A brief summary

A place for writings that have no other.

1957

(Source: Email from David L. Newquist, "A" Btry, 2nd Msl Bn, 56th Arty, 1957-59)

I was part of Overseas Package 5 which came from Fort Bliss to Germany in December 1957. After deplaning at Frankfurt, we went to Mannheim and picked up the 95th AAA Bn. to convert it to a Nike Ajax battalion. We left Mannheim by convoys and the battalion headquarters and Batteries C and D were sent to Pirmasens. Battery B went to Landau, and Battery A went to Germersheim. The sites were constructed and we moved the equipment onto them.  When we deplaned in Frankfurt, civilians were demonstrating outside the air base gates with “Sputnik, Go Home” signs. However, a public information blitz was mounted and by January 1958 the missile equipment was in place and the batteries were operational.  We were extremely short of personnel, and the command structure was complicated, involving the ADA command at Kaiserslautern and NATO. Sometime in 1958, we all had to buy the new green dress uniforms and the unit was redesignated the 2nd Missile Battalion, 56th Artillery. I was in Battery A at Germersheim.  While we were the 95th Bn., we went to sick call at Pirmasens and dental call at Karlsruhe. After the redesignation, we reported to Heidelberg for medical services.  We pulled 24-hour shifts and got a “rest” day after such a shift. We were so short handed that we often were assigned to drive the troops and the dependents to sick call. When in Karlsruhe, we were warned to be extremely careful of civilians. As it turned out, the Baader Meinhof gang was centered at Karlsruhe, although their activities were pretty low-key in the late 1950s.  An ordnance company that supervised a civilian force that serviced and reconditioned military vehicles was already in operation at Germersheim. The base was a World War II German fighter base. The hangars were in a forested area and were concrete bunkers covered with dirt and planted over with trees. When the U.S. forces occupied the site, that area was fenced off and guarded by a Bulgarian Labor Force. That Force also guarded a bombed-out bridge on the Rhine, on which Germersheim is situated. The hangar-bunkers were used to store explosives. We were allowed in there only when we assembled missiles and had to pick up missile fuels (red fuming nitric acid, unsymmetrical dimethylhydrazine, and nitroglycerin solid booster propellants) and warheads. We weren’t supposed to know it and neither were the Bulgarians, but nuclear warheads were stored there.  While the Nike system was intended and designated to be an air defense system, the Hercules versions and later the Zeus could be used as short range ballistic missiles. Our radar operators had been trained to set ground targets on the radar-guiding computers.  I completed my active duty in March 1959. There are many stories to tell, but there was a hostility in Germersheim that did not create fond memories. On occasion, Soviet staff cars were seen cruising near the base, and we also learned that Germersheim had a history during the Holocaust years that the people preferred to keep stifled.