Seemed weird to me that they turned it into a secondary site; we were fighting relatively incapable-of-force-projection people in the mountains and deserts at the time, but even if Russia wasn't a clear threat in 2008, it seems like it should have been obvious EMP, conventional infiltration attacks, etc. would be reasonable threats in the future. Unless you're willing to go to fully dispersed command (and thus risk a commander at theater or below level launching on his own authority...), or run 24x7 airborne looking glass (which ended in 1990, and presumably was even more costly than modernizing Cheyenne Mountain Complex), what we had from 2008-2015 was clearly less survivable.
> Unless you're willing to go to fully dispersed command (and thus risk a commander at theater or below level launching on his own authority...),
pretty much the plot of Dr Strangelove
According to Daniel Ellsberg the US did implement a scheme where regional commanders could use nuclear weapons without explicit authority from the President:
"Walking out of the theater, Ellsberg turned to his friend, another nuclear denizen, and said, “That was a documentary.”"
I read once that UK submarine commanders had the authority to launch if they couldn't contact London and the BBC was no longer broadcasting.
Makes sense the idea that your entire war plan hinges on one guy is stupid.
In descriptions of the process it always amuses me that they talk about failure to receive Radio 4 being the test (perhaps of it also being broadcast on long wave)...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Letters_of_last_resort