Nike firing position Albach
 Nike firing position Albach
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| country | Germany | ||
| local community |
Fernwald and Lich , Gießen district |
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| Coordinates : | 50 ° 34 ' N , 8 ° 49' E | ||
| Opened | 1964, 1987 end of the Nike position |
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| Formerly stationed units | |||
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1. + 4. / FlaRakBtl 23 501st USAAD (Team A) |
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Location of the Nike firing position in Albach in Hesse |
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The Nike-firing position Albach was a nuclear- tipped anti-aircraft missile position of the type Nike Hercules [ naɪki hərkjuli: s ] east and west of the villages Albach and Steinbach the municipality remote forest about 10 km southeast of Giessen . The 1st and initially also the 4th battery of the anti-aircraft missile battalion 23 (FlaRakBtl 23) of the Bundeswehr Air Force were stationed there from 1964 to 1987 (4th battery until September 1966). As part of the nuclear sharing of NATO tactical US nuclear warheads had been mounted on the missiles in an emergency in order soaring Soviet bombers to destroy, in turn, with nuclear bombs would have been loaded. It was one of 70 positions in the so-called Nike Belt , which stretched from the North Sea to the Alps.
Areas
Over the years, this position consisted of five individual areas:
- Two separate fire control areas for the 1st and 4th battery west of Fernwald-Steinbach. These each had up to five radars for (remote) monitoring, target acquisition, target tracking and missile tracking, but could only be inadequately protected because of their exposed location. In order to be able to defend against attacking low-flying aircraft, the remaining fire control area of the 1st battery was retrofitted with several 20 mm twin guns from 1974.
- The launch area northeast of Fernwald-Albach with three launch sites, each with three launch ramps and nine Nike missiles from the 1st battery, including the associated bunkers. These were dug deep into the ground and protected by earth walls. The rockets were kept ready on launch rails, the so-called "monorail" (see pictures). The entire area and the surrounding area could be kept in view on watchtowers.
- A well-secured US depot in the forest (in the Lich district) for the storage of ten nuclear warheads for the Nike firing position near Fernwald-Albach.
- The Limes barracks outside (to the west) of the city of Lich to accommodate the German and American soldiers.
Four out of five areas of the Nike fire position in Albach in the communities of Fernwald and Lich near Gießen
Three erected Nike-Hercules rockets from 1./FlaRakBtl 22, 1980, Nike-Feuerst.Oedingen (comparable to Albach)
Good aerial view of the Nike firing position Mülheim / Eifel with its 3 x 3 launch sites (comparable to Albach)
Fire control area of a Nike-Hercules position with five radar devices, location unknown (but comparable to Albach)
Operation and US designations of the five radars (1 - 5) and the computer system that controls them
Practice or test launch of a Nike Hercules rocket, date and location unknown
"Monorail" system of the Nike Hercules missiles (launch rails, here 4 Nike Ajax missiles)
All former US Army and German Bundeswehr facilities in the area east of Giessen
Nuclear warheads
The nuclear warheads for this firing position of the type W31 were stored in a so-called Special Ammunition Storage (SAS) in a double-fenced bunker depot in the forest southeast of Albach . This depot was guarded inside around the clock by a team from the US Army , who supervised the nuclear weapons, while the external security was taken over by civilian employees of the Federal Air Force who were out with shepherds in the area. Cameras were installed between the inner and outer fence. A well-paved path led from there 2.5 km through the forest to the missile site, to which the nuclear warheads would have had to be transported in an emergency.
Most of the nuclear weapons depots of the Nike positions in Germany were on the site of the launch site. However, if this was relatively close to a place - as in the case of Albach, where the first houses were less than a kilometer away - the depot was installed a little further away so that the place would get less of it in the event of a nuclear weapon accident. For maintenance, the nuclear warheads were flown with CH-47 Chinook transport helicopters to Ramstein Air Base , where the central nuclear weapons depot of the US Army was located. The helicopters landed directly at the nuclear weapons bunkers, where a large free space had been created within the specially secured area. The depot area in the forest was renatured after the Cold War , but you can still see the road network in the satellite image: ⊙ . At some point, however, these traces of history will be gone.
There were two versions of W31 nuclear warheads for the Nike. The smaller one, named B-XS, had an explosive force of 2 kilotons for fighting individual bombers at great heights. The larger B-XL originally had an explosive force of 40 KT. The latter were exchanged for warheads of 20 KT in the 1970s (the Hiroshima bomb had an explosive force of 12.5 KT). A maximum of ten nuclear warheads were available per position, eight of the size XS with 2 kilotons and two XL with 40/20 kilotons of explosive power. The XL version would have been used against several approaching bombers. Conventional warheads were preassembled on the missiles, which led to an operational readiness of less than 15 minutes, but in an emergency these would have been exchanged for nuclear warheads and only used as a reserve.
The reason for fighting strategic bombers with nuclear weapons was as follows: as soon as a Soviet bomber had crossed the inner-German border in an emergency , its atomic bombs would have been activated. If this bomber had now been brought down with conventional anti-aircraft missiles over the territory of the Federal Republic , its bombs with megaton explosive power would have detonated when a certain drop height had been reached. In order to prevent this, the bomber and its nuclear load had to be destroyed, and that was only possible safely with nuclear warheads on the anti-aircraft missiles, which revealed their target to complete destruction even 1 km away.
From the North Sea to the Alps, a dense belt of 70 NATO Nike air defense positions , all of which were equipped with nuclear warheads, ran through western Germany from the 1960s to the late 1980s . 24 of these positions were served by the Bundeswehr, 26 by the US Army, 12 by Dutch soldiers and 8 by Belgian soldiers. The US Army has always been in charge of the respective nuclear warheads.
Operational readiness
The four missile batteries of FlaRakBtl 23 were from 1966 at four different locations ( deployment ), which were up to 80 km apart: Albach , Schöneck ⊙ , Kemel ⊙ and Obersayn ⊙ . Each of these locations was assigned a different level of readiness, which alternated at fixed intervals. The maximum reaction times of the individual stages were 1.) 30 minutes, 2.) 3 hours, 3.) 12 hours and 4.) more than 12 hours. Within a battery, at least two of the three launch sites had the same level of readiness. If one of the batteries was unable to maintain its level of readiness for technical reasons, it was moved to the end of the operational chain and the other batteries one operational level up. Depending on the level of readiness, the position was constantly manned and ready for use in shifts. There were also three combat crews in the battery for the fire control and launch area, which alternated in a system of 48-hour shifts during the week and 72-hour shifts at the weekend.
In order to guarantee the operational readiness and also the security of the entire weapon system, it was subjected to an intensive test twice a year. This happened once through an internal audit of the Special Ammunition Support Command (SASCOM) of the USAF , which was called TPI (Technical Proficiency Inspection), and once during a consolidated exercise, the so-called Tactical Evaluation (TACEVAL). In addition, there were regular inspections of the higher-level NATO command structures ( Federal Air Force , USAAD ). A TPI also included the simulated demolition of an unfired nuclear warhead.
terminology
Both the Bundeswehr and the US Army had official names and abbreviations for military units, areas, buildings, etc. Instead of the “1. Battery of the anti-aircraft missile battalion 23 “one spoke z. B. from the "1./FlaRakBtl 23". It was subordinate to the "FlaRakRgt 1" (anti-aircraft missile regiment 1). The Americans used the so-called “ SAC terminology”, which was also adopted by the Bundeswehr.
The fire control area was called IFC (Integrated Fire Control) and the five radar systems HIPAR, LOPAR, Target Tracking, Target Ranging and Missile Tracking. The interconnection building there served to allow a US Army employee to take control of Nike's advanced and secret capabilities. One of them was probably to be able to attack ground targets, another the possibility to intercept ballistic missiles. The Launch Area (LA) was the missile launch area. On it there was the Warhead Building (WB), the Assembly Building and the Ready Hut. In the Warhead Building there was also the safe with the codes for the US PAL team (Permissive Action Links), which would have armed the missiles if they had been equipped with nuclear weapons. A launch section - of which there were three - consisted of a rail body (Ready Round Rail) with three launch ramps on Hercules monorail launchers.
The main sources for the entire article:
When reading these four sources it becomes clear that authors with ample background knowledge must have written the texts there or that they at least contributed to the articles. These can really only be former employees of these missile sites.
Whereabouts
On March 31, 1987, the Nike position in Albach was deactivated and continued to operate with more modern Hawk anti-aircraft missiles until 1992 . The former radar display on the "Lutherberg" ⊙ , northwest of Steinbach, which was clearly visible from the nearby federal highway 457, was renatured after the final withdrawal and demolition. The area of the fire control area on the "Hohen Rod" ⊙ , west of Steinbach, is today u. a. used by the Lahnfunk emergency service. The former rocket launch area in the "Buchwald" ⊙ , northeast of Albach, initially served as a landfill for the Fernwald community and is now a solar park. In the accommodations of the former Limes barracks ⊙ , on the western outskirts of Lich , there is now a department of the Hesse riot police .
The Lutherberg west of Steinbach. Radar systems once stood where sheep graze today.
The Nike missile launch area northeast of Fernwald-Albach, now a solar park.
The place in the forest near Albach where the US depot with the nuclear warheads was.
Warning signs in the vicinity of a US depot with tactical nuclear weapons
Entrance to the former Limes barracks near Lich, now a location for the riot police
See also
- Nike firing position Oedingen
- Nuclear weapons in Germany
- Special ammunition depot
- Nike Hercules anti-aircraft missile
- Nike missile
- W31 nuclear warhead
Neighboring former military facilities:
- Alten-Buseck special ammunition depot
- Giessen special ammunition depot
- Casting US depot
- Steuben barracks (Giessen)
- Casting Patriot missile position
Web links
- W31 nuclear warhead on Wikipedia
- Geocaching.com: On the Lutherberg
- 50 years of the German Armed Forces FlaRak