![]() ![]() For example, a moderate readiness level would allow the missile to be launched within one hour, and included inserted flight path data and initiation of the missile’s onboard guidance system. Generally, decreased start-up time would be sacrificed for the missile’s shelf life in any configuration. Overlay by Authorsįour identical silos housed the R-12 missiles, with each kept at a different level of combat launch readiness in the event of nuclear war. Western European capitals within the effective range of the Tirza SS-4 Sandal missiles. From their initial fielding in 1959 through the 1980s, the Sandals were the mainstay of Soviet nuclear missile forces in Europe, and became infamous in 1962 when 42 of them were revealed in Cuba. Placed on the western edges of the Soviet Union due to their limited range of 2,000 kilometers, the Sandals could reach targets as far west as London. Our destination in the vicinity of this sleepy little town was an enormous subterranean Dvina missile silo complex, once the home of R-12 medium-range ballistic missiles (NATO designation: SS-4 Sandal) of the Soviet nuclear arsenal. ![]() It seemed we were more interesting to them than the scandalously-dressed teenage Russian pop-stars on TV, and the gaze lasted the full duration of our Latvian truck stop dinner. We occupied a table in the corner and noticed two other patrons giving us a piercing stare. The place was a far cry from a favorable Yelp review, but it was the only open restaurant in the isolated municipality of Gulbene. “Da?” (Да) muttered the broad-shouldered man behind the diner counter, eyes apathetically glancing at the television mounted in the corner of the room playing Russian pop music videos. ![]() In this part, they explore the remnants of the Soviet nuclear missile infrastructure in Latvia and Estonia. In the first of this two part series, they showed War on the Rocks readers what they saw in an abandoned Soviet military city. The former missile site is over the top of the monument in the distance.Editor’s note: In December 2015, two Army intelligence officers set out on a trip to explore the mysterious remnants of the Soviet Union in the Baltic States. The cover is 11.5" in diameter and is solid aluminum. The photos below were taken at another site which still has the pedestal with the cover cap in place. "USAF Property $250 Fine or Imprisonment For Disturbing This Mark". With the cap slightly off the top and titling toward the camera, the wording reads: The aluminum cover on the top of the monument. The Atlas Missile silo is in the distance over the top of the monument. Coast & Geodetic Survey established first-order level lines to each of the missile sites, so there should be precise bench marks in the immediate vicinity of each site. All of the silos are now abandoned and are on private property.Īlso in 1961 during the construction of these silos, the U. An older farmer in that area told me that during the "Cuban Missile Crisis" in October of 1962 the missile at this site was out of its silo and was ready to fire. I took these photos around 1991, and at that time the aluminum cover was still present on top of the concrete pedestal. The monument in the photos below was near the Eagle, Nebraska site. It is my understanding that each site had survey monuments established near them that were used for the alignment of the missiles once they were brought up out of the silos. In 1961 there were twelve Atlas "F" Missile sites constructed in southeast Nebraska as offensive nuclear weapons to be used against the Soviet Union during the Cold War. Nebraska Atlas Missile Silo - Survey Monument ![]()
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