An Evening with a Minuteman

The Mixed Metaphors and Messages at Vandenberg

Back on May 20, I had an opportunity to watch an interesting outdoor show titled “Glory Trip 256.” I was accompanied by two other folks: one came from Salinas, the other from Los Angeles. We drove down Highway 1, turned onto Mountain View Boulevard, and then parked our cars at Vandenberg Middle School, popularly known as the “Home of the Minuteman.”

It was the Minuteman that we came to see, but not the one on the sign at the entrance to the school parking lot. That sign had an image of a man wearing a Tricorn Colonial hat, holding a long gun — not exactly an ideal welcoming figure given the many mass school shootings that take place in the U.S. No, we were there for the Minuteman III, an Intercontinental Ballistic Missile (ICBM) that was set to launch and is capable of carrying multiple nuclear warheads. Held in an underground silo at Vandenberg Space Force Base (VSFB), the missile had been shipped in from one of the military basesin Wyoming, Montana, or North Dakota that have armed ICBMs in silos ready to fire.

Vandenberg Middle School is a public school located on military property under “exclusive jurisdiction” belonging to VSFB. A “designated protest area” is located near the main gate of the base, across Highway 1 from the school parking lot. That’s where my colleagues and I stood that evening, protesting and looking to the night sky, awaiting the launch of the ICBM.

At one minute past midnight, the Minuteman began its “glory trip” that would end within a half hour, approximately 4,200 miles away at Kwajalein Atoll in the Marshall Islands. We saw little glory in the launch of the ICBM, but much eeriness.

The missile initially seemed silent as we watched it climb above the base, giving off a spectacular glare generated by its flaming exhaust. After a few seconds we heard its rumble. After a few minutes the missile disappeared out of sight, heading west over the Pacific Ocean.

We were somewhat awed, somewhat afraid, and somewhat angered by the spectacle. After all, we were observing the most powerful and deadly weapon in human history, thankfully unarmed during the test.

The U.S. military has 400 ICBMs in silos on alert, ready to be fired. They are operated and maintained by “10,000 elite warfighters,” according to the U.S. Department of War. These ICBMs are thermonuclear bombs employing fusion, far greater in power than the atomic fission bombs that the U.S. dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki on August 6 and August 9 of 1945, respectively.

The destruction to be rendered by a deployed, armed Minuteman III ICBM is humongous. Its purpose is to devastate necessary infrastructure and slaughter hundreds of thousands of nonmilitary, innocent people.

Astoundingly, the 400 Minuteman III missiles have been in use — on alert but not fired off — for more than 55 years. The U.S. is working on producing more deadly ICBM Sentinel missiles to replace the Minuteman IIIs in the early 2030s. According to the Air and Space Forces Magazine, these new ICBMs will cost over $140 billion.

So, the new ICBM monsters will be younger and more powerful. The Sentinel ICBMs are also expected to be operable up to 2075, i.e., 45 years. We have Northrop Grumman Corporation to thank for producing this “young Frankenstein.”

And the land-based ICBMs are only one of the arms of the U.S. Nuclear Triad, which includes fighter jets and submarines capable of delivering nuclear bombs. Moreover, the Department of War is calling for upgrading all three. This military upgrading is consistent with the “peace through strength” and “warrior ethos” promulgated by Secretary of War Pete Hegseth.