Talk:Special Atomic Demolition Munition/@comment-216.96.11.35-20150303051329

(continued from below) although we never had to deploy the weapon we were constantly training on the device. Due to the possibility of an EM Field, the unit had a mechanical timer located underneath a plate which had fluorescent paint to allow the soldiers to find the cover plate in the dark. Even after it was set, the three man team still was required to be close enough to observe the weapon and make sure it detonated. More or less endangering the team with either death from the blast or radiation poisoning which led to death also. The problem with the mechanical timer was that it could be off by as much as 18 minutes. So setting the timer could trigger the bomb at that point. All teams were required to have the highest Top Secret Clearance available in the Army. There were three teams set to detonate the devices at the Fulda Gap area. The main entry point, as I have said, that was decided the Russians would cross from East Germany. Other teams were scattered across Germany and assigned to Combat Engineer Units to attack other areas to impede or stop completely the forward momentum of the enemy. This was only the Army's extent of the ADM. The Air Force had theirs and the Special Forces Teams also had their own type of ADMs. Small tactical weapons such as this (and the MDAM) were seen as an alternative to attacking the enemy with Total Nuclear Annihilation and was seen as an alternative that would not cause the Russians to resort to full scale nuclear war. It is also important to note that the Russians also had small tactical weapons teams like this. After the Cold War ended, it was discovered that 50 of these 'so-called' back-pack nukes were missing from the Russian Military Inventory