“In the 1950s, President Eisenhower created the U.S. highway system with this kind of dual-use in mind. He modeled America’s original “National System of Interstate and Defense Highways” after “the superlative system of German autobahn,”138 he wrote in his presidential memoirs. Not only could U.S. highways facilitate large-scale evacuation of cities in a nuclear war, but the broad, flat interstate lanes could be used as runways for takeoff and landings on bombing runs. For setting down a helicopter in the median strip, or along the side of the road in the grass. This is how many of America’s mid-century transportation systems were designed.”
―
Annie Jacobsen,
Nuclear War: A Scenario
