244
Nuclear consent switch on an F-16 Fighting Falcon
(thelemmy.club)
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
this post was submitted on 02 Jun 2026
244 points (100.0% liked)
HistoryPhotos
1508 readers
834 users here now
HistoryPhotos is for photographs (or, if it can be found, film) of the past, recent or distant! Give us a little snapshot of history!
Rules
- Be respectful and inclusive.
- No harassment, hate speech, or trolling.
- Foster a continuous learning environment.
- No genocide or atrocity denialism.
- Photos MUST be at LEAST 10 years old, and ideally over 20. We appreciate that we are living through events which will become history, but this is ultimately not a comm for news or current affairs, but events which have occurred some time in the past.
Related Communities:
- !militaryporn@lemmy.world
- !forgottenweapons@lemmy.world
- !historymemes@piefed.social
- !historyruins@piefed.social
- !historyart@piefed.social
- !historyartifacts@piefed.social
founded 11 months ago
MODERATORS
"one of" is doing some heavy lifting there :)
That button isn't meant to stop crazy or evil people from killing us all. That's (hopefully) taken care of by things like careful pilot vetting.
A completely sane and non-mass-murderous pilot might still accidentally press a normal button. Especially if they were tired near the end of a long mission.
It's not as stringent as the safeguard that Roger Fisher proposed. He suggested that the nuclear launch codes be placed in a capsule and surgically implanted near the heart of a volunteer. That volunteer would follow the president around with a butcher knife. If the president ever wanted to launch the nukes it would need to be serious enough that he was willing to take that knife and carve the launch codes out of the chest of an innocent man.
I like the Homer approach. I want three different nuclear launch codes! One here, here, and here. You can never remember the nuclear launch code when you're angry.