One Of My Traumas

by Wayne
(Savannah, Georgia)

I was in the US Air Force and was stationed in a northern tier location. I worked in the nuclear missile field as a computer technician where I made repairs on the nuclear launch facilities. That is where the control of launching nuclear missiles takes place.

The nuclear mission is a 24hr, seven days a week, 366 days a year war ready mission. There is no real down time. It is an environment where a group of people attempt to be literally perfect. Zero-defect is not just a goal but a mandate. The inspections, training, testing, practicing and implementation is constant. Commanders come and go because of the micro mistakes that take place solely due to the fact that it is imperfect beings that created the weapon, the system, and the cause for the need of the weapon.

The mission is not about controlling a territory or stopping some supply line of the enemy. It is not like any other military mission. Surely, shooting an individual or some large force of people armed to the teeth with the intent of killing you and yours, or bombing some other group of souls defending their own as directed is truly a horrible event. It is different from the strategic nuclear mission because it can be understood and seen in terms of all of the actions in front of you. It is insane, but one can still wrap oneself around the vision.

The issue with the strategic nuclear mission is that it is so big, it is so destructive, it is so devastating, that a person can’t even fathom the action of launching such an attack. This is not Hiroshima. This is the planet herself, set ablaze and covered with an element that will surely destroy most, if not all, life. Our world would be as Mars or the Moon. It is so big that Albert Einstein himself stated that it would ignite the very atmosphere that surrounds the Earth.

I had been trained that if this attack were to take place, I would have approximately eleven minutes to live. Huge numbers of bombs at enormous megatons of nuclear power would fall on me leaving quarter mile deep holes, three miles in diameter, all around me. I, of course, was a part of the same process that would do the same to those who had insanely brought this all to be.

It did almost come to be. It was a very few small seconds that separated the story of a blue earth and the story of the new Mars.

I and one of my peers had been called out in the night to go to a launch control facility to repair a computer. It was something that we had done a hundred of times before. It would not end like the others before.

We were inside of the facility working on the computer. The computer is a collection of dresser drawer like assemblies that are stacked one on top of each other and plugged into a cabinet to become a whole working machine. In the back of the cabinet are the plugs that the drawers plug into and connect all of the other drawers together. I was standing with half of my body inside of one of these cabinets repairing one of these plugs. In the background were the sound of commands coming over the speakers telling the officers what to do, usually intended to cause the officers to run around and go through the steps of practicing their trade. I had heard it so many times that even I began to understand what was about to be done next by the officers.

Tonight was different. There I was, inside of this machine, listening to the commands coming over the intercom, when I realized that something was very different. Suddenly I heard the sound of two guns being charged. In my head I was thinking, CRAP. Even as I was slowly coming out of the cabinet from this bent over position I heard the officers tell me to come out, step to the back of the facility, sit down on the floor, put the pillow in front of my face and don’t move, or I will be shot. My co-worker was already there. As we sat there side by side we had front row seats to a real nuclear launch. Every step we had seen practiced over and over again was being played out with great speed and precision. No extra talking was heard. Only the commands over the intercom combined with the coordination of the officers preparing to launch the missiles could be heard.

I can’t begin to describe the feelings. I can only remember the thoughts of, “These fools are really going to do it.” I thought about how my family and friends were all on top and what was going to happen. I thought about how none of any of that would soon matter because there would be nothing left to matter. The idea of surviving turned into a wish to die than see the results, even as if this were to be a choice. I heard the countdown working its way down and eventually getting to 10,9,8,7,6,5,4,3 and then all of a sudden more commands came across the intercom.

The officers started to fly around the facility flipping switches, pushing buttons, pulling keys out of the ever so important control console. It had been stopped.

Again I can’t explain the feelings. I look back and realize that I felt so out of my own body that it was as if I was watching the whole affair from some other place. My co-worker and I quickly finished up the job, packed up our gear and left the site. None of us there spoke a single word to each other. The hundred mile drive home was oddly short and without conversation. We arrived back on the base, put our gear away and went hone like it was just another day on the farm.

I found out later that the Russians had launched two weather satellites at the same time without telling anyone. This set off the automated launch system. It was stopped by the last person in the check and balance system who stopped the launch.

It was a couple of years after I retired from the service that I began screaming in my sleep that everyone is going to die. I don’t remember doing this but my wife said that I did it almost every night for years. It caused my wife to suffer from sleep deprivation, and it put an amazing strain on our marriage.

Hundreds of hours of therapy later, which involved the release of gallons of tears, intense anger, amazing guilt, terrible sadness, unimaginable grief, and years of lost sleep, I began to feel better. I can say that as I write this account I find that I still have a few feelings left to clean out. I desire peace and therefore will spend the time needed to heal these surfacing memories and feelings. I will give them their time and be patient with myself as I have had to learn to do. I am important and deserve to feel calm while being able to glean a certain amount of wisdom from going through the fire and seeing the beauty on the other side.

Response from Dr. DeFoore

Thank you, Wayne. This is an experience that thankfully, few human beings will ever have to go through. It is so big, that as you say, it's hard to wrap your mind around it. I guess the best place to go is gratitude. Gratitude that the countdown was stopped. Gratitude that we are alive and here on this beautiful planet today. Gratitude that you have the courage and wherewithal to do the work to heal this unthinkable trauma, and find peace in your soul.