That economy-class seat you once occupied while flying in Asia might one day be the very place from where the United States nuclear weapons arsenal is controlled. That’s because five Boeing 747 passenger jets once operated by the South Korean flag carrier Korean Air have been purchased by the Sierra Nevada Corporation, the contractor for the replacements for the US Air Force’s current fleet of strategic command and control military aircraft, more commonly known as “Doomsday” planes. Also known as the E-4B “Nightwatch,” the Doomsday planes are designed to be command-and-control centers for the US military in the event of a national emergency that sees command facilities on the ground destroyed or incapacitated, such as nuclear war. They could become what amounts to a Pentagon in the sky, taking aboard the US president, secretary of defense and members of the Joint Chiefs among more than 100 other people with the…
