What goes up must come down.

Nike Hercules launch

“Hercules also offered the ability to attack pre-located ground targets, after feeding in the coordinates in an operation that took about five minutes. For these missions the computer used the MTR to guide the missile to a point above the target, then commanded it to dive vertically while measuring any changes in trajectory as it fell. The missile would eventually pass out of line-of-sight with the MTR, so final arming information was provided during the dive, and the warhead was triggered by a barometric fuse.” wiki

Comment: In one of the many US Army schools that I attended I was told that this SAM was actually the most accurate intermediate range ballistic missile that we had at the time. Surprise!

This is not to say that the Ukrainians deliberately put this thing into Poland. No, what I am saying is that the capacity of what they have to go ballistic and smash the s–t out of something there is easy to imagine. pl

Nike Hercules – Wikipedia

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9 Responses to What goes up must come down.

  1. Kilo 4/11 says:

    Long before anybody heard of the athletic shoe, one could visit the Nike missile installations in and around Chicago: https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/nike-missle-site-c-44

    • cobo says:

      We had one down the road from my HAWK unit in the town of Hermeskeil.

    • Fourth and Long says:

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Nike_missile_sites

      All sites domestic and international. Now I will look for Robert Graves ideas on the Goddes Nike and likely settle for Wikipedia.

      It suggests Nigh Key. A location in a James Bond novella? Not a reference, I hope to Nigel’s Kensington Wayfarer’s Public House, I hope not.

      From this excerpt below the link I am led to wonder if Col Lang is prompting visions of victory. I didn’t take him for a Victorian, Edwardian perhaps or Diplo-Elizabethan, in homage to the recently late Queen. I haven’t watched the recently released episodes (Season) of The Crown on Netflix. Net Flix. Is it a Russian way of saying No to Felix? The 2nd Season of Gangs of London is unfolding. Ep 1 free, Ep 2 needs AMC+ where I am.

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nike_(mythology)
      At Athens, Nike became a servant to Athena as well as an attribute of her due to the prominent status Athena held in her patron city. The fusion of the two goddesses at Athens has contributed to the ambiguity surrounding Nike’s origins. It is unclear whether she originated from a character trait of the Greek goddess Athena or has always existed as an independent deity.[7] Her origin story in Greek mythology is also slightly ambiguous, with the Theogony claiming Nike to be the daughter of Styx and Pallas[8] while the Homeric Hymns describe Ares as being Nike’s father.[9] Her Roman equivalent was Victoria.

      • Fourth and Long says:

        Wiki:
        While the Greek word νίκη
        (nikē) is of uncertain etymology, R.S.P. Beekes has suggested a Pre-Greek origin.[10] However, it has also been speculated to have derived from the Proto-Indo-European neik- meaning to attack or “start vehemently.” If this is true it would make the word cognate with Ancient Greek νεῖκος (neîkos, “strife”) and Lithuanian ap-ni̇̀kti (“to attack”).
        /-/-/

        Look at that. Nike in Greek letters -νίκη- looks a lot like Viki.
        And I copied it from Wiki. Nicky is also a name of the devil.

  2. Tim says:

    Fun fact: the nuclear-tipped Nike used a unique sensor on the nose, part of the final decent guidance system. I learned how to work on Army nukes back in the early 80s, we still had Nike batteries in Europe back then. Rumors were that our location was on their target list in case we were overrun and couldn’t clear our bunkers.

    • Fourth and Long says:

      I always wondered why anti air missiles weren’t nuclear tipped. Thank you. Now I see my childhood and youth as an even more restrained overly tidy place than I fully understood. The list above is staggering. And they were nukes too? A fellow at the Donegal Tavern in NY City who I spoke with around the time the Pope was shot had served in Europe as an enlisted man. He laughed as politely as he was able to when he told me I had a very inaccurate idea of how many missiles were in Europe. “I don’t know where you get your ideas man, but I was there and it seemed like every shed you opened: missiles.” He continued in a jovial style. I hope I was socially conscious enough to remember to buy him a drink. I can’t recall either if he was there to place a bet, receive winnings, pay a debt, or see if there were still illegal crap games in back. Very impressive soldier material though, and then I was only charged 35 cents for a small domestic draft beer.

      • LeaNder says:

        only charged 35 cents for a small domestic draft beer.

        Was it that cheap then, really? 1981? You remember the brand of draft beer in that Tavern. Can’t help,but sounds as if you could have a Guinness on draft too at that place.

        • Fourth and Long says:

          Could be a minor memory lapse. I’m old. Whenever I think of that place it sends me to images of the TV they had showing stuff about Lech Walesa and Gdansk. I confuse it in time with the attempt on the life of John Paul II. I also confuse the that attempt, because it rings a “Pope death” bell, with the death of his predecessor John Paul I, not only because the names are so similar, but because he was so briefly in office. It was 35c for a short draft of either ballantine or miller when I first drank there in the late afternoons of 1976, but that encounter with the peacetime late Vietnam era veteran and after stationed in Europe for a period of time was probably ’79. God, if you only knew what went on there, but you might then rightly question my judgement .. . Guiness, yes, but much better at a fancier place with a bigger pool table right around the corner.

      • Pat Lang says:

        F&L
        American Nike Hercules had nuclear warheads on some of the missiles.

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