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Feb 8, 2004
Dear Ed:
Nothing is forever. After writting to you I revisted Rolf Dieter Goericks web site and found a description of a unit I'd never heard of, the 5th US Artillery Group, composed of all the units I was writting about. It turns out that everything was reorganized in 1972, SASCOM ceased to exist and the 514th and 522nd were disbanded. So, I've incorporated this into my article. I also expanded and clarified some points and added some things that might be of interest to your readers.
So there are two sources of confusion, the US Army vs. Host country nomenclature and the reorganization of the entire European structure in 1972. Even I got confused. Please feel free to edit this if it's too much.
With thanks for keeping the memory alive.
Richard J. Scheffler
Dear Ed:
Your excellent web site contains some references to the American Army Units stationed with
NATO Nike-Hercules Batteries. In the section on German units, you admit there is some confusion
because the German units and American units had different names, chain of command and so on.
Perhaps this text will help. Nike Battery and Battalion unit designations varied from NATO country
to country but the Army system was uniform across Europe. Because my unit, the 35th USAAD,
(United States Army Artillery Detachment) supported the German 26th FlaRak Battalion, I'll use it
as an example of how the Detachments and Teams operated.
While the NATO allies owned the rockets and the conventional warheads mounted on them,
the nuclear warheads remained property of the U.S. and custody and control was maintained by the
U.S. Army (since the Nike-Herc program was an Army function in the U.S., it was also so in Europe
and Turkey).
Until 1972, the U.S. Army units were organized as follows:
The basic unit was the Team. A Team supported a host country battery. The Team
Commander was a 1Lt with usually two but sometimes three lieutenants heading up security and
warheading operations. The Team had two own cooks, a Team Sgt., a Team Clerk, at least two
specialists or sergeants who were specialists in warheading and a sergeant in charge of the security
troops. While the T.O.&E. Was about 35 officers and men, the teams frequently functioned with 25
to 30 due to the manpower requirements of the Vietnam theater. The teams had no organic
transportation, were housed separately from the host unit and were supplied through Army channels.
The host county manned the kitchen and provided and maintained the Team HQ building.
The teams were located about two hours by car from the Detachments of which they
were a part. The Teams were usually located on the Kaserne or other facility of the supported Nike-
Herc battery. The teams were identified by letters, hence B Team, 35th USAAD, etc.
Every facility with nuclear warheads had two fences, an outer fence controlled and
secured by the host country and an inner fence controlled and secured by U.S. forces. At night, the
area between the fences was patrolled by handlers with dogs and armed guards. The "barns" (we had
metal barns as the launching areas in northern Germany were so low that any hole dug immediately
filled with water) containing nuclear armed missiles were secured with combination locks for which
only the U.S. forces had the combination, half the combination held by officers, half by N.C.O.'s. The warheading
building was located within the inner fence and was guarded by U.S. forces when a nuclear weapon
was present. The German Air Force was responsible for air defense and Nike-Herc operations in
Germany where I served. Any operation involving nuclear weapons was overseen by U.S. forces utilizing strictly enforced "two man" rules.
The "fuzes", authentication codes and everything else involving the nuclear warheads
were under the control of the U.S. under heavy security. The warheads were secured with PAL,
Permissive Action Link, devices that had to be removed before the weapon could be fuzed. The
combinations to these devices were not maintained by the Team or Detachment but would have been
transmitted from USAEUR in the event of war.
The Teams worked closely with the Germans on a daily basis. Most of the officers
and a few enlisted men soon learned German and later in my deployment some of the officers had
had language school training. Since the Teams had no organic transport and getting vehicles from
the Germans was a royal pain, usually POV's were used to and from the housing area to the launch
site. There was no BOQ. Married NCO's could occupy German military housing and the E.M.'s
occupied a small barracks area at the Team HQ building in the base area. Some enlisted men
brought their wives over at their own expense and had housing in the local economy.
The Duty was particularly hard on the officers and senior NCO's. Because an officer
and NCO had to be on duty 24/7 365 days a year and only two or three officers were assigned to a
Team, duty was essentially continuous. During a two-year tour I had no leave and only two three
day passes. While I was gone, the other officers pulled 24 on, 24 off. Of course 24 off meant off
watch not off duty. This situation may have improved after the Vietnam War was over. I don't
know but I thought the duty was pretty grim.
The Detachments had a Detachment Commander, a Captain, a Detachment Sgt., Det.
Clerk and a Warrant Officer specializing in warheading. A new Lieutenant without the Top Secret clearance
necessary to work on the Missiles might be the temporary executive officer. Each Detachment had a Signal Corps
communications specialist to operate the radio equipment that served as the main link with
SASCOM and hence USAREUR. These specialists were not in the Artillery chain of command, a
situation that led to some friction. The Detachment was actually attached to A Team for mess, mail
and non-appropriated fund activities such as movies, PX and bar.
The detachment served a German Nike-Herc Battalion of four Batteries. Since the
Battalion Commander was a Lt. Col. And the Detachment CO a Capt. There was a potential for
friction. As far as I knew, this potential was never realized. Some confusion occurs with the 35th
USAAD because it had not four but five teams. Teams A (Jever, later Hohenkirchen) through D and
E Team in Elsfleth. Thus, this Detachment served two FlaRak Battalions the 24th and the 26th. As
far as I know, this was the only Detachment with five teams. Until sometime in the '70's, the
Headquarters of the 35th was located at Fliegerhorst Jever although the launch site was far north,
almost on the North Sea coast. Later, the Team moved into new quarters in Hohenkichen near the
launch site.
The CWO would go from Team to Team, generally just prior to an inspection,
observing and correcting the Team warheading crew. The Detachment CO weould inspect before
the next higher level and occasionally accompany an inspection team from a higher level.
The next higher level was the Group. I served with A and B Teams of the 35th USAA
Detachment and we in turn belonged to the 552nd USAAG located in Soegel, FRG. This unit had
a LtC or Col as CO and provided payroll, adjudant, limited supply and other support. A group
covered a broad geographical territory and might include units supporting units in more than one
NATO country and field artillery as well as air defense.
The next higher level was also called a Group, in my case the 514th USAAG in
Monchen-Gladbach, FRG. I had so little contact with this group, except for inspections, I can't
honestly say what it did except inspect. I do know it cut my orders for assignment to the 35th USAAD.
Finally there was SASCOM, Special Ammunition Support Command, in Heidelberg,
FRG. SASCOM had administrative control of all US Army units assigned to NATO forces with
nuclear weapons. It was the funnel point for all communications in the nuclear weapons chain of
command. Operation Orders, all drills during my tenure, would come down through USAREUR through
SASCOM to the Detachments and then to the Teams. SASCOM regularly inspected all the Teams.
USAREUR was the next level, it inspected all the Teams as well. There were also occasional
inspections run out the US, these were from the facilities that actually built the weapons.
Originally, SASCOM units wore the USAREUR patch but a SASCOM patch was
authorized about a year after I arrived in Germany (1968). The 552nd and all of its junior units were
authorized a distinctive unit insignia or crest shortly before I left the service in 1970. There was.
Daily life in a Team involved two activities, securing the launch site and preparing for or
suffering the next inspection. The TO&E, training schedule and higher echelons, envisaged a
skeleton crew on duty at the launch site during the evening hours and an eight hour day for everyone
including an eight hour training schedule with breaks. In reality, the Germans would carry on
operations all night, seek entry to the nuclear barns to service the conventional missiles also located
there and in general do their thing 24/7. As a result, the security detail would work eight to twelve
hours, come off duty, eat, raise some hell in the nearest bar or watch a movie (we did get a new one
every night) and sleep. Eight to twelve hours later they would be on duty again.
The Teams were inspected at least monthly by one command level or another. The lower the
level, the tougher the inspection which covered pre-fire warheading, security and site demolition as
well as the usual military Mickey Mouse. In the meanwhile, the Team was also performing its
mission and running joint readiness exercises with the Germans. We frequently did joint training warheading
operations with the Germans as they were expected to take over the complete operation of the site
if the warheads were ever released to them.
One of my fellow officers, quite short at the time, was asked on an informal visit by the CO
of the 514th how the training schedule was coming along. He answered, "Sir, I haven't followed that
damn schedule since I've been Team Commander." He was quite pleased to be relieved of his
command a week or so later when, I assume, the Colonel returned to his HQ, stopped fuming and
gave the order.
Because the Batteries would likely be overrun in the event of war, we were required to be
able to deploy explosive demolitions on the all the nukes in two hours or less. This consisted of
shaped charges on each warhead section connected by both electrical and det cord detonators back
to the guard shack. We practiced this a lot with dummy charges. While the airspace over the launch
site was supposed to be a no-fly zone, we were frequently overflown at low altitude by US planes.
I was on TDY outside Munich once and ran into a pilot in an O club. I asked him if he knew why they
did that and he said, "Sure. You have two hours to blow the site, right? Well, if you don't, we'll
come and do it for you." Somehow I didn't feel safer.
Most of the Teams I was familiar with were located in very small German towns with few
facilities except for a grocery store, a schnell-imbiss or two and a few bars plus a church. The largest
town I served in was Jever, Rolf Dieter's hometown, and it had a few more amenities and a really
good restaurant. It was quite pretty as well.
The quarters in Jever were a disaster, temporary buildings on a German air base that had been
built in WWII. The walls were of such poor concrete that they could be literally dug into with a
spoon. Made for a terrific weapons room and secure storage area. The launch site was so far from
the Team that by regulation, it had to be manned by an NCO and officer for the two man rule. Since
the Team HQ had the same requirement (being also the Detachment HQ), keeping the duty roster
running was a nightmare. Most of the Officers pulled 60 on, eight or ten off until a waiver was
granted. I didn't get a lot of sleep. All the other Teams had modern, purpose built HQ's with a mess
hall, offices and barracks room.
If I sound a little bitter, I guess I may be. It was mostly cold and dark and wet in Northern
Germany. There was little time for R and R and we were constantly undermanned. The peacetime
safety rules required that all the personnel have at least a high school diploma. I had some soldiers
who had dropped out after the eighth grade. I had one security guard who was illiterate, tough to
train that guy.
What follows about the organization after 1972 is from Rolf Dieter Goerick's excellent set
of web pages.
SASCOM and AWSCOM (?) were merged and reorganized in 1972 and all of the
Detachments became part of the 5th Artillery Group. The Detachments and Teams in Europe were
assigned as follows:
The 35th lost Echo Team. I don't know which Detachment got it.
The 42nd Artillery Detachment, headquartered in Barnstorf, supported the 25th FlaRak
(German) Battallion`s Nike-Hercules missiles. Alpha Team was colocated with the headquarters,
while bravo team was 20 kilometers south.
The 43rd Artillery Detachment headquarters, in Dueren supported the 13th Belgian Missile
Wing. Alpha team was colocated with the detachment headquarters while Bravo team was in
Kaster; Charlie team was in Euskirchen and Delta team in Blankenheim.
The 51st Artillery Detachment, headquarters on the northwest corner of the German
metropolis of Bremen in Adelheide, was the only detachment in the group without an Alpha or
Bravo team; the two split off during a Brigade reorganization. Charlie team was in Westercheps,
near Oldenburg, and Delta team in nearby Syke, south of Bremen.
The 52nd Artillery Detachment, headquartered in Burbach, is close to the 557th Artillery
Group headquarters in Herbomseelbach, and about an hour and a half north of Frankfurt.
The 66th Artillery Detachment was headquartered in Becke, the group headquarters in
Bueren. They supported the 21st (German) FlaRak Battalion. They had their own kaserne four
kilometers east of the headquarters in the heart of a Belgian training area.
The 501st Artillery Detachment, headquartered in Kilianstaetten, was on the north-east
section of Frankfurt and was the groups southernmost unit. It supports the 23rd FlaRak Battalion.
The 597th Artillery Detachment, in Grefrath with its Alpha team, close to Duesseldorf
supported the 9th Belgian missile wing
The 509th Artillery Detachment headquartered in Voerden, 50 miles southwest of Bremen,
supported the 12th Netherlands Missile Group. Detachment Headquarters and Alpha team were
colocated, Bravo team was in Schoeppingen and Charlie team was in Borgholzhausen.
There were Teams in Turkey and Greece as well but I have no information on them.
I can only hope that conditions and morale got better after the Vietnam war ended. From
reading the descriptions of life under the 5th Arty Group, I sense they were. I made a visit
back to Jever and Rodenkirchen in '76 with my wife and revisited Rodenkirchen again in the '90's
but by that time the Nike-Herc sites were dismantled and the Kaserne was manned by a skeleton
crew, mostly civilian. The Germans had removed any sign that our building was ever occupied by
the U.S. Army, they even took down our flagpole. I had lunch that day in the local restaurant where
the waitress had not been even been born when I was there. I don't think she knew the American
Army had ever been there.
I hope that this is useful to you. I kept all my orders from my Army days and can probably
provide the names of the CO's of the various Teams, the Detachment and the 552nd if you'd like
them. I never took a camera to the launch site so I have no photos of the missiles. I remember some
of the specs of the warheads (Y-1 and Y-2) which are probably still classified. Interestingly, the W-
31 warhead was also used as a nuclear demolition with different fusing and safety interlocks of
course.
Thanks for keeping this story alive. I served for nearly two years at two sites in northern
Germany and as far as I can remember no one ever thanked me for helping defend their country or
Europe but I'm proud of my military service and feel that we served our country well or, as Milton
said, "They also serve, who only stand and wait."
Sincerely,
Richard J. Scheffler 1Lt FA (yep, a cannon cocker from Ft. Sill)
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