Montana – America

Montana in Amerika het meer as net ‘n spookdorp om te wys.    Ou geboue, huise, meubels, eie boustyle – restourasie is puik gedoen op Garnet.  Dis so jammer dat ons eie ou goud of ander myn-dorpies so tot niet geplunder, afgebreek, afgebrand en nie bewaar word nie.   Dit kon net ekstra toeriste aantreklikhede gebied het, asook ekstra inkomstes vir eienaars.    Die algehele skoonheid van die natuur laat ook ‘n blywende indruk, al is dit net via beeldmateriaal.

Garnet Ghost Town seeks volunteer resident | State & Regional ...

 

*

These are the 300 tallest named peaks in Montana. The list of peaks was derived from the U.S. Geological Survey’s Geographic Names Information System (http://gnis.usgs.gov), and their elevations are the elevations shown on USGS 1:24,000 scale topographic maps.

The county name for each peak is also from the GNIS, which only shows one county for each peak, even though it may be on a boundary shared by several counties. A list of the tallest peaks in each of Montana’s mountain ranges is also available.

You may click on the name of a peak to view it on a map.

http://geoinfo.msl.mt.gov/geography/geography_facts/montanaxs_300_tallest_peaks.aspx

*

Ghost town

The houses are old and impressive.   Even the equipment used.

High in the mountains of western Montana you will find a REAL ghost town, Garnet, one of Montana’s best preserved and least visited. Garnet was started in 1895 when gold was discovered. The town thrived with over 1,200 miners and their families. Garnet had four hotels, four stores, two barbershops, a butcher shop, a doctor’s office, laundry facilities and thirteen saloons. It even had stagecoach service!

After a few years the gold ran out and so did the population. It dwindled down to 150 people by 1905. In 1912 a fire wiped out half of the commercial buildings and was never rebuilt. What you see today are efforts of stabilization, preservation and restoration from many volunteers who are dedicated to help preserve Montana’s rich mining history. Congratulations to each and every one of you!

*

Montana state – aka Big Sky Country, The Treasure State, Land of the Shining Mountains, The Last Best Place. Visit Libby Dam, Kalispell & Whitefish Mountains. An HD aerial experience – full-length Episode journey of ‘The World From Above HD.’ Great if you plan to visit or if you want to learn about Montana.

*

Beautiful mountains

Enjoy some of the best places and views of Glacier National Park: Going-To-The-Sun Road, Highline Trail, Grinnell Glacier Trail, Scenic Point Trail, Iceberg Lake Trail. Recorded September 2014 in 4K (Ultra HD) with Sony AX100.

*

History of Nuclear Weapon Storage in Montana

During the Cold War, the United States had nuclear missile silos all over the nation, and Montana is one of the states whose physical evidence of nuclear warhead storage serves as a reminder of the Cold War and the potential for disaster, a memory that still rings true today. In Montana, Malmstrom Air Force Base, located near the city of Great Falls, was the epicenter of nuclear warhead silo construction (Fig. 1). [1] After the Cold War, treaties led to efforts to decrease ICBM (Intercontinental Ballistic Missile) warheads across the country. [2] Malmstrom Air Force Base remains a location where fifty since-emptied ICBM silos have just been destroyed as part of the effort to change America’s nuclear stockpile. Montana has been intertwined with the United States’ nuclear history, and remains part of the story today.

At the time of the Cold War Era, Malmstrom Air Force Base was home to over two hundred IMCB’s and silos (Fig. 2), but legislation has made it so changes have occurred over the last fifty years. [3] Previously, Malmstrom was one of just three locations that shared five hundred ICMB warheads, a number that has since shrunk due to global efforts to reduce nuclear warheads after the signing of the Moscow Treaty in 2002. The base in Great Falls, Montana was one of the epicenters of nuclear missile storage for decades, and it took until the turn of the century for change to be set into motion. [3] The weapons housed at Malmstrom are called Minuteman III warheads, a specific type of ICBM that can have up to three warheads, as opposed to the long-outlawed ICBMs called the Peacekeepers. [3] Although the military has been pursuing a replacement for the Minuteman III missiles for some time, they are still the current type of missile included in military strategy that involves nuclear stockpiles and and speaks to America’s omnipresent goal of global dominance. Although views of nuclear power and how it should be involved with global politics are changing alongside the number of warheads, Malmstrom Air Force Base and Montana have been important factors in supporting the diplomacy of the United States on a global scale.

Every Minuteman III missile initially contained three warheads. [3] Across the US, this added up to a total of 1,500 warheads in total at the military’s disposal. [3] In 2001, to meet the START (Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty) limit of 6,000 warheads, the United States removed two warheads from each of the one hundred-fifty Minuteman missiles at an Air Force Base not far from Malmstrom, which meant that the Minuteman III force shrunk down to 1,200 total warheads. According to Amy F. Woolf, a specialist in nuclear weapons policy, “During the downsizing process, the Air Force also removed and destroyed the bulkhead, the platform on the reentry vehicle, so that, in accordance with START rules, these missiles can no longer carry three warheads”. [3] Woolf’s insight into START and its affect on nuclear stockpiles across the United States highlights some key technologies related to the Minuteman warheads. Before diplomatic efforts led to changes in the warheads themselves, they all contained three warheads, which meant either a greater amount of damage upon impact than a basic missile, or the ability to break off and hit three different targets after launch. Woolf also mentions the “bulkhead,” which is part of a technology that streamlines how the missile uses its nuclear capabilities while heading downwards upon a given target.

© Sam Werner. The author grants permission to copy, distribute and display this work in unaltered form, with attribution to the author, for noncommercial purposes only. All other rights, including commercial rights, are reserved to the author.

http://large.stanford.edu/courses/2017/ph241/werner1/

*

The article’s authors – Hans M. Kristensen of the Federation of American Scientists and Robert S. Norris of the Natural Resources Defense Council – identified the likely locations by piecing together information from years of monitoring declassified documents, officials statements, news reports, leaks, conversations with current and former officials, and commercial high-resolution satellite photos.    read more:

https://fas.org/blogs/security/2006/11/new_article_where_the_bombs_ar/

*

2005

Two such incidents during the Cold War era nearly started World War III. When silo doors open, it indicates the intention to launch missiles against another nation.

According to an essay published by the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation (NAPF), an organization dedicated to abolition of nuclear weapons: “The US experienced several near-accidents at its Cheyenne Mountain early warning station in the late 1970s. Twice, the equipment at the base generated false indications of a nuclear missile strike from Russia and nearly prompted US retaliation on both occasions.”

According to Phil Patton, author of “Dreamland: A Cultural History of Area 51,” an incident also occurred in 1980 in which “a multiplexer chip failed in a Nova 840 computer and sent a false missile warning to the national command center.” Pattons says that it was the second such incident in less than a year. “In the first one, fake data from a war-sim was mistaken for the real thing, and the Pentagon was notified that a Soviet missile strike was under way. It took about eight minutes to determine that the end of the world was not, in fact, at hand.”

Today, there are 200 Inter-Continental Ballistic Missiles at Malmstrom Air Force Base at five missile alert facilities in Montana, with four operational missile squadrons assigned as combat-ready forces to continuously operate, maintain, and secure “strategic nuclear deterrence.”

One of these squadrons declares on its web page that its squadron works “every day of the year, 24 hours per day” to “keep America free by operating and safeguarding her most destructive power.”

According to the NAPF essayist, Justin Murray, “Despite the end of the Cold War, the United States and Russia once again find themselves on the brink of a nuclear Armageddon,” but the threat “does not stem from hostilities or a premeditated, intentional strike but from miscalculation and computer errors.” Murray states that both the U.S. and Russia maintain thousands of nuclear weapons in launch warning mode. While launch procedures in the U.S. demand almost instantaneous decision-making by the President, the situation in Russia is even more hazardous, where decay of early warning systems elevate the possibility of false alarms.

Of course, the unasked and unanswered question here is: what about terrorists?

There seems to be no indication that the incident in Montana is a terrorist-related one. However, the incident begs two crucial questions: first, are our systems inadequately protected?, and second, does the increase in development of more nuclear weapons under President Bush create greater dangers? (We already have approximately 9600 warheads and are talking about developing a new line of small nuclear weapons called “bunker busters.”)

The answers are no and no.

First, the systems are inadequately protected because whenever you have a very sophisticated electronic system (and, in this case, systems), there is the potential for an accident ­ and already there have been enough incidents to warrant shutting these dangerous systems down.

Second, there is no such thing as adequate control of nuclear weapons. Their management and control simply cannot be guaranteed. The return to proliferation of nuclear weapons is risking an End Game ­ THE End Game. Although we might labor under the false belief that the Nuclear Genie is back in the bottle, even if she is, the cork is definitely not on.

The incident in Montana, which may never make it into the mainstream press, proves this.

Nuclear Incident in Montana

Jennifer Van Bergen, J.D., is the author of The Twilight of Democracy: The Bush Plan for America (Common Courage Press, 2004). She has written and spoken extensively on civil liberties, human rights, and international law. She and Raymond Del Papa are currently organizing a major Forum on Dissent Since 9/11 in Miami from March 11-13. See www.partnersinprotest.org. She may be contacted at jvbxyz@earthlink.net

*
This Tiny Montana Town Is One Of The Happiest Places In America ...

Laat 'n boodskap

Verskaf jou besonderhede hieronder of klik op 'n logo om in te teken:

WordPress.com Logo

Jy lewer kommentaar met jou rekening by WordPress.com. Log Out /  Verander )

Twitter picture

Jy lewer kommentaar met jou rekening by Twitter. Log Out /  Verander )

Facebook photo

Jy lewer kommentaar met jou rekening by Facebook. Log Out /  Verander )

Connecting to %s