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SAC Automated Command & Control System 1968 USAF Strategic Air Command FR-818
🕑 Added 2020-01-30 21:38:40 +0000 UTCmore at http://quickfound.net/
From Strategic Air Command Semiannual Film Report, February-July 1968
Originally a public domain film, slightly cropped to remove uneven edges, with the aspect ratio corrected, and one-pass brightness-contrast-color correction & mild video noise reduction applied.
The soundtrack was also processed with volume normalization, noise reduction, clipping reduction, and/or equalization (the resulting sound, though not perfect, is far less noisy than the original).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ITT_465L_Strategic_Air_Command_Control_System
Wikipedia license: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/
The ITT 465L Strategic Air Command Control System (SACCS, SAC Control System, 465L Project, 465L Program) was a Cold War "Big L" network of computer and communication systems for command and control of Strategic Air Command "combat aircraft, refueling tankers, [and] ballistic missiles". International Telephone and Telegraph was the prime contractor for Project 465, and SACCS had "Cross Tell Links" between command posts at Offutt AFB, March AFB, & Barksdale AFB (SACCS also communicated with the Cheyenne Mountain Complex and Air Force command posts. The 465L System included IBM AN/FSQ-31 SAC Data Processing Systems, Remote (RCC) and Simplex Remote Communication Systems (SRCC), SAC Network Control Office, "4-wire, Schedule 4, Type 4B alternate voice-data operation", and one-way communication with "ICBM launch control centers" (the SAC Digital Network upgraded to two-way communications.) In addition to IBM for the "Super SAGE type computers", another of the 6 direct subcontractors was AT&T ("end-to-end control" of the communications circuits),..
1st IBM "Big L" system
In 1955 the Experimental SAGE Subsector was completed with a simplex IBM XD-1 prototype of the AN/FSQ-7 planned for the SAGE computer network, and IBM Federal Systems subsequently built dozens of vacuum tube computers for the AN/FSQ-8 and AN/FSQ-7 centrals of Support System 416L (SS-416L), the 1st "Big L" system. SAGE radar stations used AN/FST-2 sets for transferring data, and GATR sites and BOMARC Ground-to-Air Transmitter Facilities provided radio control for ground-controlled interception...
Development
On February 11, 1958, Headquarters USAF published General Operational Requirement or GOR 168 for SACCS (the Westover AFB command post was to get a computer system) and on April 1, HQ USAF changed the SACCS designator from Program 133L to 465L. SAC's QOR for the National Survivable Communications System (NSCS) was issued September 13, 1958, and in October 1959 the systems cost had increased from $139.7 million to $339.8 million in 12 months: the Office of the Secretary of Defense—with "doubts regarding the validity of the entire 465L concept"—cut the program by December 1. In September 1960 the "installation of a SAC display warning system" included 3 consoles (e.g., BMEWS Display Information Processor (DIP) in the Offutt bunker and on 7 December I960, the 465L Program was cut to ""a most austere approach" (an austere air defense sector was also established for NORAD, which soon planned a smaller BUIC control system.) "In July 1961, the Department of Defense redirected SACCS 465L to a pre-strike system and established a separate [airborne] post-attack command control system with air and ground elements.
by 1962, "SAC installations, inclusive of those overseas and of tenant bases, peaked at 85". "Project 465L, the SAC Control System (SACCS) [with] over a million lines, reached four times the size of the SAGE code and consumed 1,400 man-years of programming; SDC invented a major computer language, JOVIAL, specifically for this project."
SACCS "was delivered to Strategic Air Command by the contractor in March 1965" and was designed to survive nuclear attack and to provide rapid transmission, processing, and display of information to support command and control of SAC's geographically separated forces. On January 1, 1968, the SACCS attained operational capability (maintenance at Offutt and March were by the respective 55th Strategic and 33rd Communications Squadrons.) During construction of NORAD's nuclear bunker, SAC's 1963 plan for construction of a Deep Underground Command Center in Colorado beginning in 1965 was cancelled.
In 1968, "after SAC completed its tests during March, AFSC arranged for modification of the SAC terminals for use with LES-6" for satellite communications. A SACCS remote communications van completed on 12 July 1968 was shipped to Andersen AFB, Guam, e.g., for supporting the SACADVON (30 SAC B-52s had deployed on 17 February 1965 to Guam for the Vietnam War...
