A Tan Beret Goes to Nellis

[Wolfman]

Next thing you know, a gentleman in a white suit will come to recruit Caitlin. That is if a certain General doesn't come first.

They both like people who while flexible on where the line is, know when the line is set in stone.

My money’s on the General in this timeline. Any other timeline, it’d be the gentleman in the white suit…

[Poohbah]

19 December 1987
Binion's Gambling Hall and Casino Hotel
Las Vegas, NV

Sophie scanned the monitors again, looking for . . . something.

Christy leaned forward. "Sophie, check H-5, will ya?"

Sophie looked at the feed from High Camera 5.

"Not seeing it . . . I'm going to try H-6."

H-6 was on the other side of the street. She flipped it on and panned it to roughly where Christy was pointing the street level camera.

And she saw it.

"Caitlin, we've got something."

Caitlin leaned in behind her. "Show me."

Sophie wound the video back on H-6, then sped it ahead to present time.

Caitlin frowned. "So? It's a guy walking in the street, wearing a hat."

Christy said, "Caitlin, nobody walks a perfectly straight line through a street party on a Saturday night like that unless they're up to something."

Caitlin watched as the unknown man slowed to let a knot of four revelers pass in front of him, then sped up to make up for lost time. He glanced at his watch.

Caitlin said, "Good eyes! He's running a surveillance detection route."

Sophie grabbed a body transceiver and clipped it to her belt, threading a microphone down her ABU blouse to her left wrist, a PTT switch into the palm of her left glove, and an earpiece under her hair.

"Don't do anything stupid."

Sophie nodded. "OK, here's the plan. I'm going to get in front of the guy and get eyes on his face from the direct front. You get a sketch artist ready, if he can start work from what S6 got, good. Christy, you stay with him on street, Caitlin, you take over, coach me in."

Caitlin nodded and said, "Go-go-go!"

Sophie caught Christy's worried expression as she headed out.

* * *

Sophie exited Binion's through the Whiskey Licker Bar onto Fremont street and headed northwest, glancing at her watch every few seconds as she began to trot, weaving around obstacles and groups of people, just someone worried about missing a meet-up.

Her headset crackled. "Okay, our friend is on East Ogden, still headed northwest, cutting straight under the bridge . . . walking pace."

Sophie cut right at 1st street, still looking more at her watch than the crowds, still moving at a deceptively slow trot.

Christy's voice. "You've got someone with eyes on you in front of Glitter Gulch."

Sophie broke squelch twice with her left thumb. Copy, too busy to talk.

She cut across the street to the Glitter Gulch entry line, and saw the man staring at her. She smiled delightedly, charged right up to him, held down the PTT switch, and gave him a big kiss.

When she broke the kiss after a few seconds, she put on a shocked and chagrined expression. "Uh, sorry, I thought you were someone else!"

The man was thoroughly flustered.

"My man's at the Fremont! Which way is it?"

He pointed southeast on East Ogden, and Sophie blew him a kiss. "Thanks, honey!"

She released the switch, trotted southeast, spotting the target, continuing on her way, glancing again at her watch.

She got eyes on him--and immediately broke to the right, getting out of the street.

She broke squelch three times: CRITIC inbound.

She ducked to the opposite side of the street and slipped into the crowd in the parking lot on the northeast side of East Ogden, downshifting to a walk and shifting her body language, slouching slightly, taking off her Air Force ABU cover and replacing it with her tan beret. She slipped through the crowd, dancing to Billy Idol's Dancing With Myself, and walked into the east wing of Binion's.

* * *

"All right, good news is that we don't need the sketch artist. Bad news is that we know this guy. That, ladies, was Heinz Roon, born Heinz von Roon, in 1944, raised by the state in an orphanage after his father died on the Western Front. He is a senior officer in the Überseeischer Jagdverband--Overseas Hunting Association--of the Wachregiment "Feliks E. Dzierzynski", or the Feliks Dzerzhinskiy Guards Regiment of the Stasi, he's apparently been an illegal in America, and he is an absolute fucking psychopath. In 1985, he was leading a flying column out of San Antonio and came across civilians desperately fleeing the fight on foot. He cleared them from the roadway by calling in a napalm strike. This was covered by a San Antonio news crew; when the tape made it across the lines to America, ol' man Roon executed the entire staff of the station, down to the contract janitors, and executed their immediate neighbors . . . by impalement."

Caitlin said, "Sounds like Sergei Khvostov."

"Word has it they're drinking buddies."

* * *

Caitlin looped all of their tape along East Ogden.

And then she saw it.

"Sonofabitch. Roon met a guy in that panel truck. He's stepping out . . .and there's Brock Addison . . . and a girl who looks young enough to be his daughter."

Sophie nodded. "Some East German spycraft comes from the Abwehr, the post-World War I German military intelligence service. They like face-to-face meetings more than dead drops. It lets them assess things one-on-one. Some risk, especially right on the main drag. Roon meets Addison, gets something, and Addison walked off with his payment."

Caitlin asked, "So who owns that truck?"

A phone check with AFOSI later, Caitlin was seething. "The plates don't come back at all."

Sophie blinked. "They don't match the vehicle, or they don't exist?"

"There's a weird error message."

Sophie blinked. "You can't get gas stickers for the vehicle without valid plates . . . and that thing has a T sticker. Get your guy back on the phone."

Once he was on the phone, Sophie asked, "All right. What, exactly, came back?"

The AFOSI technician said, "Ma'am, it said that it was unable to provide requested information, and gave a phone number."

"What was the phone number?"

"Let me run the query again . . . 703-555-8989."

Sophie hung up and handed her Post-It note to Caitlin, who blinked. "Damn it, that's Las Vegas PD. Let me call someone."

She dialed, and said brightly, "Jim? Caitlin O'Shaugnessy. Listen, we just ran some plates on a panel van, and got an error message from the Nevada DMV telling us to call LVPD. Is that thing one of yours?"

After a brief pause, Caitlin read off the plates.

Pause.

"I see."

Another pause.

"Look, don't say anything right now--hell, if you can be too busy to talk to him, that would be great, but we're going to want to talk to him tomorrow."

Sophie held a hand up, and Caitlin said, "Hang on a sec." She covered the receiver. "What's on your mind?"

"If that van was signed out to an officer . . . could you ask if he's running Richie Madano as an informant?"

"Hey, Jim, would your guy happen to know Richie Madano? Yeah, we're looking for him. I haven't seen him lately, either. Yeah, my colleague sweated his brother Vinnie. Can't say the little bastard didn't deserve it." Pause. "OK, thanks. We'll be by tomorrow, right before evening shift. Bye."

Caitlyn hung up and said, "Good guess. Madano's supposedly this guy's CI."

Sophie said, "Made men don't like relatives talking out of school."

Caitlyn nodded. "It's why Italians don't like Jehovah's Witnesses."

"Why's that?"

"They don't like any witnesses."

The two women shared a tired chuckle.

Finally, Caitlin made shooing motions at Christy and Sophie. "All right, you two, that's enough for one night. Go spend the rest of your night having some fun."

* * *

Christy and Sophie climbed out of the cab in front of a modest bungalow. Christy checked the door, then gestured for Sophie to follow her in.

The house was tidy and sparsely furnished. Christy turned on the stereo. Madonna's Crazy For You came over the speakers. Christy stepped in close and whispered, "Let's dance. Just us."

Sophie tried to relax into the song, but found herself tensing up.

Christy turned off the music and led her to the couch.

"What's bothering you?"

Sophie tapped her ear.

Christy said, "This is a safehouse. A rich businessman lends me the key, but it really belongs to General Lodge, and he keeps it secure."

Sophie nodded. "All right. You can't talk about this to anyone, ever."

Christy made a cross-my-heart gesture, then held out her right pinky.

Sophie curled her right pinky with Christy's. "Pinky swear."

Christy nodded. "Pinky swear."

Sophie sighed, then said, "I had a clear shot at him last year during the New Mexico Scud Hunt."

Christy blinked. "Roon?"

Sophie nodded.

"What went wrong?"

"Roon wasn't the objective. We were waiting for bigger game. He'd already found his." She shuddered.

"Sophie!"

Christy held Sophie gently, and Sophie found herself crying for a long moment.

Finally, she said, "Our target was an missile battery that we believed was going to set up there--we were at a geodetic benchmark. When we got there, the only thing there was a few wheeled personnel carriers and . . . of all things . . . a damn school bus.

"So, the battery arrives . . . and Roon starts hauling kids off of the bus and has his people chain them to the missile launch vehicles and the reloads. And then he stares right at my hide location, like he knew my team was there. Like he was daring us to call it in. And he drove off."

Christy asked, "What did you do?"

Sophie sighed. "I called it in. We had to kill these missiles, they were the latest ones, extremely accurate and lethal. There's a whole test for weighing civilian casualties against military necessity, and military necessity won handily."

Sophie felt the tears coming again. "And I can't even find it in myself to condemn my actions. I mourn those kids every day . . . but I'd do it again."

Christy said, "You didn't chain those children to the missiles. He did. You said it yourself; the mission was crucial. Roon was trying to fuck with your head. But you know yourself better than he knows you. You know that he's trying to do that, and your soul is saying, 'No sale.' He took a lucky guess on your position. He did his best to get you to doubt the mission, to doubt the war, to doubt yourself. He thought he had you, and you showed him you're far tougher than he is. Sophie . . . part of you wants vengeance. But remember that if you're seeking revenge, you first need to dig two graves. Don't give him the satisfaction. Don't look for vengeance."

"What should I look for?"

"Justice. Send him off to hell, sure. But on your terms. You've beaten him once. You can beat him again. You're smarter, tougher . . . and you're pure of heart. Sophie Henrix is that hero Bonnie Tyler was holding out for."

"She was holding out for a guy."

Christy smiled. "Her loss. I'm far more flexible."

She leaned in and kissed Sophie for a long moment.

After they broke the kiss, Christy said, "Come on, let me love you tonight."

[Matt Wiser]

There is a special room in hell waiting for this Roon....animal. His end should be appropriately painful and humiliating.

And was that Sgt. Jim Brass on the other line at LVPD?

[jemhouston]

If Sophie knows Roon, does he know her by sight?

[Jotun]

Kneecap that guy with a shotgun and then decide how to kill him.

One quibble: Jagdverband is better translated with Light Infantry Formation. Jagd is a noun (hunt) and in German military lingo is associated with a) light infantry (Jäger, as in Gebirgsjäger, Fallschirmjäger and suchlike) and b) air force fighters (Abfangjäger (interceptor/fighter), Jagdbomber (fighter bomber)). A Verband is simply a (military) formation.
Curiously, the only historic use of Jagdverband in German I am aware of off the top of my head is the fighter wings of the WW1 Imperial German air force.

Jagdkommando would be a better fit, in my Germanic opinion. It is the name of the Austrian SOF, and the Bundeswehr used and uses it for ad hoc, small, regular grunt detachments - albeit specially selected and trained - hunting enemy SOF and paratroops behind their own lines or wreak havoc behind enemy lines…

[Poohbah]

Kneecap that guy with a shotgun and then decide how to kill him.

One quibble: Jagdverband is better translated with Light Infantry Formation. Jagd is a noun (hunt) and in German military lingo is associated with a) light infantry (Jäger, as in Gebirgsjäger, Fallschirmjäger and suchlike) and b) air force fighters (Abfangjäger (interceptor/fighter), Jagdbomber (fighter bomber)). A Verband is simply a (military) formation.
Curiously, the only historic use of Jagdverband in German I am aware of off the top of my head is the fighter wings of the WW1 Imperial German air force.

Jagdkommando would be a better fit, in my Germanic opinion. It is the name of the Austrian SOF, and the Bundeswehr used and uses it for ad hoc, small, regular grunt detachments - albeit specially selected and trained - hunting enemy SOF and paratroops behind their own lines or wreak havoc behind enemy lines…

1. Sophie's German isn't fluent, and she did a literalist translation.
2. More to come. Remember, this is a Stasi formation.

[Jotun]

Kneecap that guy with a shotgun and then decide how to kill him.

One quibble: Jagdverband is better translated with Light Infantry Formation. Jagd is a noun (hunt) and in German military lingo is associated with a) light infantry (Jäger, as in Gebirgsjäger, Fallschirmjäger and suchlike) and b) air force fighters (Abfangjäger (interceptor/fighter), Jagdbomber (fighter bomber)). A Verband is simply a (military) formation.
Curiously, the only historic use of Jagdverband in German I am aware of off the top of my head is the fighter wings of the WW1 Imperial German air force.

Jagdkommando would be a better fit, in my Germanic opinion. It is the name of the Austrian SOF, and the Bundeswehr used and uses it for ad hoc, small, regular grunt detachments - albeit specially selected and trained - hunting enemy SOF and paratroops behind their own lines or wreak havoc behind enemy lines…

1. Sophie's German isn't fluent, and she did a literalist translation.
2. More to come. Remember, this is a Stasi formation.

1. Ah. An IC thing. I said nothing^^
2. While the Stasi is generally regarded as a quite effective organization, they were not supermen. Just a lot less restricted in their portfolio than their western counterparts, of any given nation.

[jemhouston]

It occurred to me that someone in Caitlin's position would be good target to comprise. Who watches the watchers.

[Poohbah]

20 December 1987
Headquarters, 10th Air Force
Nellis Air Force Base
Las Vegas, NV

Decker blinked. "Heinz Roon? Here? In Vegas?"

Sophie said, "Yes, sir, I had eyes on. And he's apparently meeting with dirty cops . . . and Colonel Addison."

Decker sipped his coffee, then said, "Holy shit, we have ourselves the heaviest of heavy hitters. Fun background, too: his daddy was an Sturmbannfuehrer in the Waffen-SS, equivalent of a Major. Worked for Otto Skorzeny on Operation Greif during the Ardennes Offensive."

"Operation Greif?"

Decker nodded. "Yes. The idea was to infiltrate behind our lines disguised as American troops and cause chaos and confusion. Fortunately, most of their troops barely knew any English; only a few knew American slang and could speak with an American accent. Albrecht von Roon was one of them. We caught up with him outside Charleroi, and he was shot as a spy. Looks like the son didn't fall far from the tree."

Hummel asked, "Did he make you?"

"I was wearing my ABU cover, not the beret. I'm sure he would've made me in a nanosecond with the beret. There's only three of us. Me, Alyssa Miller, and Laura Compton, and each of us looks very different from each other. But I had bright lights from Glitter Gulch and Club Las Vegas behind me, so that was to my advantage, as far as that goes. I'd rate it as possible. He didn't give any sign of recognizing me . . . but he's trained. So I can't say 'no way.' There's a chance."

Decker nodded. "All right. So, let's consider the situation. What is Roon's mission?"

Sophie said, "We might be sitting on Ground Zero."

Decker stood up and went to the whiteboard. "Good thought."

Hummel said, "The JSOC cell?"

Sophie said, "Or the whole damn HQ. Take down a numbered Air Force staff, how long will it take to reconstitute it and get it back to proper performance?"

Decker was writing on the whiteboard with a dry erase marker, using quick, precise strokes. "OK. Two obvious ones. What else?"

Sophie asked, "We got any fun toys here at Nellis? He might want a can or two of Instant Sunshine."

Hummel said, "There's a bunch of bunkers north side that have extremely tight security. Like what we have at places like Poseidon and Trident submarine bases."

Shagan said, "I'd worry more about Navy nukes. Air Force nukes have PALs."

Sophie blinked. "Pals?"

"No, Air Force nukes don't have friends. Permissive Action Links. They're arming switches that only work if you put in a specific sequence electrical and mechanical inputs."

Sophie said, "First rule of computer security: if I have physical access to the box, I will eventually have access to the data."

Shagan chuckled. "Sandia Labs was way ahead of you on that. Bypassing the PAL and detonating the weapon is roughly as difficult as performing a tonsilectomy without killing the patient . . . while going in from the wrong end. If you try to just play through all of the possible combinations, the firing block bricks itself. And we have NEST here, too."

Sophie nodded. "All right. Between that, the insane security, and NEST, figure stealing a nuke or three is out."

Decker frowned. "Maybe not. And a nuke the only option that makes any sense for a guy at Roon's level to be here--the only way for it to be worth the risk he's taking. There just isn't enough conventional firepower to take this many people down in one go--and he's only going to get one go. And there's other ways to get a nuke." He looked around the room. "I'm relying on everyone's discretion."

Everyone nodded. Sophie stifled a grin, and received a glare from Decker.

Decker's voice was more gravelly than normal. "Something amuses you, Chief?"

Sophie stood up and walked to Decker. Held her right fist up, then extended the pinkie.

"Is pinkie swearing good enough, sir?"

Decker chuckled and extended his own pinkie.

"Accepted."

They interlocked pinkies, to general laughter. Decker asked, "What was so funny, anyway?"

"I swore the same thing last night, sir. Long story. It just tickled my funny bone at the wrong moment."

Decker nodded, a slight smile on his face. "I understand."

After Sophie sat down, Decker said, "I was in charge of GREEN LIGHT in EUCOM in '84 when the word came to retrograde everything back to the states."

The rest of the room stirred around Sophie.

"GREEN LIGHT, sir?"

Decker sighed. "One of the dumber ideas from the glory days of atomic this and atomic that . . . hell, atomic everything. We were using nukes in everything from ballistic missiles down recoilless rifles on jeeps. GREEN LIGHT involved Special Forces teams trained to infiltrate behind enemy lines . . . on foot, in a stolen vehicle, by air, even by scuba diving. Each team carried a very small nuclear device, with a yield ranging from 10 tons up to, in the B54 Mod 2 weapon, one kiloton. One guy could carry it if he had to." Decker inclined his head to Shagan. "Harry, I hate to burst your bubble, but the only security on the thing was a lock I wouldn't use to secure a $50 bicycle, let alone the firing panel on a nuclear bomb."

"Are you fucking kidding me, sir?"

"I wish I was. Like I said, this was one of the dumber ideas of the Atomic Age. Anyways . . . well, we had a bit of a problem. A dozen of our weapons weren't in the kaserne's munitions bunker. They were in East Germany, prepositioned for early use."

Sophie blinked. "Um . . . sir, with all due respect . . . "

Decker's face wore a sardonic grin. "Let me guess: that was a really stupid variation on an already very stupid idea?"

"Um . . . try stupid and crazy, sir. What would happen if little Hansel and Gretel happen to find one of the nukes?"

Decker nodded. "And that was the fatal flaw in the operation. We put them out in what passes for the boonies in that part of Germany, but it's not like here in America. Europe is way too small and far more densely populated. If the land can be farmed in that part of Germany, it's getting farmed. If it's too rough to farm, you're still way too close to people. Especially because it had to be put close enough to the target that the team could get it there in reasonable time." Decker sighed. "A dozen weapons were on forward placement--that was our euphemism for the whole thing. No paperwork signing them out of the storage bunker, no record that we'd ever had custody aside from one sheet of paper in my safe, signed by the previous commanding officer, indicating that they'd been transferred to a unit that, if you dug deep enough, didn't exist. We got eleven of them back. One of our recovery teams never made their initial safe-landing call. We don't know what happened--there weren't any show trials, nothing sent via backchannels, nada. The investigation was inconclusive, but the Army broadly hinted that it was probably time for me to retire, and I didn't feel like arguing about it."

Sophie was watching Decker's face, and realized that she was seeing his reaction to something he was unfamiliar--and uncomfortable--with: failure.

Sophie said, "It makes sense. If this were to succeed, the only evidence would be that it was an American weapon. They might be able to tell you the warhead type--or not--but the bomb material would be definitely American. It would look like a dreadful accident. By the time anyone figured out what really happened, the Air Force would be long considered proven guilty. Hell, President Bush would probably get impeached. 100% plausible deniability."

Shagan said, "But we'd figure it out, and it would fall on the Soviets."

Sophie suddenly felt numbers coming on, hard--to the point of getting a headache.

Decker was looking at her oddly. "Chief?"

Sophie sighed. "Sir . . . humor me . . . the ideas are flowing . . . "

She let the numbers dance for a moment, then pinched her right earlobe as hard as she could to snap herself out of it.

"Follow my logic. We treat East Germany as one cog in the WARPAC machine."

Shagan said, "Right. Because their military chain of command goes through Moscow, not East Berlin. Same on the intelligence side."

"Sir . . . that's the neat, academic way things get explained. Just like how, supposedly, the lieutenant is the guy who runs an infantry platoon."

Decker laughed. "Point made. There's theory, and practice. But in practice, all WARPAC comms goes through Moscow."

"International relations theory treats the WARPAC as a rational unitary actor, no factionalism or anything like that. But it also treats America just the same."

Hummel said, "Now there's a line of crap. There are factions at every level from the Executive against Congress, the President against his own national security advisor at times, all the way down to feuding majors on the division staff."

Sophie put her head in her hands. "That's why I damn near flunked my Introduction to International Relations course. Because real world experience and logic don't support the theory, and my brain wouldn't let me repeat that line of crap."

Decker said, "Okay, you're saying Ivan has factions. Different groups want different things."

"I'm also saying the WARPAC as a whole has factions, at national levels, and at the sub-national level, inside agencies. Where you stand depends on where you sit, and where you sit depends on who you know, sir. And all factors being equal, intelligence agencies are most likely to have factions successfully competing for dominance. Wherever two or more spooks are gathered in Lenin's name, you can bet your paycheck that at least one of them is engaging in shenanigans."

Hummel said, "Makes sense. They have to lie to the adversary to do their jobs. The only question is who they think those adversaries are. Maybe some of those adversaries are their own bosses. European history tends to be made in secret, this is just continuing a trend."

Shagan said, "This is getting scary. Secret cells inside secret agencies, all looking to . . . well, do what?"

Decker nodded. "Whatever happens, the consequences fall on Ivan. That might even lead to us taking down the USSR leadership for good. And vice versa. We damn near did last year after Raven Rock. If Raven Rock had succeeded . . . "

Hummel asked, "How could some Spetsnaz operators have succeeded at Raven Rock?"

Decker gave him an eloquent look, and Hummel said, "Jesus." He shook his head, then said, "Well, that explains why we used nukes at Cherepovets."

Shagan said, "But I'm not getting how East Germany benefits."

Sophie asked, "What if one of Roon's buddies somewhere spills the beans to the US, just too late to stop the nuke?"

Decker said, "East Germans are suddenly the good guys and we don't nuke them, the US and USSR take each other down a few pegs, and next thing you know, German reunification happens on Honecker's terms, and Germany becomes the most powerful state in Europe after France and the--no, wait, Russia would kill France's nuclear capabilities, and the UK's as well. Deutschland Über Allies. The triumph of the Iron Dream. With a side helping of bone cancer, of course. But Germany 'wins,' and is calling the shots in Europe."

Hummel shook his head. "They win. For certain values of winning that I don't quite understand."

Sophie's voice was quiet. "Someone like Roon . . . he'd say that he'd prefer to reign in Hell than to serve in Heaven."

Shagan gave Sophie a golf clap. "And she quotes Milton. Showing off that first-rate MIT education, Chief?"

"No, sir, my just my ability to memorize dialogue from Star Trek."

Everyone enjoyed a good laugh.

Sophie then said, "Thin."

Hummel said, "Anorexic."

Decker said, "But it fits what facts we do have."

Sophie said, "Gentlemen, I think we need to get O'Shaugnessy in here right now."

Decker said, "Chief, maybe you missed something. That weapon is still off the books."

"All the more reason to have someone who knows something of the law involved. And while we're at it . . . we need to talk to General Lodge."

Decker was silent for a long moment, then nodded once. "You're right, Chief on both counts." He sighed. "Time to face the music."

[Wolfman]

Oh, Crap!

[clancyphile]

And things get that much worse...

[jemhouston]

Kobayashi Maru with no ability to change the conditions of the test before hand. All you can do is play it until you can tip over the table and start a bar fight. Fizzbin anyone?

Has she actually ever punched anyone for being too stupid in her presence?

Just remembered about the NCIS: LA arc about the nukes the Soviets put into the US. At least they had keepers with them.

[Matt Wiser]

Mass "Oh, crap!" is right.

[Johnnie Lyle]

Talk about the Good Idea Fairy snorting some PCP before shift.

[Jotun]

Talk about the Good Idea Fairy snorting some PCP before shift.

Snorting PCP while sniffing glue and ingesting LSD.

OOC: I know about the Green Light teams, and I don't even find the nukes prepositioned in Dunkeldeutschland to be completely unfeasible. Great story.
Come to think of it: Has Billy Waugh made an appearance in RD+20?

[Wolfman]

Talk about the Good Idea Fairy snorting some PCP before shift.

Snorting PCP while sniffing glue and ingesting LSD.

OOC: I know about the Green Light teams, and I don't even find the nukes prepositioned in Dunkeldeutschland to be completely unfeasible. Great story.
Come to think of it: Has Billy Waugh made an appearance in RD+20?

Not to mention heroin and crack cocaine…

[Johnnie Lyle]

Talk about the Good Idea Fairy snorting some PCP before shift.

Snorting PCP while sniffing glue and ingesting LSD.

OOC: I know about the Green Light teams, and I don't even find the nukes prepositioned in Dunkeldeutschland to be completely unfeasible. Great story.
Come to think of it: Has Billy Waugh made an appearance in RD+20?

Not to mention heroin and crack cocaine…

While building a Rube Goldberg machine.

[Johnnie Lyle]

Talk about the Good Idea Fairy snorting some PCP before shift.

Snorting PCP while sniffing glue and ingesting LSD.

OOC: I know about the Green Light teams, and I don't even find the nukes prepositioned in Dunkeldeutschland to be completely unfeasible. Great story.
Come to think of it: Has Billy Waugh made an appearance in RD+20?

It sounds more ‘50s than ‘80s, though.

[Poohbah]

Talk about the Good Idea Fairy snorting some PCP before shift.

Snorting PCP while sniffing glue and ingesting LSD.

OOC: I know about the Green Light teams, and I don't even find the nukes prepositioned in Dunkeldeutschland to be completely unfeasible. Great story.
Come to think of it: Has Billy Waugh made an appearance in RD+20?

It sounds more ‘50s than ‘80s, though.

How many stupid ideas have hung around long after their expiration date?

[Johnnie Lyle]

Snorting PCP while sniffing glue and ingesting LSD.

OOC: I know about the Green Light teams, and I don't even find the nukes prepositioned in Dunkeldeutschland to be completely unfeasible. Great story.
Come to think of it: Has Billy Waugh made an appearance in RD+20?

It sounds more ‘50s than ‘80s, though.

How many stupid ideas have hung around long after their expiration date?

1<N<oo

Also, the preferred term is “job security,” not “stupid ideas.”

OOC: Seriously, though, the idea is out of place given the much more stringent controls and practices around nukes in the US by the ‘80s. Someone should notice, even to the point of it becoming a running gag.