Twenty years ago, the Air Force activated its first Ground Launched Cruise Missile wing in Europe. The Short, Happy Life of the Glick-Em

By Peter Grier

The Ground Launched Cruise Missile, with its combined transport and launch vehicle shown here, had a short operational life but proved to be an effective counter to Soviet SS-20 intermediate-range missiles.

N JULY 1, 1982, USAF’s 501st of the nuclear-tipped cruise missiles. of the Western alliance’s determina- Tactical Missile Wing was These anti-nuclear zealots even briefly tion to be able to fight and win a activated at RAF penetrated a perimeter fence pro- nuclear war, if necessary. In short Common in Great Britain. That tecting the base against intruders. they were, by definition, bad. Ostep—taken 20 years ago this month— A makeshift “” had been “They don’t add to our security, marked the start of what would prove established outside the main gate. but [they] increase our insecurity,” to be a major political upheaval in Resident activists vowed to live there asserted Bruce Kent, who was at the Europe. Noisy protesters came early indefinitely in an attempt to force time the head of Britain’s Campaign for the arrival of the wing’s first NATO to abandon its planned deploy- for . batch of Ground Launched Cruise ment of several hundred BGM-109G Missiles. However, US troops brought GLCM (pronounced “glick-em”) Now They’re Gone them in late at night, as the protest- weapons and the US Army’s nuclear- Today, all of the GLCMs are gone, ers slept. tipped Pershing II ballistic missiles. withdrawn from Greenham Common Flash forward 18 months, to Dec. The burgeoning Western anti- and every other NATO base in Europe 12, 1983. Greenham Common on that nuclear movement did not regard and dismantled. The huge M.A.N. day was besieged by thousands of these new weapons as a much-needed (Maschinenfabrik AugsburgÐNuern- women anti-nuclear activists. They counter to the ’s SS-20 berg) diesel tractors no longer haul were chanting, singing, and blowing intermediate-range missiles. For the the GLCM canisters around the sur- trumpets in protest of the presence protesters, they were a terrifying sign rounding Salisbury Plain on mid-

70 AIR FORCE Magazine / July 2002 night deployment exercises, as they once did. The protests are no more. However, the demonstrations had nothing to do with the removal of the weapons. Contrary to the protesters’ beliefs, the GLCMs (and their stra- tegic cousins, the Pershing IIs) did not destabilize the West. In fact,

NATO’s deployment of the weapons USAF photo by SSgt. James Pearson in the face of popular unrest had a destabilizing effect in the other di- rection. The West’s ability to stand firm and carry out the deployments in the face of nerve-wracking Soviet threats convinced the Kremlin that NATO could not be intimidated. It was this realization that led to the opening of the more serious In- termediate-range Nuclear Forces (INF) talks and an INF treaty that eventually removed an entire class of Anti-nuclear protesters feared GLCMs would destablize the West. By 1981 they nuclear arms from the superpower established a permanent “peace camp” outside the main gate of Greenham arsenals—a major step in the weak- Common. ening and ultimate dissolution of the Soviet Union itself. makers were unable to duplicate the to stop and then reduce its SS-20 The GLCM existed for less than a sophisticated guidance systems of US deployments. decade. Because the weapon system GLCMs. For the Western alliance, the mat- had such a short operational life, The GLCM deployment of the ter went far beyond the need to have some Air Force members had the 1980s had roots in political events of equivalent forces. NATO’s worry unusual experience of being on hand the 1970s. By the middle of that de- was that, in nuclear parlance of the at both the beginning and the end. cade, it had become clear to NATO time, the Soviet buildup would The happy circumstances of its de- planners that the Soviet Union in- “decouple” the defense of Europe mise also gave many GLCM person- tended to undertake a concerted ef- from the US strategic nuclear arse- nel the feeling that they had helped fort to modernize its Intermediate- nal. In other words, Moscow might shape world events for the better. range Nuclear Force targeted on believe it could threaten Western “We thought GLCM held a very NATO Europe. Europe’s high-value targets—ports, important place in history,” said re- rear-echelon areas, and the like— tired Col. Doug Livingston, former The SS-20 Threat with SS-20 nuclear attack and not commander of the 868th Tactical Until that time, the most threaten- provoke US retaliation because it Missile Training Group. “It was one ing weapons aimed at Western Eu- was not threatening US strategic of the key elements that helped win rope were the single-warhead SS-4 weapons or US soil. the .” and SS-5 theater missiles, based at Deployment of NATO INF forces Throughout the tumultuous years vulnerable fixed sites. In 1977, how- was an attempt to make the West’s of USÐSoviet INF negotiations, the ever, Soviet forces began to field the nuclear deterrent more credible, by Army’s Pershing II tended to get the new SS-20, a missile fitted with three providing commanders nuclear op- most media attention. It was big, pow- accurate, independently retargetable tions short of all-out retaliatory war. erful, accurate, and fast-flying. It warheads. Worse, its launcher was Western Europe’s leaders, in par- would have been the weapon of choice highly mobile, allowing their dispersal ticular, were eager to show that the to strike time-sensitive Soviet targets at times of tension. Each launcher continent was still shielded by the in the event of all-out war. was equipped with refire missiles. US strategic nuclear umbrella de- In some ways, however, the GLCM This signified an increase in Soviet spite the existence of the SS-20 threat. was the system most feared by the firepower on a tremendous scale. Harold Brown, the Secretary of Soviets. For one thing, they were to By 1979, Soviet forces had fielded Defense, told Congress in a 1980 be more numerous than the Pershings. SS-20s in significant numbers. In message: “We do not plan to match Plans called for deployment of 464 that year, NATO political leaders the Soviet program system by sys- cruise missiles in Belgium, Britain, agreed on a historic “dual track” ap- tem or warhead by warhead, which Italy, Netherlands, and West Ger- proach to solving the problem. One might be construed as an attempt to many. By contrast, NATO forces track was political: The West would create a European nuclear balance were to receive only 108 Pershing attempt to engage the Soviets in se- separate from the overall strategic IIs, and they would be based only in rious talks aimed at curbing the INF relationship. ... Instead, we seek to West Germany. forces of both sides. The other track strengthen the linkage of US strate- The GLCMs also represented an was military: NATO would deploy gic forces to the defense of Europe.” area of NATO technological superi- in Europe hundreds of GLCMs and NATO planners chose to deploy a ority. At the time, Soviet weapons- Pershing IIs unless Moscow agreed pair of weapons to counter the So-

AIR FORCE Magazine / July 2002 71 viet SS-20 because the GLCM and ways smooth. Engineers found that contractor. McDonnell Douglas made the Pershing II had distinctive, they needed to do much more than the guidance system, and Williams complementary characteristics. simply slap a Tomahawk on a trailer International/Teledyne provided the The new Pershing was a follow- and hand the driver a portable radio. small F107 turbofan power plant on to the existing, shorter range Development of the Transporter GLCMs were stored in protective Pershing IA. As a ballistic missile, it Erector Launcher and associated in- aluminum canisters with their wings, offered a high assurance of penetrat- frastructure such as the launch con- control fins, and engine inlets re- ing any Soviet defenses. Its speed trol center was a task that proved to tracted. In a crisis, the canisters would enabled it to threaten time-sensitive be far more complicated than first be loaded onto Transporter Erector targets. It was designed to take ad- imagined. Crashes of test vehicles Launchers—giant 78,000-pound trac- vantage of the existing Pershing IA also caused the Joint Cruise Missiles tor trailers. The TELs and their sup- infrastructure in Europe. Project Office to decertify the mis- port vehicles would be deployed to The smaller GLCMs were pro- sile on two occasions. secret, presurveyed launch sites in jected to have lower life-cycle costs. The finished production missile remote areas of the host country. Their longer range—1,550 miles— was almost 21 feet long, with its Coordinates for the launch location, allowed them to be based farther stubby wings stretching out to about along with weather information, were from the front lines. This increased nine feet. Top speed was just under then to be entered in the missile’s their survivability and—not inciden- Mach 1. The Convair Division of flight computer. Two launch officers tally—allowed more allied nations General Dynamics was the prime would have taken 20 minutes to en- to accept deployments on their terri- tory. As Brown put it: “The deploy- ment of a mixed ballistic/cruise mis- sile force hedges against the failure of one type of system, provides the flexibility to select the best weapon for a given mission, and greatly com- plicates enemy planning.”

USAF photo by TSgt. Bill Thompson

Naval Origins The Air Force’s BGM-109G GLCM, nicknamed Gryphon, did not begin life as an Air Force system. It was a modified version of the Navy’s Toma- hawk sea launched cruise missile. Development began in 1977. Because of the political need for the system, the GLCM passed rap- idly from concept through develop- ment, but its progress was not al- ter launch codes received by satel- lite. Once authorized, the officers would have simultaneously pressed “execute” buttons. GLCMs were blasted out of their launch tubes by a solid-fuel rocket booster. Once clear of the canister, the booster was jettisoned and the missile’s wings, control fins, and engine inlet would snap into place. The turbofan engine then took over and powered the missile on a pre- cise, preprogrammed route to a tar- get hundreds of miles away. The GLCM was intended to over- fly friendly nations at high altitudes to save fuel. Approaching hostile territory, it would then drop to an altitude of about 50 feet above ground level and its terrain-following guid- ance system would steer it toward its In a crisis, the GLCM system would be deployed to secret, presurveyed launch sites. At top, a camouflaged GLCM unit was hard to spot. Here, a GLCM was target. On final approach it would fired during a test launch in the US. swoop upward to avoid any physical

72 AIR FORCE Magazine / July 2002 barriers and then plunge down onto the designated impact point. Likely targets would have been second-echelon fixed sites such as the Kronstadt naval base or the Severomorsk headquarters of the Soviet Northern Fleet.

Source of Crews USAF photo by Sgt. David Jablonski On July 1, 1981, the 868th Tactical Missile Training Squadron, DavisÐ Monthan AFB, Ariz., became opera- tional. The 868th was the only USÐ based GLCM unit and the source of the crews that staffed the forward deployed wings a year later. Many GLCM personnel were mis- sileers who switched over from ICBM duty. Coming from an environment that focused on fixed-site systems, many found the mobility of their new Formal talks began between the US and USSR in 1981, but the INF treaty weapon, and all the bouncing about wasn’t signed until 1987. The US then began removing GLCM systems from the countryside that training entailed, Europe. Here, a unit is loaded aboard a C-5A for the trip back to the US. both strange and exhilarating. “It was new to everybody,” said stant irritant to base officials. Anti- At one point, its residents petitioned Livingston. “That’s what made it so nuclear protesters occasionally would the local council to have the camp exciting.” Livingston served as a breach exterior defenses and reach declared a historic national site. GLCM test official and then training logistics buildings. They always The Greenham Common protest- group commander. He can claim to seemed to know when GLCM units ors were part of a larger Western have been involved with the launch would be leaving the base to practice movement that gathered consider- of the first Gryphon as well as the launch deployments on Salisbury Plain. able force in the 1980s. In some destruction of the last one under the Not that such convoys were easy European nations, the anti-nuclear INF accord. to hide. A full deployment consisted sentiment grew so large that politi- The six overseas NATO units, in of more than 20 vehicles, most of cal leaders weren’t sure they could order of their deployment, were as which were filled with security guards fulfill commitments to host the weap- follows: and logistics support for the TEL ons. In the US, anti-nuke sentiment July 1982, 501st Tactical Mis- and the mobile launch centers. surfaced in a widespread nuclear sile Wing, RAF Greenham Common, “It was tough,” recalled Livingston, freeze movement. UK then the GLCM wing’s deputy com- In many ways, the opposition to June 1983, 487th TMW, Comiso mander for logistics at Greenham NATO’s new INF forces reflected AB, Italy Common. “We had to ‘protester the old split between what might be August 1984, 485th TMW, Flor- proof’ the vehicles.” called “nuclear minimalists” and ennes AB, Belgium That meant, for instance, install- “nuclear warfighters.” April 1985, 38th TMW, Wuesch- ing safety wiring over the gas caps The former group included those heim AB, West Germany to prevent the insertion of foreign who believed that a small, surviv- December 1986, 303rd TMW, material or protecting parts of the able force of nuclear weapons was RAF Molesworth, UK vehicles against the ever-present adequate for deterrence. The godfa- August 1987, 486th TMW, Wo- paint bombs thrown by protesters. ther of this view was Robert S. ensdrecht AB, Netherlands “They may have slowed us down a McNamara, the Secretary of Defense Comiso Air Base, located on Sic- bit, but there were never any serious who, in his years at the Pentagon ily, was far removed from Italy’s accidents,” said Livingston. (1961Ð68), moved to limit the nuclear large population centers and thus was weapons budget as much as possible. somewhat insulated from the anti- Fringe and Freeze The latter group believed that a nuclear movement then sweeping Greenham Common residents were more elaborate, flexible arsenal pro- Europe. All of the other GLCM bases the colorful fringe of the anti-nuke duced sounder deterrence. Those who were, to some extent, subjected to movement. Protests were often sched- held this view—including most of political protests—sometimes intense uled to coincide with solstices, equi- the senior leadership of the Air Force ones. noxes, and other astrologically sig- and the other military services— The permanent Greenham Common nificant events and took on overtly thought that an adversary would be peace camp was probably the most pagan characteristics. The camp sur- less likely to launch a nuclear strike famous concentration of protesters. vived for years following the with- if it believed a US president had The peace camp, a semiorganized band drawal of the last GLCM. It was retaliatory options short of all-out of squatters who lived outside the maintained as a permanent protest nuclear response. facility’s gates for years, was a con- against nuclear weapons everywhere. To minimalists, the GLCMs and

AIR FORCE Magazine / July 2002 73 accelerate. High-level discussions took place in 1986, capped by the confusion caused by the October 1986 summit between Reagan and Soviet leader in Reyk- javik, Iceland. In February 1987, the Soviet Union announced that it was ready to work

USAF photo by MSgt. Jose Lopez Jr. an INF deal detached from all other nuclear issues. That July, Gorbachev agreed to the original US zeroÐzero position. He also agreed to then un- precedented verification protocols, including on-site monitoring of INF production facilities. The political context of the INF accords will be a subject of histori- cal inquiry for years to come. Dete- riorating internal conditions in the USSR clearly played a part in Soviet The INF treaty called for destruction of all but eight display articles. Here, at decisions. Perhaps Reagan’s deter- DavisÐMonthan AFB, Ariz., a circular saw cuts through the door of a GLCM mination to pump billions into stra- transportÐlaunch vehicle. tegic defense technology contributed, too. Pershing IIs were at best redundant Moscow, for its part, proposed a The agreement also validated and at worst provocative. They re- limit of 300 missiles and nuclear- NATO’s original two-track response jected the whole idea of “linking” capable aircraft, with British and to the advent of the SS-20. The de- US and Western Europe together via French nuclear systems counting to- ployment of GLCMs and Pershing placement of new INF systems on ward NATO’s quota. IIs demonstrated in a convincing European soil. manner the depth of the US commit- The leading proponent of this view Soviet Walkout ment to European security and the was Paul Warnke, the dovish director At the time, GLCM deployments strength of alliance solidarity. of the Arms Control and Disarma- had not yet begun, and with the The two sides signed the INF treaty ment Agency in the Carter Adminis- power of the anti-nuclear movement in 1987, and soon thereafter the Air tration. “There is no military justifi- still building, the Soviets must have Force began withdrawing its GLCMs cation” for cruise missile deployment, thought time was on their side. But from Europe. By May 1991, all were Warnke wrote in an opÐed article in NATO hung together. After addi- gone, sawed up into expensive scrap. the Washington Post. “The potential tional US systems began arriving in All, that is, except for the eight dis- targets for these missiles are already Europe in late 1983, the USSR play articles permitted under terms covered by ballistic missiles.” walked out of the talks. No negotia- of the treaty. The US Air Force Mu- Warnke was enthusiastic about tions took place in 1984. seum at WrightÐPatterson AFB, Ohio, depriving the US of nuclear weap- Eventually, Moscow blinked and has the first of the Gryphons that ons. He urged the Reagan Adminis- agreed to come back to the negotiat- went on alert at Greenham Common. tration to quickly strike an arms deal ing table. In January 1985, Secretary The Ground Launched Cruise Mis- that would halt the deployment of of State George P. Shultz and Soviet sile Historical Foundation dedicated the American GLCMs and Pershing Foreign Minister Andrei Gromyko a second display article this spring IIs in return only for a reduction— agreed to parallel talks on INF, stra- at the Pima Air and Space Museum not the elimination—of the Soviet tegic forces, and defense and space in Tucson, Ariz. SS-20 force. Warnke opined that, issues. That fall, Moscow hinted that Eventually the GLCM foundation without progress on arms control, it wanted an INF treaty separate from hopes to have a full display reflect- “The United States will face a fur- the other negotiating tracks. Soviet ing all the capabilities of a squad- ther deterioration in its relations with negotiators offered a proposal that ron, including launch facilities and the Soviet Union, and Western would have allowed NATO to keep security forces. Europe’s confidence in American some GLCMs—but which still would “We knew all along we were po- leadership will decline.” have permitted SS-20 warheads equal litical pawns,” said Livingston, who In the end, of course, Reagan de- to GLCM and British and French serves as president of the founda- clined to take Warnke’s advice. For- forces combined. This was clearly tion. “Everybody knew the impor- mal INF talks between the US and unacceptable to the West. tance of what we were doing. That the USSR began in 1981 but didn’t Then the pace of events began to pride has carried over to today.” ■ really get serious until the major deployments began. The US posi- Peter Grier, a Washington, D.C., editor for the Christian Science Monitor, is a tion was a simple one: “zero–zero”— longtime defense correspondent and a contributing editor to Air Force elimination of the new longer-range Magazine. His most recent article, “Meltdown of the Nuclear Critics,” ap- INF systems in Europe by both sides. peared in the June 2002 issue.

74 AIR FORCE Magazine / July 2002