Firstly the password was supposed to only be known to central authority, and distributed to firing crews when a launch was ordered; but in fact all the firing crews knew it anyway. So its usefulness as a defence against authorized personnel going rogue was lost.
Secondly making the password the same everywhere makes it possible to use a password discovered from one installation in another; for instance if any of the authorized operators of any Minuteman missile could be blackmailed or bribed then the password for all of them would be known. Whereas if they were all different, you'd have to get to someone who knew the password for the particular missile you'd stolen.
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Date: 2004-06-02 01:19 am (UTC)Firstly the password was supposed to only be known to central authority, and distributed to firing crews when a launch was ordered; but in fact all the firing crews knew it anyway. So its usefulness as a defence against authorized personnel going rogue was lost.
Secondly making the password the same everywhere makes it possible to use a password discovered from one installation in another; for instance if any of the authorized operators of any Minuteman missile could be blackmailed or bribed then the password for all of them would be known. Whereas if they were all different, you'd have to get to someone who knew the password for the particular missile you'd stolen.