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"Honest John" Incident
by a U.S. military ally

By Section Editor: Robert M. Forrest

 

This is an anecdote that has remained in certain U.S. Army artillery circles since the late 1970's. The event's documentation is nowhere to be found, and its truthfulness is only supported by the question, "Why would someone make this up?"

Here's how it goes.

The incident, it is told, occurred in Korea, where a U.S. Army unit kept custody of nuclear warheads that could be released to the ROK army in the event of an all-out war on the peninsula. The ROK army had Honest John rockets, and apparently one of the other duties of the custodial unit was to advise the ROK artillerymen on the entire system. At least two U.S. officers were present to watch the Koreans fire an Honest John one afternoon.

The rocket prior to ignition is held secure by three large pins on its raised launching rail or ramp. The pins are painted red so they can be readily seen, but apparently the one in the middle is obscured from casual observation by some of the mechanism and might be overlooked. A failure to notice and remove that middle pin would set events in motion.

One of the U.S. officers gave this account:

"I was sitting there waiting for the rocket to fire, and finally it did. I saw this big cloud of smoke and flames, but I noticed that I didn't see any rocket coming out of it. I thought, 'uh oh!'" When the smoke cleared up a little, I could see the rocket was still sitting there attached to the truck. Then, the truck started to shake and bounce around, and pretty soon the whole thing kind of rose up slowly into the air -- truck, rocket, and all! It got up about 50, 60 feet and then nosed over, and slammed into the ground. The motor was still burning, so it started rolling and bouncing end-over-end down range, until it finally blew up."

Other than proving that the pins had a 200% safety margin, since one of them was unfortunately all too capable of holding the rocket on the rail against the thrust of the motor, I can only imagine what went on in the Korean artillery battalion headquarters. I imagine some rocketeers quickly became infantrymen, or worse!

I have never heard of such an event occuring to the 3AD or any Army unit in Germany, but if anyone knows of such an accident, or of any serious nuclear weapon mishap in Germany, please contact me through the webmaster.

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