile attack, the
deployment of ICBMs (along with submarine-launched ballistic
missiles [SLBMs]) in the late 1950s and 1960s altered the
strategic military balance between the superpowers. The Soviet
Union finally achieved strategic parity with the United States,
and the Cold War evolved into a more stable relationship based on
mutual deterrence (or "mutual assured destruction" [MAD]).
Moreover, the ICBM provided a rocket with sufficient thrust to
place objects into Earth orbit, and thus gave birth to the Space
Age, which also had enormous impact on the Cold War.
The ICBM has a lengthy history of development reflecting the
many complex technical challenges that it posed for scientists
and engineers. These challenges-which included problems of
materials, fuels, engine design, and guidance systems-required
years of research and testing, and substantial government
resources, to overcome. 21 In fact, the technical problems of ICBM
design were so formidable that some American military leaders and
scientists-notably Vannevar Bush-regarded its development as
"impossible" after World War II. 22
History of Rocketry (1903-45). The pioneers of rocketry
were inspired by dreams of space travel and the writings of Jules
Verne, H.G. Wells, and other science fiction authors. In Russia,
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early theoretical work w published in 1903 by Konstantin
Tsiolkovskii (1857-1935), who addressed concepts of combustion,
lift, and orbital mechanics. Although Tsiolkovskii was not an
engineer and never tackled the more practical problems of rocket
design, he created a tradition of research in the Soviet Union
that later produced concrete results. The American engineer
Robert Goddard (1882-1945) designed and launched the world's
first liquid-fuel rocket in 1926. However, Goddard was highly
secretive about his research, and his achievements were not
widely known for many years. In Germany, initial research was
encouraged by Hermann Oberth (1894-1989), who published a book on
space travel in 1923 and helped test a small liquid-fuel rocket
in 1930 with young Wernher von Braun (1912-77). 23
The early rocket enthusiasts apparently failed to appreciate
the scale of the resources required for substantive research and
development and the need for government sponsorship. 24 During the
1930s, rocketry found state sponsorship in both the Soviet Union
and Germany, but not in the United States. In the Soviet Union,
F.A. Tsander (student of Tsiolkovskii) worked at the Central
Aerodynamics Institute (TsAGI), where he tested the first Soviet
liquid-fuel rocket in March 1933. During the same year, the
Soviet army consolidated rocket development at the newly
established the Jet Scientific Research Institute (RNII), and
Sergei Korolev (1907-66)-who eventually built the first ICBM-was
appointed deputy director. However, further Soviet progress in
rocketry was limited by the effects of Stalin's purges in 1937-
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38. Korolev and other leading rocket scientists were arrested
and either executed or imprisoned. 25
Germany became the first nation to develop a ballistic
missile, although the effort was costly and the short-range V-2
missile-armed with conventional warhead-had little strategic
value during World War II. The German army began to support
rocket development in 1930 and awarded a small contract to von
Braun in late 1932. Although the first design (A-1) was a
failure, von Braun successfully launched a liquid-fuel 300-kg
thrust rocket (A-2) in December 1934. With expanded funding
support from the German military, a large research and
development complex was established at Peenemunde in 1936-37 and
work began on the first ballistic missile (A-4). As Michael
Neufeld has observed, to build the A-4, breakthroughs were
required in three crucial technologies: (1) large liquid-fuel
engines, (2) supersonic aerodynamics, and (3) guidance systems. 26
In October 1942, the Germans successfully test-launched the
A-4 (later renamed V-2), which was powered by a 56,000-lb (25-
metric ton) thrust engine, and achieved an altitude of roughly 50
miles (80 km) and downrange distance of 120 miles (190 km). With
direct support from Hitler, production of the V-2 became a
priority. Between September 1944 and March 1945, over 3,000 of
these short-range ballistic missiles were launched at London and
other Allied targets with a 2, 200-lb explosive warhead. 27
Although once viewed by Hitler as a "weapon that can decide the
war, " 28 the V-2 campaign had no significant effect on its outcome.
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During 1941, von Braun's team also developed preliminary plans
for a multi-stage ICBM (A-9/A-10) for use against the United
States, but this project would have required a new set of major
technological breakthroughs and was never pursued. 29
Ballistic Missile Development in the Soviet Union (1945-57).
Despite the lack of its strategic value, both the Soviet Union
and the United States sought to acquire V-2 missile technology
from the Germans at the end of World War II. Most leading German
rocket specialists, including von Braun, continued ballistic
missile research in America. However, a number of German
scientists were forcibly brought to Russia in 1946 to help begin
a Soviet program of missile development. This program was put
under the direction of Korolev, who had been released from prison
during the war. Like Hitler, Stalin provided personal support
for ballistic missile development. During 1947, the Soviets
test-launched reassembled V-2 rockets (designated R-lA), and
Korolev began work on a new missile (R-2) with a thrust of 35
metric tons and range of 360 miles (600 km). The R-2 was
successfully test-launched in October 1950. 30
In 1950, Korolev also began work on two larger missiles,
which included the R-5 with a projected range of 720 miles
(1,200 km) and the R-3 with a range of 1,800 miles (3,000 km).
The R-5 had an engine thrust of 40 metric tons and could be
modified to carry an atomic warhead. This missile was test-
launched in April 1954, and the nuclear variant (R-5M) was tested
in 1955-56. The R-3 would represent the first Soviet strategic
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missile intended to reach targets in Britain and U.S. forward
bases in Europe, one that presented new challenges, especially
with respect to engine design. 31
After the death of Stalin in March 1953, the Soviet military
began a reassessment of strategic weapons programs. Korolev
recormnended abandoning the R-3 project (with a range of 1, 800
miles [3,000 km]) and proceeding directly with the development of
an ICBM with a range of 4,200-4,800 miles (7,000-8,000 km) on the
grounds that both projects would require roughly the same amount
of time to complete. In May 1954, Korolev was authorized to
begin work on the ICBM (R-7) . 32
The decision of the Soviet government to cormnit resources to
the design and construction of an ICBM, despite the high cost and
technical challenges of the project, seems to have been
influenced by several factors. The failure to deploy a strategic
bomber force with sufficient striking power in the face of
increasingly effective American continental air defense must have
been a central consideration. At the same time, the successful
development of a thermonuclear warhead that could be delivered by
a rocket provided Soviet ballistic missiles with the potential
strategic value that the V-2 had lacked. The past successes of
Korolev and the supporting analyses of other leading Soviet
scientists, encouraged confidence in the ICBM project. 33
The most formidable technical problem was the engine, which
had a 400-metric ton thrust requirement (i.e., ten times greater
than the R-5). This problem was solved by attaching four engines
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("packets") around a central core engine. Another major
challenge was guidance and control, because existing systems did
not provide sufficient accuracy for the distances involved in
ICBM flight. The Soviet government had to construct a costly new
ICBM infrastructure that included launch pads, fueling
facilities, missile assembly facilities, and tracking stations.
The R-7 engines were tested in February 1956, but the first test
launches during March-June 1957 were failures, and the program
was threatened with cancellation. 34
The world's first ICBM was finally launched successfully by
the Soviet Union in August 1957, and traveled 3,800 miles (6,400
km) downrange to a target area in the Pacific Ocean. A second
test launch was performed in September, and on 4 October 1957, an
R-7 was used to boost the first artificial satellite (Sputnik I)
into orbit around the Earth. In November, the Soviet Union
launched a second larger satellite (Sputnik II) weighing over
1, 000 lbs. and containing a dog. 35
The launch of the two Soviet satellites in October-November
1957 had an enormous impact on the United States and the rest of
the world. In addition to their value in international prestige,
the space launches effectively demonstrated the ICBM capabilities
of the Soviet Union, which altered the strategic military balance
of the Cold War. Not only did the United States lack a ballistic
missile defense, but existing radar systems were not adequate to
provide advance warning of a Soviet ICBM attack. Furthermore,
the United States did not test an ICBM (which could at least
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deter such an attack with sufficient warning time) until December
1957, and its first satellite launch during the same month was a
failure.
A period of intense recrimination followed, and the
Eisenhower administration, as well as American institutions of
education and science, were subject to wide criticism. 36 The
failure to anticipate a Soviet ICBM was probably due in part to
the delayed effort to develop an ICBM in the United States,
which, in turn, reflected its advantage in strategic air power at
the beginning of the Cold War, as well as the high costs and
technical difficulties of building a long-range ballistic
missile. Sputnik acted as a catalyst for increased federal
funding in defense and other areas, which included the first
missile early warning system. The U.S. Congress authorized
initial funding for BMEWS in January 1958. 37
In fact, the Soviet ICBM threat did not become real for some
years following the Sputnik launch. The R-7 had major
shortcomings as a weapons system, which included the 20 hours
required for launch preparation. As late as 1962, the Soviet
Union possessed only four ICBM launch complexes. In an effort to
improve his strategic position, Khrushchev installed intermediate
range ballistic missiles (IRBMs) in Cuba during October of that
year, but was forced to withdraw them in the ensuing Cuban
Missile Crisis. The Soviet Union began to deploy new ICBMs in
1962, including the R-9 and the R-16. During 1966-69, deployment
increased by approximately 300 annually, and by November of 1969,
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the Soviet Union had 1,140 ICBMs and 185 submarine-launched
ballistic missiles (SLBMs)-but only 145 long-range bombers. 38
Chapter 1 Notes
1Kissinger, Henry A., Diplomacy. (New York, Simon and Schuster 1994) .
2Ambrose, Stephen E., Rise to Globalism: American Foreign Policy Since 1938. Seventh Edition. (New York, Penguin Books 1993).
3Moynihan, Brian, Claws of the Bear: The History of the Red Army from the Revolution to the Present. (Boston, Houghton Mifflin 1989) t pp. 150-193.
'Thomas, Hugh, Armed Truce: The Beginnings of the Cold War 1945 -1946. (New York, Atheneurn 1987), p. 550.
5 Ibid, p. 550.
6Ambrose, pp. 53-57.
7Kissinger, pp. 428-429.
8Kennan, George F., Memoirs 1925 - 1950. (Boston, Little, Brown and Company 1967), pp. 292-297.
9Jones, Joseph M., The Fifteen Weeks (February 21 - June 5, 1947). (New York, Viking Press 1955).
10Zaloga, Steven J., Target America: The Soviet Union and the Strategic Arms Race, 1945 - 1964. (Novato, CA, Presidio 1993). The technological backwardness of the Soviet Union may have had deep historical roots. As Arnold Toynbee observed, Russian cultural heritage was primarily derived from Byzantium and not Western Christendom (Toynbee, Arnold J., "Russia's Byzantine Heritage," in A. J. Toynbee Civilization on Trial (London, Oxford University Press 1953), pp. 164-183). The historian of Medieval technology Lynn White found a cultural and theological basis for the rejection of novel technology in Byzantium (e.g., ban on clocks and pipe organs in Orthodox churches) and the very different attitudes of the West (White, Lynn, "Cultural Climates and Technological Advance in the Middle Ages." Viator, Vol. 2, pp. 171-201, 1971).
11Ambrose, pp. 90-99.
uKissinger, pp. 456-457.
13 Zaloga, pp. 63-79.
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14McCullough, David, Truman. (New York, Simon and Schuster 1992), pp. 775-794.
15Schaffel, Kenneth, The Emerging Shield: The Air Force and the Evolution of Continental Air Defense 1945 - 1960. (Washington, Office of Air Force History 1991), pp. 129-139.
16Hastings, Max, The Korean War. (New York, Simon and Schuster 1987) .
17Holloway, David, Stalin and the Bomb: The Soviet Union and Atomic Energy 1939 - 1956. (New Haven, Yale University Press 1994), pp. 294-319; Rhodes, Richard, Dark Sun: The Making of the Hydrogen Bomb. (New York, Simon and Schuster 1995).
uZaloga, pp. 79-88.
19Schaffel, pp. 169-239.
20Spires, David N., Beyond Horizons: A Half Century of Air Force Space Leadership. (Washington, Air Force Space Command 1998), pp. 31-35.
21Neufeld, Michael J., The Rocket and the Reich: Peenemunde and the Coming of the Ballistic Missile Era. (Cambridge, Harvard University Press 1995).
22spires, pp. 11-21.
23McDougall, Walter A., ... The Heavens and the Earth: A Political History of the Space Age. (New York, Basic Books 1985); Neufeld, pp. 5-16.
24Ibid, p. 77; Neufeld, p. 10.
25 Zaloga, pp. 108-113.
26Neufeld, pp. 16-109.
27Ibid, pp. 135-265.
28Speer, Albert, Inside the Third Reich (New York, Avon Books 1971), pp. 469-472.
29Neufeld, pp. 138-139.
30 Zaloga, pp. 125-128; Holloway, pp. 245-248.
31 Ibid, pp. 128-139; Holloway, pp. 249-250.
CLEAR AIR FORCE STATION BALLISTIC MISSILE EARLY WARNING SYSTEM SITE II'
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32Holloway, David, The Soviet Union and the Arms Race. Second edition. (New Haven, Yale University Press 1983), pp. 31-43; Zaloga, pp. 134-141.
33Zaloga, pp. 135-140.
34Ibid, pp. 139-145.
35Ibid, pp. 143-149; McDougall, pp. 60-150.
36McDougall, pp. 141-176.
37Ray, Thomas W., History of BMEWS 1957 - 1964. ADC Historical Study No. 32, pp. 4-7.
38Holloway, David, The Soviet Union and the Arms Race. Second edition. (New Haven, Yale University Press 1983), pp. 43-60.
CLEAR AIR FORCE STATION BALLISTIC MISSILE EARLY WARNING SYSTEM SITE II
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Chapter II
BALLISTIC MISSILE EARLY WARNING SYSTEM
AT CLEAR AIR FORCE STATION, ALASKA
The Ballistic Missile Early Warning System (BMEWS) at Clear
AFS in Alaska was part of a larger radar system established by
the U.S. Air Force in 1958-63 to provide advance warning of a
Soviet ICBM attack across the polar region. Although the U.S.
government authorized construction of BMEWS in the wake of the
October 1957 Sputnik launch, the system had been conceived
several years earlier. Most existing radar in 1957 lacked the
range necessary for adequate advance warning of an incoming
ICBM.
In addition to the radars at Clear AFS (BMEWS Site II), sites
were established in Thule, Greenland (Site I) and Fylingdales
Moor, Britain (Site III).
BMEWS was the first ballistic missile early warning radar
system (although prototypes had been constructed and tested in
Massachusetts and Trinidad during 1955-58). The deployment of
BMEWS reflected a fundamental shift in Cold War military
strategy, because in contrast to continental air defense against
nuclear bombers, it was part of a system designed to deter but
not defend against an attack from the Soviet Union. By
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providing a minimum of fifteen minutes advance warning, BMEWS
ensured sufficient time for the United States to launch a
counterstrike. "Mutual Assured Destruction" (MAD) became the
basis for a relatively stable strategic military balance between
the United States and the Soviet Union until the end of the Cold
War.
Although BMEWS was a major engineering achievement, it
represented an expansion of existing radar and computer
technology. The radars were exceptionally powerful in order to
project beams thousands of miles across the polar region, and
they included both detection and tracking radars (although the
latter was not installed at Clear until 1965-66) . Each BMEWS
site was linked to the North American Air Defense Corrnnand
(NORAD) and Strategic Air Corrnnand (SAC) in the continental
United States by redundant and secure lines of corrnnunication.
Origins and Development of BMEWS
BMEWS was based on radar technology that had been developed
irrnnediately prior to and during World War II, although it
represented an unprecedented "scaling up" of that technology to
provide advance detection and tracking of an ICBM. 1 The data
processing technology was a more recent development; the first
completely solid state computer (CG-24) had been designed for
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the BMEWS prototype tracking radar in 1956. 2 Despite the shock
of the Sputnik launch in 1957, the United States had prepared
for the possibility of a Soviet ICBM threat from 1954 onward,
and had designed radars for ballistic missile tracking and
developed the basic configuration of an early warning system in
1955-56.
Radar and Early Warning Systems (1922-59). Radar is based
on the reflection of electromagnetic waves by an object, and the
reflected waves are used to deter~ine the position and motion of
the object. Electromagnetic theory was first developed by James
Maxwell (1831-79), and published in an 1873 treatise. In 1888-
89, Heinrich Hertz (1857-94) experimentally generated and
detected radio waves within the electromagnetic spectrum,
demonstrating that they possessed the same properties as visible
light. The practical applications of "Hertzian waves" were
initially pursued by Guglielmo Marconi (1874-1937), who built
the first wireless set and transmitted radio signals across the
Atlantic in 1901. 3 However, the development of effective radar
required generation of relatively short radio waves (less than
50 meters in length) in order to reflect waves of sufficient
energy back to a receiver for detection. High frequency radios
were devised during World War I. Several years later, in 1922,
a passing ship on the Potomac River disrupted a high frequency
\ \
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radio beam, and revealed the potential application of shorter
wavelengths for early warning. 4
During the early 1930s, research and development of
primitive radar technology took place in many nations, including
Germany, Italy, Holland, Japan, and the Soviet Union. 5 In the
United States, the Army tested a radar device in 1936 that
provided detection of an aircraft at a distance of seven miles. 6
However, Britain constructed the first large-scale early warning
system (Chain Home network) during 1935-39 in response to the
threat of German air attacks {which had occurred during World
War I). At the beginning of World War II {September 1939), the
Chain Home system comprised twenty stations that provided
coverage of the eastern and southern coasts on wavelengths
between 10 and 13 meters. This early warning network played a
major role in the Battle of Britain. In 1939, British
scientists also invented the cavity magnetron, which produced
microwave radar {10-centimeter wavelength) and significantly
improved radar capabilities. 7
Like most other nations, the United States was less
concerned about potential enemy air attacks in the years prior
to World War II. On 7 December 1941, a mobile radar unit on
Oahu Island detected incoming Japanese planes, but the
information was misinterpreted and ignored. After the United
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States entered the war, the Army established ninety-five radar
stations on the west and east coasts to provide early warning.
These stations were equipped with SCR-270 (mobile) and SCR-271
(fixed) radars with a range of about 150 miles (240 km), and
were augmented with civilian volunteer ground observers. 8
Throughout the war, radar research and development was
undertaken at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT)
Radiation Lab, which ultimately designed roughly 150 types of
radars for the military, and estaplished a precedent that was
revived in the Cold War era. 9 In 1943-45, the threat of air
attacks on the continental United States again declined and air
defense and early warning radar became a low priority. 10
At the end of World War II, air defense systems in the
United States were dismantled. The strategic air threat to the
United States was perceived as low, despite the growing
confrontation with the Soviet Union during 1946-47 and the
development of the Soviet Tu-4 long-range bomber. The Soviet
threat to the continental United States was constrained by its
lack of forward bomber bases and atomic weapons. Furthermore,
the Truman administration sought major reductions in defense
spending at this time. The Air Force proposed a "radar fence"
plan in late 1947 that called for deployment of several hundred
stations, but it was never implemented due to cost. At the end
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of 1947, Air Defense Corrunand (ADC) was operating only two radar
stations in the continental United States. 11
Sharply increased tensions with the Soviet Union during the
spring and surruner of 1948 encouraged the U.S. Air Force to
expand early warning radar in the northwest and northeast. This
network (eventually termed the "Lashup system") was equipped
with World War II vintage AN/CPS-5 and AN/TPS-lB/lD radars that
could detect bombers at altitudes of 10,000-40,000' (3,000-
12,000 m) and distances of 60-120 miles (95-190 km). Further
proposed expansion of the system to eighty-five radar stations
and eleven control centers in the continental United States and
Alaska (termed the "Permanent Network") were again shelved in
late 1948 due to cost. However, President Truman's announcement
of a Soviet atomic bomb test in September 1949 significantly
raised public concern regarding air defense, and funds were
allocated for construction of expanded network by the end of
that year. To supplement the radar stations, the U.S. Air Force
organized a ground observer corps in early 1950 that eventually
comprised over 300,000 civilian volunteers. 12
The attack on South Korea in June 1950-followed by Chinese
Communist intervention in November-further accelerated the
expansion of the U.S. early warning network. New funding was
authorized for construction of more radar stations and
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acquisition of upgraded radar equipment. Reflecting increased
emphasis on new technology, the Air Force had established the
Air Research and Development Command (ARDC) in January 1950, and
supported the recommendation for a new MIT laboratory devoted to
air defense problems. The Lincoln Laboratory was constructed at
Hanscom Air Force Base (AFB) in Massachusetts, and immediately
began work on a computer to improve the highly complex command
and control functions for radar networks. 13
During 1951-53, Lincoln Laboratory developed the AN/FSQ-7
computer (also known as Whirlwind II) with a magnetic-core
memory, which was tested as part of the experimental Cape Cod
System in October 1953-August 1954. The Cape Cod System became
the model for a computerized continental air defense network
known as SAGE (Semi-Automatic Ground Environment) . By the time
that SAGE became operational in 1958-59 (employing a new
generation of radars), strategic air defense had been superseded
by the Soviet ICBM threat. However, the innovations in computer
technology and command and control functions developed for the
Cape Cod System and SAGE are now viewed as having been critical
to the evolution of Cold War early warning systems, including
BMEWS .14
The Soviet test of a hydrogen bomb in August 1953 acted as
another catalyst to the expansion of early warning systems and
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air defenses in North America. The latter included construction
of the Mid-Canada Line and-even further north-the Distant Early
Warning (DEW) Line, which had been recormnended by the Surmner
Study Group in 1952. The Mid-Canada Line consisted of ninety-
eight unmanned microwave radars deployed roughly along the 54th
parallel and became fully operational in 1958. The
controversial and costly DEW Line (comprising fifty-seven
stations from Alaska to Greenland) was built during 1955-57 with
new radars adapted for arctic use that included the AN/FPS-19
search radar (range of 160 miles [260 km]). The massive
construction effort above the Arctic Circle anticipated the
construction of BMEWS, which began the following year. Like
SAGE, these early warning lines did not become operational until
strategic air defense had already been overshadowed by the
Soviet ICBM threat. 15
During 1955-59, several improvements were made in U.S.
radar technology related to the evolution of early warning
systems and continental air defense. New "gap filler" radars
such as the AN/FPS-14 and AN/FPS-18 were developed for detection
of low-flying aircraft. As a result, the U.S. Air Force
disbanded the civilian Ground Observer Corps at the beginning of
1959. New "frequency-diversity" (FD) radars (e.g., AN/FPS-24)
were designed to avoid the effects of electronic counter-
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measures (ECM), which had blinded ADC radars in a 1956 attack
exercise. 16
The Eisenhower administration, which came into office in
January 1953, advocated a "New Look" in defense policy that
entailed spending cuts and greater emphasis on the deterrence of
"massive retaliation" by nuclear bombers. Air Force officers
who favored increased support for offensive capabilities
attacked the DEW Line proposal as "Maginot Line mentality." The
expansion and improvement of early warning radars undertaken
after 1953 appeared inconsistent with the "New Look" approach,
but actually reflected recognition of the inseparable
relationship between offensive and defensive capabilities in the
Nuclear Age. Effective early warning (measured in hours or
minutes) was necessary to ensure survival of the capacity to
retaliate. 17 The MAD concept (mutual assured destruction), which
is associated with the later ICBM threat, seems to have evolved
from this earlier understanding of the role of early warning
systems in U.S. nuclear strategy.
Origins of BMEWS (1954-57). The Summer Study Group, which
was convened during June-August 1952 at the Lincoln Lab
(discussed above), had been asked to consider the ICBM among the
range of potential threats to the United States. Apparently
regarding this possibility as relatively remote, they focused
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attention on strategic air defense issues. However, as early as
1954, intelligence reports revealed the existence of the Soviet
ICBM program (during the same year that Korolev had been
authorized to proceed with the R-7) . 18 While successful
development of an ICBM in the Soviet Union might take many
years, the U.S. Air Force recognized that it represented an
entirely new strategic threat that would render much o.f the
evolving air defense system obsolete. An ICBM presented a
problem not only with respect to defense (because it appeared
impossible to intercept and destroy), but also to detection and
tracking.
The northernmost state-of-the-art early warning radars on
the DEW Line (which became operational in 1957) could detect
Soviet turboprop and jet bombers (traveling at cruising speeds
of 425-500 miles [710-835 km] per hour) at altitudes of 65,000'
(20,000 meters) at a distance of 160 miles (250 km). This could
provide several hours' early warning of a Soviet nuclear attack
on the United States. However, an ICBM would travel at a
velocity of roughly 4 miles (7 km) per second at an altitude of
up to 600 miles (1,000 km) or higher. Even if the DEW Line
radars could detect the comparatively small ICBM target at such
a speed and altitude, they could not provide sufficiently early
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warning-given the ICBM's extreme high velocity-to protect
retaliatory forces from destruction. 19
The U.S. Air Force asked General Electric (GE) and the
Lincoln Lab to design new radars that could detect and track
ballistic missiles. Initial discussions during 1953-54
addressed the question of whether any form of radar technology
would be adequate for this task. The ballistic missile radar
design first proposed by GE lacked sufficient range resolution.
In November 1954, Lincoln Lab began to modify the GE concept,
which eventually became the AN/FPS-17 coded-pulse radar. The
AN/FPS-17 represented the first long-range radar (range of over
600 miles [1,000 km]), and provided for both detection and
tracking of missiles by generating long pulses constructed from
short pulses on a frequency of 200 megahertz. The large fixed
antenna measured 110' (34 meters) in width and 175' (53 meters)
in height. 20
An AN/FPS-17 was tested at Laredo AFB, Texas in 1956, where
it successfully tracked sounding rockets fired at White Sands
Missile Range at a range of several hundred miles. The radar
was subsequently installed at Pirinclik in Turkey to monitor
Soviet missile launches, and detected the Sputnik launch in
October 1957. An AN/FPS-17 was also installed on Shemya Island
in the Aleutians to track Soviet missile tests in the North
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Pacific (eventually replaced with the Cobra Dane phased-array
radar) . 21
In June 1955, the Air Force issued General Operational
Requirement No. 96 (GOR 96) entitled "A Ballistic Missile
Detection Support System," which called for the construction of
three northern radars for detection of Soviet ICBMs over the
polar region. The system would be designed to provide a minimum
of fifteen minutes early warning of an ICBM attack. GOR 96 was \
first formal proposal of the missile early warning system that
ultimately became BMEWS. The estimated cost of the system was
$1.3 billion, and the proposal was promptly shelved as too
expensive. 22
Nevertheless, the Lincoln Lab organized a Systems Research
Group in 1955 to study the problems of designing a ballistic
missile early warning system. The ,group addressed a variety of
issues, including the radar reflection properties of ICBMs,
prediction of missile impact areas, and meteor trails (which had
generated false alarms on the AN/FPS-17 radar). The Lincoln Lab
also proceeded with the development of a more powerful missile
radar that would become the prototype for the BMEWS tracking
radars. Construction of the new radar began in the summer of
1956 at Millstone Hill, located in Westford, Massachusetts near
Hanscom AFB. 23
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Building the Millstone Hill radar forced Lincoln Lab to
confront the major problems of designing an ICBM early warning
system. Such a system did not require any fundamental
innovations in radar technology (e.g., cavity magnetron), but
rather a massive "scaling up" of existing technology to provide
the needed increase in range (by a factor of 20) and sensitivity
(by a factor of almost 100,000) . 24 To provide adequate warning
time of an ICBM attack, the radar would have to detect the
incoming missile at a range of several thousand miles (i.e.,
significantly greater range than the AN/FPS-17). The data
processing equipment would have to discriminate quickly between
a hostile ICBM and other phenomena (e.g., a meteor), or risk
triggering an accidental nuclear war.
As radar historian Robert Buderi has written, at Millstone
Hill "everything seemed designed on a gigantic scale." 25 The
transmitter operated on an average power of 60 kW and peak power
of 1 MW with "monster klystron" tubes (100 times more powerful
than any existing klystrons) that generated waves at 440
megahertz. The waveguide " ... ran almost the size of a heating
duct. /1 The mobile antenna was 84' ( 2 6 meters) in diameter and
was mounted on a 90' (27-meter) tower. A separate building
adjacent to the tower housed the control and processing
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equipment, including the world's first solid-state digital
computer (CG-24) for real-time data processing. 26
The Millstone Hill radar was operational by October 1957
and successfully tracked Sputnik I in earth orbit at a range of
600 miles (960 km), although its detection range was over 1,000
miles (1,800 km). The Lincoln Lab made further improvements to
the radar during the following year, and rebuilt the system in
1962 for L-band operation at 1295 megahertz. Millstone Hill was
subsequently used for space surveillance and research. In 1963,
the antenna was shipped to Pirinclik in Turkey to replace the
existing AN/FPS-17, where it was operated at higher power
(average of 150 kW) with a detection range of 3,800 miles (6,400
km) . 27
In August 1956, the Systems Research Group at Lincoln Lab
prepared two technical reports that outlined the design of an
ICBM early warning system in greater detail than had been
described in the GOR issued fourteen months earlier by the U.S>
Air Force. In Lincoln Lab Technical Report No. 127 ("A
Comparison of Selected ICBM Warning Radar Configurations"), the
authors concluded that the Millstone Hill prototype would be
suitable only for tracking missiles. Detection of the ICBM
would be achieved with massive fixed arrays (measuring 440' [134
meters] in width and 165' [50 meters] in height), which would be
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less susceptible to jamming. 28 This radar would represent an
expansion of the AN/FPS-17 coded pulse radar. The 1956
technical reports from the Systems Research Group became the
basic blueprint for BMEWS.
The model for what would become the BMEWS detection radar
was assembled by GE on Trinidad in the British West Indies in
1957-58. The Trinidad radar followed Lincoln Lab specifications
and included a 400'-wide (123-meter) fixed array antenna and
scanner. A tracking radar based on the Millstone Hill prototype
was also constructed. These radars were tested on missile trial
launches from Cape Canaveral (approximately 1,500 miles [2,400
km] northwest). 29
The Soviet Union test-launched their first ICBM in August
1957, and used the R-7 as a booster for the first two satellites
during October and November. As described earlier, the Sputnik
launches generated a public furor in the United States, which
had wide-reaching and long-term consequences for federal
funding. One of the almost immediate consequences was the
allocation of funds for the construction of the first BMEWS
radar site. On 7 November 1957 (four days after the Sputnik II
launch), the U.S. Air Force issued a new general operational
requirement for BMEWS (GOR 156), which updated the original GOR
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96 with the results of research and development undertaken since
June 1955.
GOR 156 (misleadingly titled "Ballistic Missile Defense
System") specifically called for construction of radar sites at
Thule, Greenland (Site I); Clear, Alaska (Site II); and
Fylingdales Moor, Britain (Site III). These radar sites were to
provide overlapping coverage of the polar region at a range of
2,600 miles (4,200 km) to ensure fifteen minutes advance warning
of an ICBM attack. They were to operate at a level of virtually
100 percent reliability with the capability to resist jamming
due to ECM and false alarms due to meteor trails and other
disturbances. Construction of Site I in Greenland was
designated as the first priority with a scheduled completion
date of 1959, while Site II in Alaska was tentatively scheduled
for completion in 1960. The estimated total cost was $750
million. In January 1958, Congress appropriated funds for
construction of Site I. 30
Despite the public furor that followed the Sputnik
launches, which included charges of negligence against the
Eisenhower administration, it was apparent that the U.S. Air
Force had prepared for the Soviet ICBM threat since 1954. Not
only had the overall configuration of BMEWS been developed, but
many of the components of the system had already been built and
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tested by late 1957. Sputnik simply acted as a catalyst for
funding construction of BMEWS. Moreover, the U.S. Air Force was
close to completing the offensive side of the equation, and
successfully tested the first American ICBM (Atlas) in December
1957. Finally, many historians have emphasized the point that
by launching Sputnik, the Soviet Union implicitly accepted space
as an international zone (as opposed to sovereign "air space")
and established the right of other nations to conduct satellite
reconnaissance over its territory. In the final analysis, this
precedent was more important to the U.S. government than the
temporary loss of prestige engendered by the Soviet space
achievement. 31
Construction of BMEWS (1958-63). Between 1958 and 1963,
the U.S. Air Force constructed the three northern BMEWS sites
with support facilities and rearward communication systems. The
construction of BMEWS, which required installation of massive
high-powered radars in arctic and subarctic environments,
represented a major engineering achievement, although the DEW
Line project (1955-57) provided some precedent. The technology
of the BMEWS radars was not revolutionary, but did reflect a
significant expansion of existing technology.
Two types of radars were installed at the BMEWS sites. The
first of these was the AN/FPS-50 detection radar, comprising an
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immense fixed antenna measuring 400' (122 meters) in width and
165' (50 meters) in height and a scanner building. This radar
(an expanded version of the original AN/FPS-17 missile detection
radar) was designed to operate on L-band (400 megahertz) with ~
range of over 2,500 nautical miles (4,630 km). The other radar
was the AN/FPS-49 tracker-based on the Millstone Hill prototype-
that consisted of a mobile parabolic reflector (70-80' [21-24
meters] in diameter) mounted on a pedestal. The tracker would
operate at an unprecedented average power level of 540 kW and
peak power of 10 MW. 32
The BMEWS data-processing equipment was essential to
effective operation of the early warning system because it was
designed to discriminate as quickly as possible between the
trajectory of an incoming ICBM and other phenomena in the upper
atmosphere. The radar sites were equipped with solid-state
digital computers (International Business Machines [IBM] 7090s)
using a software program (BMEWS Operational Simulation System
[BOSS]) designed by Lincoln Lab. The computer technology had
evolved rapidly from Whirlwind (associated with the Cape Cod
System and SAGE) through the CG-24 (for the Millstone Hill
radar). A dual system was operated at each site for greater
reliability. 33
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The three radar sites were linked to the North American Air
Defense Command (NORAD) and Air Defense Command (ADC)
headquarters at Ent AFB in Colorado by a rearward communications
system. Dual lines of communication over land, sea, and air
were established for each site. Site I in Greenland, for
example, was connected to NORAD/ADC via submarine cable and
microwave radio-relay (route one), and also via tropospheric-
scatter radio and commercial telephone circuits (route two).
Additional backup facilities were available for use if both
primary communication routes failed. Data from the BMEWS sites
was instantly relayed from Ent AFB to SAC headquarters in Omaha,
Nebraska. 34
Each of the BMEWS sites had a unique configuration of
radars and support facilities. Site I at Thule Air Base in
northern Greenland was originally designed with four AN/FPS-50
detection radars and three AN/FPS-49 tracking radars. Site II
at Clear, Alaska would receive three detection and two tracking
radars, and Site III in the United Kingdom would operate with
three detection and three tracking radars. However, funding
constraints soon forced the Air Force to scale back the original
plans. Sites I and II received only one modified tracking radar
each-in addition to the detection radars-while the AN/FPS-50
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detection radars were never installed at Site III, which
received only the three tracking radars. 35
When completed, the BMEWS sites provided broad radar
coverage of the polar region, and were capable of detecting anq
tracking most (although not all) potential Soviet ballistic
missile trajectories. Because of their irrnnense range and
sensitivity, they could detect an ICBM at sufficient distance to
ensure a minimum of fifteen minutes advance warning (estimated
maximum of thirty-seven minutes) to NORAD/ADC and SAC. The
giant AN/FPS-50 detection radars projected two line-of-site
beams at 3.5° and 7° above the horizon, respectively. An ICBM
passing through the lower beam within a range of at least 2,500
nautical miles would trigger an alarm. As the missile
intercepted the upper beam, the computer would determine if the
trajectory matched the characteristics of an ICBM or some other
phenomenon. The AN/FPS-49 radar would be used to track the
missile to its target (and provide further confirmation of ICBM
detection) . BMEWS Site III also offered four minutes advance
warning of intermediate-range ballistic missiles (IRBMs)
targeted at the United Kingdom. 36
On 9 May 1958, the Secretary of Defense authorized the U.S.
Air Force to proceed with the construction of BMEWS Sites I and
II. The entire system was to be constructed within a total
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funding ceiling of $822.7 million. Air Materiel Cormnand was
assigned responsibility for systems development and funding,
while Air Defense Cormnand was to assume control of the system
when it reached operational readiness. A Special Project Office
(SPO) for BMEWS was established at Hanscom AFB (where the MIT
Lincoln Lab was located) under Electronic Systems Division (Air
Force Systems Cormnand) . The SPO was designed to function as a
liaison with the various Air Force organizations, contractors,
and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. 37
The prime contract for the construction of BMEWS was
awarded to Radio Corporation of America (RCA), which
subcontracted more than half the work to other firms. Over
3,000 companies were involved in the project. The detection
radars were built by General Electric (GE) and D. S. Kennedy and
Co., while the tracking radar was built by Goodyear Aircraft
Company. Support facilities were constructed by the U.S. Army
Corps of Engineers (Eastern Ocean District) . The data
processing equipment was designed by Sylvania Electric, and the
solid-state digital computers were manufactured by IBM. Western
Electric was the prime contractor for construction of the
rearward cormnunications system. 38
Construction of Site I in Greenland began in May 1958, and
placement of the four 1,500-ton detection radar antennae began
CLEAR AIR FORCE STATION BALLISTIC MISSILE EARLY WARNING SYSTEM SITE II
HAER No. AK-30-A (page 43)
in April 1959. The antennae had to be installed on permafrost
but capable of withstanding a 6-inch coating of ice and winds of
up to 185 miles (300 km) per hour. The U.S. Air Force delayed
installation of the tracking radar, and Site I reached initial
operating capacity (IOC) with the four AN/FPS-50 radars on 1
October 1960. A single tracking radar (AN/FPS-49A) was
constructed during October 1960 - July 1961. The total cost for
Site I was approximately $425 million (i.e., more than half of
the established ceiling for BMEWS as a whole) . 39
Site II construction at Clear, Alaska (described below in
detail) began in July 1958. Unlike Thule, there was no pre-
existing military installation at Clear, and a complete Air
Force station was established to support the BMEWS facilities.
The construction schedule was delayed by labor strikes and a
major fire in one of the transmitter buildings. The three
detection radars and transmitter buildings were not completed
until March 1961, and Site II achieved IOC on 30 September 1961.
The total cost for Site II was approximately $350 million. In
1965-66, one tracking radar (AN/FPS-92) was installed at Clear
AFS. 40
Construction of Site III in the United Kingdom (eventually
placed at Fylingdales Moor in Yorkshire, England) was also
delayed by several factors. After protracted negotiations with
CLEAR AIR FORCE STATION BALLISTIC MISSILE EARLY WARNING SYSTEM SITE II
HAER No. AK-30-A (page 44)
the British government, construction commenced in late 1960.
More than fifty labor strikes occurred, slowing completion of
the facilities. Three AN/FPS-49 tracking radars were ultimately
installed, and Site III reached IOC in September 1963 at a total
cost of $120 million. Fylingdales Moor was connected to
NORAD/ADC by four transatlantic lines of communication, three of
them via submarine cables. 41
The construction of BMEWS between 1958 and 1963 marked a
fundamental turning point in the military and political balance
of the Cold War. While all previously built early warning radar
systems-from the Chain Home network to the DEW Line-were part of
a strategic air defense designed to help destroy as much of the
attacking force as possible, BMEWS was established only to
provide advance warning. It ensured survival of the U.S.
ground-based ICBM force (deployment of which began during this
period) and nuclear bombers for a counterstrike. Although both
the United States and the Soviet Union developed model anti-
ballistic missile (ABM) systems after 1963, neither side
deployed large-scale ABM defense during the Cold War (addressed
in the 1972 ABM Treaty) . BMEWS marked the beginning of a
relatively stable balance of military power based on the mutual
deterrence of ICBMs (supplemented with SLBMs and bombers) or the
MAD concept. As noted earlier, the latter was not an entirely
CLEAR AIR FORCE STATION BALLISTIC MISSILE EARLY WARNING SYSTEM SITE II
HAER No. AK-30-A (page 45)
novel concept-it was implicit in President Eisenhower's support
for the DEW Line and other early warning systems prior to BMEWS
to ensure "massive retaliation" by SAC.
BMEWS Site II at Clear AFS, Alaska
Site II at Clear AFS in Alaska was the only BMEWS radar
site within the United States. Located in south-central Alaska
roughly 85 miles (135 km) southwest of Fairbanks, Site II
represented the western BMEWS radar site and provided coverage
of ICBM launches from Northeast Asia at a range of 2,600 miles
(4,000 km) on a 170° azimuth. Constructed during 1958-61, the
BMEWS site at Clear AFS remained operational throughout the rest
of the Cold War (1961-89) and beyond. Site II was initially
equipped with three AN/FPS-50 detection radars, but one tracking
radar (AN/FPS~49) was also installed in 1965-66. A coal-fired
power plant was constructed at Clear AFS to provide the enormous
power needed to operate the radars.
At the time that the U.S. Air Force began construction of
BMEWS, several early warning systems were already operating in
Alaska for strategic air defense. They included the Aircraft
Control and Warning (AC&W) network, comprising twelve coastal
and interior radar stations constructed during 1950-54 (six
additional stations were completed by 1958). The AC&W stations
CLEAR AIR FORCE STATION BALLISTIC MISSILE EARLY WARNING SYSTEM SITE II
HAER No. AK-30-A (page 46)
were equipped with AN/CPS-5 and AN/FPS-3 long-range search
radars, which were also deployed at Ladd AFB and Elmendorf AFB.
Along the northern coast were sixteen recently constructed DEW
Line stations equipped with newer AN/FPS-19 search radars. The
Alaskan radar stations were linked to NORAD via a tropospheric
scatter and microwave relay system (White Alice Communications
System) initially constructed during 1955-57. 42
Construction of Clear AFS and BMEWS Site II (1958-61).
Clear was selected for BMEWS Site II in January 1958. The
location (approximately 65° North 149° West) was chosen for the
Alaskan BMEWS site among eleven candidates on the basis of
relatively easy access, suitable substratum for construction,
open horizons, and lack of electronic interference. 43 The land
(34,642 acres) had been withdrawn by the U.S. Air Force in 1947,
and used during 1948 for an AC&W radar site. The radar
equipment was subsequently moved to Ladd AFB, and the site was
renamed Clear Air Force Auxiliary Field and used by Alaskan Air
Command (AAC) for a gunnery range. In 1949, the land was
transferred to the Department of Interior; a 1956 fire destroyed
the three structures built for the AC&W site. 44
After the Air Force reacquired the Clear site in early
1958, a temporary camp was established to house 800 workers for
construction of the new facilities. During the winter of 1958-
CLEAR AIR FORCE STATION BALLISTIC MISSILE EARLY WARNING SYSTEM SITE II
HAER No. AK-30-A (page 47)
59, the area was cleared of trees, and construction of the
support facilities began under the direction of the U.S. Army
Corps of Engineers (Alaska District) . The support facilities
included dormitories, dining facilities, workshops, garages, and
other structures. Construction was delayed by a plumbers and
carpenters strike in June-July 1959, and by the national steel
strike during August 1959-January 1960. 45
Construction of the radars and other components of the
BMEWS site began in early 1960. In addition to the three
antennae for the AN/FPS-50 detection radars (Structures 735,
736, and 737), scanner buildings (Buildings 104, 105, and 106)
were erected opposite the reflectors. Larger transmitter
buildings (Buildings 101 and 102) were constructed in between
the scanner buildings. On 4 May 1960, a major fire occurred in
Building 102, causing extensive damage to the floors, walls, and
roof of the structure. This further delayed completion of Clear
AFS and BMEWS Site II. 46
To meet the high power requirements of the radars, a large
power plant (Building 111) was constructed as part of the BMEWS
facilities at Clear AFS. The seven-story plant was designed to
produce 22,500 kW with three steam-driven turbine-generator
units. The fuel source was sub-bituminous coal, mined near
Healy (located approximately 30 miles [50 km] south of Clear)
CLEAR AIR FORCE STATION BALLISTIC MISSILE EARLY WARNING SYSTEM SITE II
HAER No. AK-30-A (page 48)
and shipped to the BMEWS site on a specially built Alaska
Railroad spur line. The power plant was completed in 1961. 47
In addition to the major subcontractors such as GE and
Sylvania Electric (discussed above), many smaller local firms
were contracted for various components of Clear AFS and the
BMEWS facilities. The transmitter buildings were constructed by
Baker Ford (Contract No. DA-95-507-ENG-1282), and the scanner
buildings were erected by Patti-MacDonald (Contract No. DA-95-
507-ENG-1317). Empire Gas and Engineering was contracted to
build the power plant (Contract No. DA-95-507-ENG-1333), and
Miller Brothers was contracted for the fire station. 48
Because of the construction delays caused by the labor
strikes and fire in Building 102, the BMEWS Site II radars and
support facilities were not completed until March 1961.
Communication links with NORAD/ADC at Ent AFB in Colorado were
established between 30 June and 31 August 1961. BMEWS Site II
achieved Initial Operating Capacity (IOC) on 30 September, and
full operational status on 31 December 1961 (i.e., more than
year after its originally scheduled completion date) . 49
Description of Facilities: Clear AFB and BMEWS Site II.
Clear AFS comprises three areas: (1) Technical Site (BMEWS
facilities); (2) Composite Site (administrative and support
facilities); and (3) Camp Site (original work camp). The
CLEAR AIR FORCE STATION BALLISTIC MISSILE EARLY WARNING SYSTEM SITE II
HAER No. AK-30-A (page 49)
following description of facilities is focused primarily on the
BMEWS Site II radars and associated structures at the Technical
Site.
As noted earlier, BMEWS Site II contains a unique
configuration of radars and support facilities that are not
fully duplicated at the other two BMEWS sites. All of the BMEWS
facilities at Site II are located within the fenced boundaries
of the Technical Site at Clear AFS. These facilities include
the three AN/FPS-50 detection radars (antennae and scanner
buildings), two transmitter buildings, and one AN/FPS-92
tracking radar (located on the roof of the larger transmitter
building). The scanner and transmitter buildings are joined by
a protected passageway (or "utilidor") for all-weather access
from the Composite Area. A supply warehouse was constructed
adjacent to the larger transmitter building in 1966 (i.e.,
concurrently with the installation of the tracking radar). The
other facilities at the Technical Site include the power plant
and associated structures (including the fire station and
locomotive shelter), which are located northeast of the radar
complex in a separate enclosure. 50
Each of the antennae for the three detection radars
(Structures 735, 736, and 737) measures 400' (122 meters) in
width and 165' (50 meters) in height, and weighs approximately
CLEAR AIR FORCE STATION BALLISTIC MISSILE EARLY WARNING SYSTEM SITE II
HAER No. AK-30-A (page 50)
900 tons. Each antenna is composed of 2,000 steel frames
(special steel alloy designed to withstand extreme low
temperatures and high wind conditions), and is supported by
concrete footings and lattice backstays. The twenty concrete
footings at the base of each antenna are spaced 21' (6 meters)
apart; each footing measures 16' x 22' (5 x 7 meters) and rests
on 30' (9 meters) of compacted fill. The solid tubular
backstays at BMEWS Site II were modified to withstand potential
earthquakes (which did not present a hazard at the other BMEWS
sites). s1
Each antenna faces a scanner building (Buildings 104, 105,
and 106), which functions to project electromagnetic waves onto
the reflecting antenna to produce the two radar beams for target
detection. Each two-story scanner building measures 80' (24
meters) in width, 144' (44 meters) in length, and 58' (18
meters) in height. Although basically rectangular in plan, the
side facing the antenna exhibits a curvature that mirrors the
parabolic form of the latter. Each building is constructed with
a steel frame and corrugated metal exterior siding covered with
an asbestos/asphalt coating. The frame rests on a poured
concrete foundation and pilings to ensure maximum stability and
cushion the structure from the effects of permafrost and
vibration.
CLEAR AIR FORCE STATION BALLISTIC MISSILE EARLY WARNING SYSTEM SITE II
HAER No. AK-30-A (page 51)
Two rows of feedhorns that project electromagnetic waves
onto the antenna through the scanner "windows" are located on
the curved side (or plenum) of each scanner building (visible as
white horizontal bands on the building exterior). The feedhorns
are connected by waveguides to a central "pipe-organ scanner" in
each building (so named because of its resemblance to a church
organ). The pipe-organ scanner, which was designed by the
Lincoln Lab, is one of the most famous engineering features of
BMEWS. 52
The larger transmitter building (Building 102) is
rectangular in plan, and measures 376' (115 meters) in length
and 155' (47 meters) in width. Like the scanner buildings, it
is constructed with a steel frame and metal siding (coated with
asbestos/asphalt paint) over a poured concrete foundation. This
structure houses the banks of "monster klystron" amplifiers,
which generate the waves (at an average power of 150 kW each)
guided to the scanner buildings and projected onto the antennae.
Each klystron tube measures 9'-8" (3 meters) in length.
Building 102 also houses the control centers and data-
processing equipment for the radars. The Missile Warning
Operations Center (MWOC) is located on the lower floor, and
contains consoles that display the computer output. The
original computers (also located on the lower floor) were two
CLEAR AIR FORCE STATION BALLISTIC MISSILE EARLY WARNING SYSTEM SITE II
HAER No. AK-30-A (page 52)
solid-state IBM 7090 digital computers loaded with specially
designed software programs for missile impact prediction (MIP) .
Each computer would process the radar data and compare results
with the other IBM 7090. They were replaced in 1982-1983 with
Control Data Cyber 170/720 computers. The Central System
Monitoring Room (CSMR) is located adjacent to the MWOC and
contains equipment used to monitor the component subsystems. 53
The AN/FPS-92 tracking radar is mounted on the reinforced
concrete roof of Building 102. This radar was installed during
1965-66, and represents a modified version of the AN/FPS-49
trackers deployed at the other BMEWS sites (the AN/FPS-92
antenna is rotated with hydrostatic rather than ball bearings).
The antenna measures 84' (26 meters) in diameter with a central
hub and 24 radial sectors (each 31' [9 meters] in length) that
are bolted to each other as well as the hub. It is supported by
a four-section steel axle with aluminum frames. The radar is
enclosed within a 104' (32-meter) radome for protection from
wind and low temperatures. The radome was originally composed
of cardboard honeycomb between fiberglass sheets, covered with
polyethylene film. In 1981, it was replaced with a new radome
composed of tedlar panels set in an aluminum frame. 54
The smaller transmitter building (Building 101) measures
only 255' (78 meters) in length and 150' (46 meters) in width.
CLEAR AIR FORCE STATION BALLISTIC MISSILE EARLY WARNING SYSTEM SITE II
HAER No. AK-30-A (page 53)
Its design is otherwise similar to Building 102. Although
Building 101 was also constructed with a reinforced concrete
roof to support a tracking radar (up to 110 tons), no radar was
ever installed on this structure. Both transmitter buildings
and the three scanner buildings are interconnected by a covered
passageway or "utilidor" that provides protected access
(personnel and vehicles) from the Composite Area. The
waveguides between each transmitter and scanner building also
are contained in the utilidor, which is composed of a steel
frame covered with steel siding that rests on a concrete grade
and is up to 19' ( 6 meters) in width. 55
The power plant (Building 111) and associated facilities
are also located within the Technical Site. Building 111 is a
seven-story steel-frame structure covered with steel insulated
panels on a concrete foundation. It contains three 7,500-kW
steam turbine generators and three 100,000-lb per hour boilers
heated by coal. Approximately three carloads of coal, shipped
by rail from the Usibelli coal mine near Healy, are required
each day to provide sufficient fuel for the boilers. Associated
facilities include a locomotive shelter (Building 118), thaw
shed (Building 110), coal transfer crush house (Building 115),
and ash silo (Building 114) . 56
CLEAR AIR FORCE STATION BALLISTIC MISSILE EARLY WARNING SYSTEM SITE II
HAER No. AK-30-A (page 54)
The Composite Area contains administrative and support
facilities for the BMEWS site. These include dormitories,
dining facility, recreation facilities, gymnasium, vehicle
maintenance, warehouses, and other structures. The Camp Site
represents the original work camp and staging area established
in 1959, and contains Quonset huts, dormitories, warehouses, and
other structures used for base civil engineering and functions
not associated directly with the BMEWS site. 57
Clear AFS and BMEWS. Clear AFS was one of three northern
sites that were part of BMEWS to provide advance warning of a
Soviet ICBM attack over the polar region. As the western site,
BMEWS Site II at Clear covered potential missile launches from
Northeast Asia at a range of 2,600 miles (4,000 km) on an
azimuth of 170°. One of the three detection radars at Site II
was operated to provide low angle coverage with radar beams at 2°
and 5° respectively within a 10° segment of the azimuth. This
would allow detection of ICBMs that could be launched at low
angles from one area in Northeast Asia and otherwise avoid the
BMEWS radars . 58
Like the other two BMEWS sites, Site II in Alaska was
connected to NORAD and ADC at Ent AFB in Colorado via redundant
lines of communication. One route was based a series of
microwave radio-relay stations that followed the Alaska-Canada
CLEAR AIR FORCE STATION BALLISTIC MISSILE EARLY WARNING SYSTEM SITE II
HAER No. AK-30-A (page 55)
(ALCAN) Highway through western Canada into Montana to Colorado.
The other route was based on a combination of systems. A
microwave radio-relay was used from Clear AFS to Boswell Bay,
where a tropospheric scatter system (part of the White Alice
network) transmitted to Annette Island. From the latter,
signals were sent by another microwave radio-relay station to
Ketchikan, where they were transmitted via commercial submarine
cable to Port Angeles (Washington), and then through commercial
telephone circuits to Ent AFB. 59 Clear AFS was not connected to
the other BMEWS sites in Greenland and the United Kingdom.
BMEWS was the first early warning system constructed and
operated for detection of ICBMs, although it was increasingly
supplemented with other sensors and radars. During the summer
of 1960, while Site II was still under construction, the United
States began launching its first reconnaissance satellites.
These included MIDAS (Missile Defense Alarm System), which
provided infrared detection (but not tracking) of missile
launches in the Soviet Union. 60 The deployment of SLBMs by the
Soviet Union also forced the United States to develop early
warning systems to cover its ocean flanks (Atlantic, Pacific,
and Caribbean) during the 1970s. Thus, BMEWS eventually
functioned within a larger network of ballistic missile early
warning systems.
Chapter II Notes
CLEAR AIR FORCE STATION BALLISTIC MISSILE EARLY WARNING SYSTEM SITE II
HAER No. AK-30-A (page 56)
1Buderi, Robert, The Invention that Changed the World: How a Small Group of Radar Pioneers Won the Second World War and Launched a Technological Revolution. (New York, Simon and Schuster 1996), p. 413.
2Freeman, Eva C. (editor), MIT Lincoln Laboratory: Technology in the National Interest. (Lexington, Massachusetts Institute of Technology 1995), p. 48.
3Cardwell, Donald, The Norton History of Technology. (New Co. 1995York, W.W. Norton and Co.), pp. 325-379.
4Buderi, pp. 62-63.
5Buderi, pp. 63-64.
6Winkler, David F., Searching the Skies: The Legacy of the United States Cold War Defense Radar Program. (United States Air Force 1997) / p. 9.
7Buderi, pp. 82-89.
8Winkler, pp. 9-11.
9Buderi, pp. 98-245.
10schaffel, Kenneth, The Emerging Shield: The Air Force and the Evolution of Continental Air Defense 1945 - 1960. (Washington, Office of Air Force History 1991), pp. 42-45.
11Schaffel, pp. 47-76; Winkler, pp. 14-16.
12Ibid, pp. 76-160.
13Winkler, pp. 22-26; Freeman, pp. 1-13.
14Schaffel, pp. 197-209; Buderi, pp. 380-406; Hughes, Thomas P., Rescuing Prometheus. (New York, Pantheon Books 1998), pp. 15-67.
15Schaf fel, p. 197-27 5.
16Winkler, pp. 33-36.
17Ibid, pp. 27-29.
CLEAR AIR FORCE STATION BALLISTIC MISSILE EARLY WARNING SYSTEM SITE II
HAER No. AK-30-A (page 57)
18Freeman, p. 45; Buderi, p. 405.
19Toomay, John C., "Warning and Assessment Sensors," in A.B. Carter, J.D. Steinbruner, and C.A. Zraket (editors) Managing Nuclear Operations. (Washington, The Brookings Institution 1987), pp. 293-294; Buderi, p. 405.
2°Freeman, pp. 45-47; Winkler, pp. 84-85.
21Freeman, pp. 46-47; Winkler, p. 85.
22Ray, Thomas W., History of BMEWS 1957 - 1964. (ADC Historical Study No. 32), pp. 1~4.
23Freeman, pp. 47-49.
24Buderi, pp. 407-409.
27Freeman, pp. 48-111.
28Pettengill, G. H. and Dustin, D. E., "A Comparison of Selected ICBM Warning Radar Configurations." Lincoln Laboratory Technical Report No. 127. (Lexington, Mass., MIT Lincoln Laboratory 13 August 1956); Buderi, pp. 412-413.
29Freeman, p. 48; Buderi, p. 413.
30 Ray, pp. 4-6.
31McDougall, Walter A., ... the Heavens and the Earth. (New York, Basic Books 1985), pp. 112-230; Spires, David N., Beyond Horizons: A Half Century of Air Force Space Leadership. (Washington, Air Force Space Command 1998), pp. 50-53.
32 Ray, pp. 8-10; Toomay, pp. 294-297.
33Klass, Philip J. , "BMEWS Uses Discrimination Techniques." Aviation Week, 6 March 1961, pp. 70-74; Freeman, p. 49.
34 1 Kass, 1961, pp. 72-73; Ray, pp. 15-24.
35 Ray, pp. 11-24.
CLEAR AIR FORCE STATION BALLISTIC MISSILE EARLY WARNING SYSTEM SITE II
HAER No. AK-30-A (page SB)
36Klass, Philip J., "First BMEWS Nears Operational Status. /1
Aviation Week, 30 May 1960, pp. 76-85; Toomay, pp. 294-296.
37Fusca, James A., "Army Reveals BMEWS Radar Site Details. /1
Aviation Week, 28 July 1958, pp. 19-20; Ray, p. 7.
38Fusca, pp. 19-20; Ray, pp. 6-8.
39 1 Kass, 1960, pp. 76-85; Ray, pp. 11-18.
40Ray, pp. 18-2 0
41 Ray, pp. 21-24.
42Denfeld, D. Colt, The Cold War in Alaska: A Management Plan for Cultural Resources. (Anchorage, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers 1994); Reynolds, Georgeanne L., Historical Overview and Inventory: White Alice Communications System. (Anchorage, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers 1988).
43Alaskan Air Command, Visitor's Briefing. (Clear, Alaska: BMEWS Site II, 2 November 1960).
44Clear Air Force Station, Alaska, Keeping Track for Twenty-Five Years 1961-1986. 13 September 1986.
45Alaskan Air Command, 1960; Ray, p. 18.
46Alaskan Air Command, 1960; Ray, pp. 18-19.
47Clear Air Force Station, 1986.
48Whorton, Mandy and Hoffecker, John, Historic Properties of the Cold War Era: Clear Air Station, Alaska. (Report prepared for 21st Space Wing, Peterson AFB, Colorado 1997); Nielson, J.M., Armed Forces on a Northern Frontier: The Military in Alaska's History. New York, Greenwood Press 1988), p. 195.
49 Ray, pp. 19-20.
50Whorton and Hoffecker, pp. 28-35.
51Ibid, p. 35 ·
52 Ibid, pp. 36-38.
CLEAR AIR FORCE STATION BALLISTIC MISSILE EARLY WARNING SYSTEM SITE II
HAER No. AK-30-A (page 59)
53Klass, 1961, pp. 72-73; Whorton and Hoffecker, pp. 39-40.
54Clear Air Force Station, 1986.
55Whorton and Hoffecker, p. 39-43.
56 Ibid, pp. 41-42.
57 Ibid, p. 43.
58 Ray, p. 19; Toomay, pp. 294-296.
59 Ray, pp. 19-20.
60Burrow, William E., Deep Black: Space Espionage and National Security. (New York, Random House 1986).
CLEAR AIR FORCE STATION BALLISTIC MISSILE EARLY WARNING SYSTEM SITE II
HAER No. AK-30-A (page 60)
Chapter III
BALLISTIC MISSILE EARLY WARNING SYSTEM
AT CLEAR AIR FORCE STATION, ALASKA
AND THE COLD WAR
BMEWS Site II at Clear AFS, Alaska became operational in
1961, and continued to operate throughout the remainder of the
Cold War, which ended in November 1989 with the dismantling of
the Berlin Wall. As part of the larger BMEWS, it provided
advance warning of ICBM attack over the polar region, and-in
conjunction with satellite early warning systems (SEWS)-it
remained the primary North American missile early warning system
for more than a decade. By ensuring sufficient warning for a
retaliatory strike, BMEWS was a critical component of U.S.
nuclear strategy (mutual assured destruction [MAD]) of the post-
Sputnik era. During the 1960s, it also provided a significant
proportion of space-tracking data to the U.S. government.
Although initially plagued with false alarms and some
software problems, BMEWS soon attained efficient operating
capacity. In 1965-66, a tracking radar (AN/FPS-92) was finally
added to Site II. By the late 1960s, when the Soviet Union was
developing a capability to deploy submarine launched ballistic
missiles (SLBMs), the United States began to expand early warning
coverage beyond the polar region. This eventually included
construction of Perimeter Acquisition Vehicle Entry Phase Array
Warning System (PAVE PAW)S in the 1970s and 1980s, which provided
CLEAR AIR FORCE STATION BALLISTIC MISSILE EARLY WARNING SYSTEM SITE II
HAER No. AK-30-A (page 61)
early warning for SLBMs (as well as air-launched cruise missiles)
in the Atlantic and Pacific oceans and Caribbean Sea. Unlike
BMEWS, the new early warning systems incorporated major advances
in radar technology (phased array radar) . 1 After 1970, BMEWS
provided a less significant proportion of the space-tracking
data.
By the early 1980s, the BMEWS technology had become rather
antiquated (especially the computer hardware and software) and
various upgrades were necessary. During the final decade of the
Cold War, the Air Force seems to have found it increasingly
difficult to maintain the system because of the older technology.
Nevertheless, BMEWS continued to function through 1989 and
beyond. During the early 1990s, phased array units were
installed at Site I and Site III, but not at Clear AFS. A phased
array upgrade at Site II finally took place in December 2000, and
the AN/FPS-92 radar was shut down during the following month.
BMEWS Site II History of Operations (1961-89)
Site II at Clear AFS in Alaska was the second of the three
BMEWS sites to achieve initial operational capacity (30 September
1961). Site I at Thule Air Base (AB) in Greenland had reached
IOC on 1 October 1960, and was first to confront some of the
unanticipated problems of operating radars of such unprecedented
range and sensitivity. Four days after becoming operational, the
rising moon triggered the highest alarm level ("Level 5") as it
passed through the lower and upper fans of the Site I detection
CLEAR AI:R. FORCE STATION BALLISTIC MISSILE EARLY WARNING SYSTEM SITE II
~R No. AK-30-~ (page 62}
radars. Because the system did not generate any missile impact
predictions, NORAD recognized this as a false alarm, and the
system was modified to ignore return signals from th€ moon. The
growing number of orbiting satellites and debris also generated
false alarms, and required additional adjustments to the system
(installed in July 1961). Less serious problems were created by
vehicular traffic and radio frequency (RF) signal generators,
which caused "single-fan" alarms. 2 Given its potential for
triggering an accidental nuclear war, the false-alarrn problem
remained a major concern that was alleviated to some extent by
deployment of early warning satellites, which provided some
redundancy (and added to the early warning time) . 3 The addition
of the tracking radars at Site I (installed by July 1961) and
Site II provided additional redundancy to the system.
Another problem that had become apparent in 1961 as Site II
prepared to become operational was the high potential of BMEWS
for jamming by the Soviet Union. This was partly a function of
the forward location of the BMEWS sites. 4 Accordingly, the Air
Force requested $160,000 for installation of electronic
countermeasures (ECM) at Sites I and II by May 1962 that included
a noise monitor, target test generator, and ECM simulator. In
1964, both RCA and GE were awarded contracts for more permanent
ECM improvements. 5
BMEWS Site II achieved full operational capacity on 31
December 1961, and on 5 January, Air Force Systems Command turned
Sites I and II over to Air Defense Command (ADC). Operations and
\
CLEAR AIR FORCE STATION BALLISTIC MISSILE EARLY WARNING SYSTEM SITE II
HAER No. AK-30-A (page 63)
maintenance of BMEWS were supervised by the 71st Missile Warning
Wing, which was part of ADC's 9th Air Defense Division. BMEWS
Site II was placed under the command of Detachment 2 of the 71•t
Missile Warning Wing. During 1962, the commander of Clear AFS
was Col. Edward H. Ellington. Although the first months of
operation were plagued by a number of technical problems,
Detachment 2 achieved 1,000 hours of uninterrupted operation
("green time") between 12 June and 30 July 1962. On July 4, a
bear ransacked Col. Ellington's office, underscoring the remote
northern location of the BMEWS sites. 6
BMEWS became part of a wider organizational problem in the
Air Force that reflected the impact of advanced technology on the
U.S. military during the Cold War. In the wake of the 1957
Sputnik launch, the Air Force had initiated development of a
variety of new electronic weapons systems. In addition to SAGE
(see Chapter II), these included the NORAD combat operations
center (425L), strategic air command and control system (465L),
electromagnetic intelligence system (466L), space track (496L),
and BMEWS (474L), and they were known collectively as the "L-
Systems." Unsure of how to fit the L-Systems into its
organizational structure, the Air Force established the "Winter
Study Group" to address the problem. In a report issued in March
1961, the Winter Study Group recommended that the L-Systems be
treated as "automated command and control systems," and not
simply weapons systems. 7
CLEAR AIR FORCE STATION BALLISTIC MISSILE EARLY WARNING SYSTEM SITE II
HAER No. AK-30-A (page 64)
In August 1962, the Soviet Union began installation of
intermediate range ballistic missiles in Cuba in an effort to
redress the strategic nuclear advantage held by the United States
at that time. This provoked the Cuban Missile Crisis in October,
which was resolved when the Soviet Union agreed to withdraw the
missiles in an exchange for a U.S. pledge not to invade Cuba.
The crisis exposed North America to the threat of missiles based
outside the Soviet Union for the first time, revealing the limits
of BMEWS and the "polar concept." In fact, ADC had been asked to
consider early warning systems for forward-based missiles on
Soviet submarines in late 1961. By 1965, the U.S. Air Force had
begun to deploy missile early warning radars outside BMEWS,
beginning with the installation of the AN/FPS-85 phased array
unit at Eglin AFB in Florida. 8
In the years following the Cuban Missile Crisis, the Cold
War rapidly evolved into a relatively stable nuclear strategic
balance based on opposing missile forces. This balance was
achieved as the Soviet Union finally began to develop a serious
long-range ballistic missile capability with the deployment of
new ICBMs (e.g., SS-7 and SS-8) and forward-based SLBMs during
1962-65. 9 Deterrence for both sides rested on the concept of
mutual assured destruction (MAD), which was formally recognized
in the Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty of 1972. In the ABM
Treaty, both the Soviet Union and United States agreed to limit
development of anti-ballistic missile systems in order to
preserve the "balance of terror. " 10 By ensuring adequate warning
CLEAR AIR FORCE STATION BALLISTIC MISSILE EARLY WARNING SYSTEM SITE II
HAER No. AK-30-A (page 65)
for a retaliatory nuclear strike, BMEWS was a cornerstone of this
balance and continued in this role for the remainder of the Cold
War (although gradually supplemented with other early warning
systems) . In fact, despite the post-Sputnik panic that had
engendered its construction in 1958-60, BMEWS anticipated a
Soviet missile threat that did not become a reality until after
1962.
During 1963-65, Detachment 2 of the 71st Missile Warning Wing
continued to improve the performance of BMEWS Site II. During 9-
28 January and 28 January-5 March 1963, Site II logged 448 and
844 hours of green time, respectively. On 27 March 1964, the
tubular backstays installed on the antennae of the AN/FPS-50
detection radars (see Chapter II) were put to a severe test by
the "Good Friday" earthquake (measuring 8.4 on the Richter
scale). The operation of Site II was interrupted for six
minutes, but no lasting damage to the radars occurred. In 1965,
the site exceeded 2,000 hours of green time. 11
In August 1965, the Air Force finally began construction of
a tracking radar at BMEWS Site II. Although the original plans
had called for deployment of two AN/FPS-49 tracking radars at
Clear AFS, the Air Force had been forced to scale back these
plans due to cost, and no trackers were built at Site II during
1958-61 (see Chapter II). By 1965, some improvements had been
made in the tracker (now designated AN/FPS-92). The new radar
was installed on the concrete-reinforced roof of Building 102 and
enclosed within a 104' (32-meter) wide fiberglass radome. It
CLEAR AIR FORCE STATION BALLISTIC MISSILE EARLY WARNING SYSTEM SITE II
HAER No. AK-30-A (page 66)
reached initial operating capacity in June 1966. The AN/FPS-92
radar added some redundancy to Site II by providing further
confirmation of ICBM detection, although it was capable of
tracking only one target at any given time. Ultimately, the Site
II tracker was used primarily to provide space-tracking data. 12
On 1 January 1967, Detachment 2 was disbanded, and BMEWS
Site II was assigned to the 13th Missile Warning Squadron (13 MWS)
of the 71st Missile Warning Wing. The 13 MWS would remain in
charge of Clear AFS and the Alaskan BMEWS site until the end of
the Cold War and beyond (although it was reassigned to other Air
Force commands in later years). On 22 May of that year, 13 MWS
received an "outstanding" rating from the 9th Air Defense Division
in ADC, which was the first such rating received at a BMEWS site.
By November 1970, 13 MWS had achieved more than 6,500 hours of
uninterrupted green time, and received the Air Force Outstanding
Unit Award for the period 1 July 1968-31 May 1970 . 13
In December 1969, an automated tracking system was installed
at BMEWS Site II to improve the tracking of both missiles and
satellites. Earlier that year'· the U.S. Air Force began to
explore techniques for countering the interference to the radars
caused by the aurora borealis (or "northern lights"). This
involved a series of experiments in which clouds of ionized
barium were injected into the aurora in order to observe the
effects on the radar. In April 1970, new experiments were
performed with the University of Alaska in which clouds of sulfur
CLEAR AIR FORCE STATION BALLISTIC MISSILE EARLY WARNING SYSTEM SITE II
HAER No. AK-30-A (page 67)
hexaf louride were dispersed into the upper atmosphere to measure
their potential for reducing the interference of the aurora. 14
By 1969, the Soviet Union had begun to deploy submarines
("Yankee Class") armed with SLBMs (SS-N-6) off of the east coast
of North America. The deployment of SLBMs, which increased
significantly during 1971-74, represented the first serious
threat of ballistic missiles based outside the territory of the
Soviet Union since the Cuban crisis of 1962. The U.S. Air Force
therefore began to expand missile early warning coverage beyond
the polar region at this time. In 1971, seven new radars
(AN/FSS-7) located at various stations along the west, east, and
south coasts were activated for SLBM early warning. In addition
to the AN/FSS-7 units, the phased-array radar installed at Eglin
AFB in Florida (partially destroyed by fire in 1965 and rebuilt
by 1969) provided early warning of SLBMs from the Caribbean Sea. 15
By the beginning of the 1970s, BMEWS had become part of a larger
missile early warning radar network that covered most of the
North American perimeter. In the late 1970s, the Air Force began
to replace the AN/FSS-7 radars with more powerful phased-array
units (PAVE PAWS) to cope with later advances in Soviet SLBM
technology. 16
The 1970s became the most stable decade of the Cold War, and
the Soviet Union and the United States negotiated a series of
treaties that recognized the balance of strategic nuclear weapons
(primarily ICBMs and SLBMs) . The tense confrontations over
Berlin, Cuba, and other crisis points that had marked the period
CLEAR AIR FORCE STATION BALLISTIC MISSILE EARLY WARNING SYSTEM SITE II
HAER No. AK-30-A {page 68)
between 1948 and 1962 ceased, and, after the U.S. moon landing in
July 1969, the space race that had begun in 1957 also ended. The
Nixon and Ford administrations pursued an active policy of
detente, which was continued under President Carter during 1977-
79. BMEWS and the other early warning systems functioned quietly
throughout the decade in their supporting role as part of the
nuclear strategic balance. 11 At the end of the decade, Site II
had set a BMEWS record for more than 19,500 hours of
. d . . 18 uninterrupte green time.
The U.S. Air Force remained concerned about the potential
for Soviet jamming of BMEWS, and conducted several exercises
during the 1970s designed to test the ability of the system to
resist electronic countermeasures (ECM) . These included a joint
exercise that ADC held with Strategic Air Command in 1974
("Snotime 74-5"), in which four B-52 bombers subjected Site II to
live ECM. In 1977, Clear BMEWS was again tested for jamming
during an exercise ("Fencing Indian 77-5") with an EB-57
aircraft. 19
Although its primary function was early warning of ICBM
attack, tracking space objects was an important secondary role
for BMEWS, and it continued to improve its capabilities for
tracking satellites during the 1970s. At the same time, the
growing number of more advanced space tracking radars (such as
the AN/FPS-85 phased array at Eglin AFB) reduced the proportional
contribution of BMEWS space-tracking data. Although BMEWS had
provided as much as 25 percent of these data during the previous
CLEAR AIR FORCE STATION BALLISTIC MISSILE EARLY WARNING SYSTEM SITE II
HAER No. AK-30-A (page 69)
decade, this had declined to less than 1 percent by 1985. In
early 1973, Site II successfully tracked 95 percent of the space
objects assigned to it by NORAD, and in 1974, the BMEWS site at
Clear achieved a 100 percent tracking rate for the first time.
Integration with other space tracking facilities was improved in
1975 with a computer modification that allowed automatic data
transfer to the Perimeter Acquisition Radar (PAR) in North
Dakota. 20
After 1975, BMEWS Site II was repeatedly reassigned within
the organization of the Air Force. On 1 May 1971, the 13th
Missile Warning Squadron had become independent of the 71st
Missile Warning Wing and was shifted to the 14th Aerospace Force.
In October 1976, Clear AFS was reassigned from ADC to HQ Alaskan
Air Defense Command. In December 1979, BMEWS Site II became part
of the 15th Air Force in SAC (although operational control was
retained by NORAD). And finally in May 1983, the Air Force
shifted BMEWS to the 1st Space Wing within Space Command I where it
remained until the end of the Cold War. 21
Detente began to break down in the late 1970s as the nuclear
arms race continued, and the Soviet Union installed several
hundred medium range missiles (SS-20) in Eastern Europe. The
Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in December 1979 inaugurated a
period of renewed Cold War tensions, which were reflected in the
strident anti-Communist rhetoric of the Reagan administration
during the early 1980s. In March 1983, President Reagan proposed
development of an anti-ballistic missile defense system
CLEAR AIR FORCE STATION BALLISTIC MISSILE EARLY WARNING SYSTEM SITE II
HAER No. AK-30-A (page 70)
(Strategic Defense Initiative [SDI]), which threatened to end the
stable balance of mutual assured destruction based on opposing
ICBM and SLBM forces. 22 This would have significantly altered the
role of BMEWS and the other early warning systems, which would
have ceased to function as part of the deterrent of massive
nuclear retaliation.
By 1980, the BMEWS technology had become outdated and in
need of substantial upgrading. During the early part of that
year, the Air Force began a major overall of the equipment in the
Tactical Operations Room (TOR) in Building 102 at Site II.
However, the TOR upgrade program was abandoned in 1981 in the
face of "insurmountable problems" with the computer software. 23
Rapid advances in computer technology had left the original BMEWS
computers at the capability level of a hand calculator by mid
19 8 0 s standards . 24 Thus, the Air Force turned to replacement of
the IBM 7090s with new computers (Control Data Cyber 170/720s),
which was completed in late 1982. Testing and evaluation of the
new computers was completed in 1983, and the antique IBM 7090s
were dismantled during the following year. 25
In 1981, the Air Force also decided to replace the tracker
radome on Building 102, because the cardboard honeycomb between
the fiberglass sheets was deteriorating and creating a potential
fire hazard. The AN/FPS-92 radar was shut down in June of that
year, and no space tracking data could be provided to NORAD for
several months until the new aluminum-frame radome was in place. 26
The Air Force seriously considered upgrading Site II with a
~
CLEAR AIR FORCE STATION BALLISTIC MISSILE EARLY WARNING SYSTEM SITE II
HAER No. AK-30~A (page 71)
phased array unit at this time, which would have brought the
BMEWS radar up to the level of the early warning systems that had
been deployed after 1971. However, this plan was shelved, and
Site II continued to operate with the older technology for the
remainder of the Cold War and beyond (although BMEWS Sites I and
III were upgraded with phased array units during the 1990s) . 21
Ironically, the renewal of Cold War tensions after 1979 set
the stage for the end of the conflict. The acceleration in
defense spending that began in 1980 placed increasing economic
and political strain on the Soviet Union. When Gorbachev came to
power in 1985, he began a program of internal reform that was
closely tied to reduced pressure from the United States to
compete in the new weapons buildup. This eventually led to new
arms control agreements and changes in Soviet domestic and
foreign policy. The Soviet military withdrawal from Eastern
Europe in 1989 marked the end of the Cold War, and within two
years, the Soviet Union itself was dissolved. 28
The final years of the Cold War were uneventful ones at
Clear AFS. In December 1986, the Site II power plant was
formally recognized for 134,266 hours (i.e., 15 years) of
uninterrupted operation in support of the BMEWS mission. When
the Cold War ended in November 1989, Site II was still operating
with the monster klystron tubes that had been state-of-the-art
radar technology in 1958. A phased array unit was finally
installed in 2000, and the AN/FPS-92 tracker was deactivated in
January 2001.
CLEAR AIR FORCE STATION BALLISTIC MISSILE EARLY WARNING SYSTEM SITE II
HAER No. AK-30-A (page 720
BMEWS and the Cold War: An Assessment
The role played by BMEWS in the Cold War was important,
although it should not be exaggerated. The strategic role of
BMEWS seems to have been critical during the years between 1963
and 1970, but thereafter it was increasingly less significant.
With the exception of a brief period during the fall of 1962
(when Soviet IRBMs in Cuba were operational), the strategic
nuclear threat to the United States prior to 1970 was confined to
the polar region. After 1962, that threat became real as the
Soviet Union finally deployed an effective ICBM force within its
borders. During this period, BMEWS was the primary early warning
system for a nuclear attack on North America and the means for
ensuring the survival (and deterrent value) of a U.S. nuclear
counterstrike. Although launch detection was provided by MIDAS
during the 1960s, the satellites lacked the capability of ICBM
tracking and impact prediction.
After 1970, changes occurred in the deployment of strategic
nuclear forces and early warning systems. The Soviet Union began
to deploy SLBMs off the coasts of North America, rendering the
"polar concept" of the early Cold War obsolete. In 1971, the
United States installed new early warning radars to provide
coverage of these areas (and during the previous year, the United
States had launched the first Defense Support Program [DSP]
satellite, which substantially improved satellite missile
detection). In 1974, the Perimeter Acquisition Radar (PAR) in
North Dakota, which was part of the Safeguard ABM system, became
CLEAR AIR FORCE STATION BALLISTIC MISSILE EARLY WARNING SYSTEM SITE II
HAER No. AK-30-A (page 73)
operational and provided complementary radar coverage of the
polar region with the capability of tracking multiple targets.
Additional early warning radar coverage of the western polar
region was provided by the Cobra Dane phased array in the
Aleutians, which became opera,tional in 1976. By the mid 1970s,
BMEWS was part of a much larger network of missile early warning
sensors and radars. Furthermore, its role within this network
was constrained by comparatively primitive technology.
BMEWS represented a major engineering achievement, but not a
revolution in radar or computer technology. It was essentially a
scaling up of World War II era radar to meet the requirements of
detecting small high-velocity targets (ballistic missiles) at
extreme distance. The necessary advances in radars and computing
power for a missile early warning system were achieved largely
during 1951-56 with development of the AN/FPS-17 coded pulse
radar and the AN/FSQ-7 computer (Whirlwind II). Although widely
perceived in 1958 as an emergency measure against an unexpected
Soviet ICBM threat, BMEWS had actually been under development for
several years (and, in any case, Soviet ICBM capabilities
remained virtually nonexistent during the first few years of its
operation} .
v~
Chapter III Notes
CLEAR AIR FORCE STATION BALLISTIC MISSILE EARLY WARNING SYSTEM SITE II
HA.ER No. AK-30-A (page 74)
1Winkler, David F., Searching the Skies: The Legacy of the United States Cold War Defense Radar Program. (United States Air Force 1997), pp. 52-56.
2Ray, Thomas W., History of BMEWS 1957 - 1964. (ADC Historical Study No. 32), pp. 26-28.
3Toomay, John C., "Warning and Assessment Sensors," in A.B. Carter, J.D. Steinbruner, and C.A. Zraket (editors) .Managing Nuclear Operations. (Washington, The Brookings Institution 1987), pp . 3 0 5 - 3 0 6 .
4 Ibid, p. 296.
5Ra y , pp . 2 8 - 2 9 .
6 l3th Missile Warning Squadron, History 30 September 1961 to 31 May 1983; BMEWS Site II Clear Air Force Station Alaska, Keeping Track for Twenty-Five Years 1961-1986.
7Meisel, Robert C., MITRE The First Twenty Years: A History of the MITRE Corporation (1958-1978). (Bedford, Mass., The MITRE Corporation 1979), pp. 28-38; Winter Study Report: The Challenge of Command and Control. (31 March 1961).
8Bundy, McGeorge, Danger and Survival: Choices about the Bomb in the First Fifty Years. (New York, Random House 1988), pp. 391-462; Winkler, pp. 53-54.
9Holloway, David, The Soviet Union and the Arms Race. Second Edition. (New Haven, Yale University Press 1983), pp. 43-55.
10Bundy, pp. 549-550.
1113th Missile Warning Squadron, p. 8.
12Murakami, F. S., Operations Report II-70-03. Site II Tracker. (Clear, Alaska, ITT-Arctic Services 1970); Whorton, Mandy and Hoffecker, John, Historic Properties of the Cold War Era: Clear Air Station, Alaska. (Prepared for 21st Space Wing, Air Force Space Conunand), p. 23.
13 l3th Missile Warning Squadron, pp. 8-9.
14 Ibid, pp. 8-9.
15Winkler, pp. 49-54.
16Winkler, pp. 54-56; Whorton, Mandy, Deter and Defend: The History of the Development and Operation of the PAVE PAWS Radar
CLEAR AIR FORCE STATION BALLISTIC MISSILE EARLY WARNING SYSTEM SITE II
HAER No. AK-30-A (page 75)
Network. (Prepared for 21st Space Wing I u. s. Air Force Space Command 2001).
17Kissinger, Henry, Diplomacy (New York, Simon and Schuster 1994) , pp. 703-761.
H13~ • 'l • S d 5 Missi e Warning qua ron, p. .
19 Ibid, p. 5 ·
20 Ibid, p. 9 ·
21Ibid, pp. 9-10.
22Arnbrose, Stephen E., Rise to Globalism: American Foreign Policy Since 1938. Seventh Revised Edition. (New York, 'Penguin Books 1993) .
23 l3th Missile Warning Squadron, p. 11; Whorton and Hoffecker, p. 27.
24Toomay, p. 296.
25BMEWS Site II Clear Air Force Station, Alaska.
26Ibid.
27Whorton ahd Hoffecker, p. 27.
2°Kissinger, pp. 762-803.
CLEAR AIR FORCE STATION BALLISTIC MISSILE EARLY WARNING SYSTEM SITE II
HA.ER No. AK-30-A (page 76)
BIBLIOGRAPHY
The HAER historical narrative for BMEWS at Clear AFS, Alaska
is based on an array of primary and secondary sources. The
latter include various sources on the background of radar and
ballistic missile development.
Government Documents
13th Missile Warning Squadron. lfh Missile Warning Squadron
History: 30 September 1961 to 31 May 1983. Clear (AK): Clear
AFS, 1983.
Alaskan Air Command. Visitors' Briefing. Clear, Alaska: BMEWS
Site II. November 1983.
BMEWS Site II Clear Air Force Station Alaska, Keeping Track for
Twenty-Five Years 1961-1986. 13 September 1986.
Cloe, J. H. Short History, U.S. Military in Alaska. Anchorage:
Office of History, Eleventh Air Force, 1981.
U.S. Air Force BMEWS Project Office. BMEWS Rearward
Cormnunications System Equipment: A Pictorial Essay. Bedford
(MA): U.S. Air Force, 1961.
Reports
Denfeld, D. C. The Cold War in Alaska: A Management Plan for
Cultural Resources. Anchorage: U.S. Army Corps of Engineers,
1994.
Murakami, F. S. Operations Report II-70-03. Site II Tracker.
Clear (AK): ITT-Arctic Services, 1970.
CLEAR AIR FORCE STATION BALLISTIC MISSILE EARLY WARNING SYSTEM SITE II
HAER No. AK-30-A (page 77)
Pettengill, G. H. and Dustin, D. E. "A Comparison of Selected
ICBM Warning Radar Configurations." Lincoln Laboratory
Technical Report No. 127. Lexington, Mass., MIT Lincoln
Laboratory 13 August 1956.
Ray, T. W. History of BMEWS 1957-1964. ADC Historical Study No.
32, undated.
Reynolds, G. L. Historical Overview and Inventory: White Alice
Communications System. Anchorage: U.S. Army Corps of
Engineers, 1988.
Whorton, M. Deter and Defend: The History of the Development and
Operation of the PAVE PAWS Radar Network. (Prepared for 21st
Space Wing, U.S. Air Force Space Command 2001).
Whorton, M. and J. Hoffecker. Historic Properties of the Cold War
Era, Clear Air Station, Alaska. Unpublished report prepared
for 21st Space Wing, Air Force Space Command, October 1997.
Winkler, David F. Searching the Skies: The Legacy of the United
States Cold War Defense Radar Program. HQ Air Combat
Command: United States Air Force, 1997.
Winter Study Report: The Challenge of Command and Control. (31
March 1961).
Journal Articles
Fusca, J. A. "Army Reveals BMEWS Radar Site Details." A via ti on
Week, 28 July 1958, pp. 19-20.
Klass, P. J. "First BMEWS Nears Operational Status." Aviation
Week 72 (May 30), pp. 76-85, 1960.
CLEAR AIR FORCE STATION BALLISTIC MISSILE EARLY WARNING SYSTEM SITE II
HAER No. AK-30-A {page 78)
Klass, P. J. "BMEWS Uses Discrimination Techniques." Aviation
Week, 6 March 1961, pp. 70-74.
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