The Book of Truths

Author's Note

I write factual fiction. I gather real events and add in a fictional premise and characters.

Yes: There was a marine named Smedley Butler and he was awarded two Medals of Honor.

Yes: Churchill did say that truth must be attended by a bodyguard of lies.

Yes: The officially acknowledged first nuclear weapon ever “lost” by the US was in 1950 over Canada. Sorry, Canadians. Our bad.

Yes: When Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara instituted technical launch codes on nuclear weapons to prevent unauthorized deployment, the Strategic Air Command, on its own, decided to override that by setting all the codes to 00000000 and they stayed that way for a while before anyone caught on.

Yes: The Pentagon did secretly remove President Nixon’s ability to launch nuclear weapons in his erratic, waning days before he resigned.

Yes: President Jimmy Carter did send the nuclear launch authorization codes out with his laundry.

Yes: President Ronald Reagan had the codes in his pocket when he was shot and they ended up on the emergency room floor, forgotten about.

Yes: General Curtis LeMay strongly believed in a preemptive first strike against the Soviet Union.

Yes: The Russians did open their nuclear “football” in reaction to a satellite launch by the Norwegians.

Yes: The scientists who worked on the Manhattan Project did have a betting pool as to the yield of the Trinity Test, with the low end being a dud and the high end igniting the sky on fire and incinerating Earth.

Which leads us to today where…