Nike Missiles: Dedicated to Defense

Nike Missiles: Dedicated to Defense. . , The Cold War, extending from , 1953 to 1979, introduced a heightened level of danger to the world. It was particularly worrisome to Americans, who experienced no homefront battles other than Pearl Harbor during the two world wars. The Cold War brought the potential for an enemy attack to any point in the country , including the heartland of Minnesota., The enemy, the Soviet Union, , emerged from the Russian Civil War that began in 1917, after the Czar lost his throne. The United States backed the losing side, and refused to recognize the Soviet state until 1933. Mutual opposition to Hitler made the two nations uneasy allies during World War II, but a bitter rivalry emerged after the conflict. It was communism vs. democracy and socialism vs. capitalism in an epic battle for world domination., When Soviet priorities switched , from bombers to intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) that could reach America, the U.S. introduced the Nike-Zeus, a faster and more lethal missile. The larger antiballistic missiles could not fit in Nike-Hercules facilities, which were bargained away in the first treaty of the Strategic Arms Limitation Talks (SALT I) in 1972. Most of the country's 145 Nike-Hercules missile installations were deactivated by 1974, followed five years later by those that remained in Florida and Alaska. Nike-Hercules continued to serve in Europe until the fall of Communism in Eastern Europe in the late 1980s. , Less than two dozen deactivated Nike-Hercules are known to survive, making the missile standing before you a rare resource. , Devastating new weapons , intensified the potential deadliness of this rivalry. In 1949, the Soviets detonated an atomic bomb, years sooner than Americans had anticipated. They tested an even more destructive hydrogen bomb in 1953, only 10 months behind the United States, and tricked U.S. observers into believing that they had a large fleet of long-range bombers two years later. The Soviet launch of Sputnik, the world's first unmanned satellite, in 1957 added heat to the Cold War. An escalation of weaponry by both sides led to the policy of Mutually Assured Destruction , appropriately abbreviated MAD , and a tense balance between the two superpowers., By the 1950s, the United States , was installing a missile-based defense system to protect major cities, industrial centers, and military bases from Soviet bombers. The Nike-Ajax, a surface-to-air guided missile (SAM), was first deployed in 1954. They started to be replaced by more powerful Nike-Hercules missiles, like those installed near St. Bonifacius, in 1958. The Hercules could carry atomic as well as conventional warheads., Panels created and installed by the St. Bonifacius Historical Society with the support of the City of St. Bonifacius and citizens near and far. , This project has been made possible by the Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund through the vote of Minnesotans on November 4, 2008. , Administered by the Minnesota Historical Society..