Fort Gaucher
Ξ August 17th, 2008 | → 0 Comments | ∇ Uncategorized, PATRIOT ACT |
Since the paper-back release of PATRIOT ACT I’ve had a few emails asking if Fort Gaucher in Mont Blanc is a real installation. No. At least not to my knowledge. I made it up as it was an exotic and plausible place for such a military/intelligence site. There were many such bunker-type bases around the world built during WW2 and the cold war (including some fascinating ones in Sydney). The name Gaucher came from two sources, Jules Gaucher and Roland Gaucher – two very different men, and I deliberately left the explanation oblique in the book, so the reader could make their own mind up on who it may have been named after. For the finer details of the base, I had in mind the old ADOC near Ramstein Air Base as a model. Here’s a bit on that, from wikipedia (complete with US spelling):
The Combat Operations Center at ADOC Kindsbach.
Close to Ramstein was the site of Air Defense Operations Center (ADOC) - Kindsbach, AKA ‘Kindsbach Cave’ - the site of Europe’s underground combat operations center.
The facility was located in a former German western front command headquarters. The French took control of the underground bunker after World War II, and USAFE assumed control in 1953. After major renovations, USAFE opened the center on 15 August 1954.
The center was a state-of-the-art 67-room, 37,000-square-foot (3,400 m²) facility where USAFE could have led an air war against the Soviet Union. The center had a digital “computer” to work out bombing problems, cryptographic equipment for coded message traffic and its own photo lab to develop reconnaissance photos. Responsible for an air space extending deep behind the Iron Curtain, the center interacted directly with The Pentagon, NATO, Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe and all USAFE bases. With its massive telephone switchboard and 80 teletype machines, the cave was plugged into everything in the outside world. The center was receiving more than 1,000 calls a day.
As a further measure of protection, the cave was fully self-contained with its own water supply, electric backup-generators, climate controls, dining facilities and sleeping accommodations for its 125-man crew. Visitor passes were rarely issued to this secret facility.
Throughout the years, leadership changed but USAFE led the operations through numbered Air Forces. The center’s commander was the USAFE Advanced Echelon. The glassed-in office was on the top floor of the three-story underground command center. Directly under the office was the management for offensive air operations. And the bottom floor office was the management for defensive air operations – to include support for U.S. Army forces and German Civil Defense. All three offices had a full view of the massive Air Operations Center map on the opposing wall.
The AOC was the largest room in the complex. Its three-story map was used to plot minute-by-minute movements of friendly and unidentified aircraft. But the center was much more than just a tracking station, because it could also react to threats. They always knew the current operational status of air weapons in theater including missiles, and could dispatch armed response “at a moment’s notice”.
By the early 1960s, the manual plotting system used to track aircraft at the cave and elsewhere throughout Germany was too slow and inaccurate for the quick responses necessary. Beginning in 1962, airmen trained in the new 412L air weapons control system began to arrive in Germany and at the cave. Over the next year, the new GE semi-automatic system was installed. When complete at the cave, the current air picture over East and West Germany, as well as parts of the eastern soviet block countries, was displayed on a 40′ X 40′ (12 x 12 m) screen. Senior US staff monitored the dynamic display 24/7. Over the next several years, additional 412L sites throughout Germany joined the network until the manual system had been totally replaced.
By 1984, the Kindsbach Cave had become too small and its cost for renovation too high, and USAFE vacated the facility. On 31 October 1993, control was returned to the German government. Today the Kindsbach Cave remains sealed – a relic of the Cold War in Europe.
