Command and Control: Nuclear Weapons, the Damascus Accident, and the Illusion of Safety

by Eric Schlosser

The new SIOP divided the “optimum mix” into three separate target groups: Soviet nuclear forces, conventional military forces, and urban-industrial areas. The president could decide to attack only the first group, the first two groups, or all three. Moscow, China, and cities in the Eastern bloc could selectively be spared from destruction. The SIOP could be launched as a first strike or as retaliation. But all the attack options still required that the Soviet Union be hit by thousands of nuclear weapons, far more than were necessary for “assured destruction.” The three target categories of the SIOP—Alpha, Bravo, Charlie—were the same as those in the attack plan proposed by SAC in 1950.