Ring the Alarm

Jackson Lears chillingly demonstrates that the United States military favors neutral technocrats over conscientious officers when it comes to nuclear armaments [“Behind the Veil of Indifference,” Revision, July]. His piece brings to mind an incident from September 1983, when the Soviet Union’s early warning system erroneously reported a U.S. nuclear missile launch. It came at the worst possible time: only a few weeks earlier, the Soviet Union had shot down a plane that strayed into its airspace, killing 269 passengers, including a U.S. congressman. Fortunately, the man who received the alarm, Stanislav…