Several dozen “Minuteman III” intercontinental ballistic missiles with nuclear warheads, which should be in the arsenal of the United States, disappeared without a trace.
It is about 79 missiles, which is one fifth of the total. In an attempt to figure it out, Pentagon officials found that the weapons were simply not taken into account in the accounting process. It became clear only at the end of the second stage of a large-scale inventory of the Pentagon, which involved specialists from the Ernst & Young contracting company.
According to the US Department of Defense, the Air Force inventory system, which stores information on the location and value of military equipment, incorrectly determined the location of ammunition. The problem was the fact that the data was entered manually.
It is worth noting that this is not the first “nuclear scandal” in the United States. So, back in 2007, by mistake, the military equipped the B-52H bomber with six AGM-129 ACM cruise missiles with hydrogen warheads instead of training ammunition. After that, the plane went flying over the air base. Found an error only after 36 hours.