DOD Drops Bomb on Annexation Plans

by Kilgore Trout
Staff Writer

January 17, 2009

The petition by Cooper to annex the area north of town known as Sasquatch Hole hit a major roadblock when the Department of Defense denied the petition based on prior military use of the land. When asked for clarification of the decision, DOD spokesperson Nancy McWhorter referred this reporter to a recently declassified document, NSC 17407-cm.

NSC 17407-cm was classified in 1973. Authored by Henry Kissinger, then National Security Advisor to President Richard Nixon, NSC 17407-cm authorized the Department of Defense to construct secret underground missile silo's that would house ICBM's. The construction of these silo's reversed previous policy of missile silo construction by allowing the DOD to keep the locations of these sites secret and by not requiring the presence of personnel within the silo to launch the missiles.

This new style of silo design was an idea of President Nixon's. He called his plan W.H.O.P.E.R., for Warhead Housing Objective Personnel Expeditious Removal (pronounced "whopper"). President Nixon had lost trust in the military chain of command, and had lost faith that when given the order to launch, those in the silo's would comply completely. He therefore sought to remove the men from the loop. The new silo's were connected directly to a button in the Oval Office, the mythical red button. Nixon also felt it was important to keep the location of these sites secret to prevent enemy sabotage and targeting of these sites as first strike targets by the enemy.

According to other recently declassified documents, the secret missile site at Sasquatch Hole was constructed in the spring of 1974 right under the noses of the citizens of Cooper. Three silo's were constructed and armed and came on-line (connected to the Oval Office) in July of that year. The Sasquatch Hole site (then referred to as the Cooper Site) was the first and only W.H.O.P.E.R. site constructed. When President Nixon resigned in August of 1974 the plan went with him. Then Secretary of State Kissinger was against the project and convinced President Ford to reverse the policy. It would seem that this was President Ford's second act as President, right after pardoning Nixon. The red button remained in the Oval Office, but was re-routed as a direct line to the White House cafeteria, so President Ford could get a plate of nachos any time he liked.

The site at Cooper was quickly covered over and forgotten about, but the missiles with their nuclear warheads remain there to this day. The Department of Defense says that plans are in the works to remove the warheads and fill the silo's with concrete just as soon as the DOD's principle contractor, Halliburton, is able to get their teams and equipment back from Iraq to do the job. When the job is done the DOD will release its hold on the annexation petition.

This revelation has also potentially solved a mystery that has puzzled Nixon biographers and historians since his death in 1994. After his death, Nixon's rumored "enemies list" surfaced and was cataloged into his presidential library. One of the last names added to the list was that of actor Dabney Coleman, added in 1983. In that year Coleman portrayed Dr. John McKittrick in the motion picture War Games. In that movie Dr. McKitrick was pushing military brass to install a super-computer to take control of all the nation's missile silo's; removing men from the loop. The name of the super-computer... W.O.P.R., pronounced "whopper". Mystery solved.