ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Wednesday, February 28, 1996 TAG: 9602280063
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A-11 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: THOMAS BECHER
MEMO: ***CORRECTION***
Published correction ran on February 29, 1996.
Contrary to erroneous information in a column Wednesday by Thomas
Becher, the once-secret bunker built for top government officials at the
Greenbrier Resort in White Sulphur Springs, W.Va., is open to the public
and hotel guests on Saturdays, Sundays, Tuesdays and Thursdays, through
March 14.
FROM THE outside, it's just a green door at the end of a service road. A sign warning of high voltage keeps the curious away.
Yet inside awaits one of the biggest secrets in U.S. history.
Buried beneath the five-star Greenbrier Resort in White Sulphur Springs, W.Va., lies Greek Island, the '50s-era bunker designed to house members of Congress, their staffs and families in the event of a nuclear war. Now a secret no more, the mall-sized bunker will open for tours for hotel guests in April.
The hotel offered a few tours recently, providing a rare look at one of the most dramatic vestiges of the Cold War. The visit allowed for a thorough inspection of what was designed to be an underground city that could house 1,000 people for a month, sealed off from radiation 250 miles southwest of one of the first nuclear targets: Washington, D.C.
Imagine arriving at the eve of Armageddon.
The 25-ton steel and concrete door clanks shut with a deafening echo. Cool mountain air gives way to the musty smells of a 400-foot-long tunnel leading to shower stalls where members of Congress would have been decontaminated. Then it's past the power plant and a crematorium.
Although many of the original furnishings were moved out when it was decommissioned a few years ago, the bunker is equipped with communications gear, 18 dormitories of bunk beds, a cafeteria, operating room, clinic and meeting rooms. There's even a cheery backdrop of the U.S. Capitol where lawmakers might have warned us of a nuclear attack - if there was anyone still alive to listen.
One of the hotel's meeting rooms would have changed in case of nuclear attack into chambers for the House and Senate. Blast doors would have sealed them off from the rest of the hotel in an instant.
Even to the bunker's last day, books, magazines and exercise equipment were kept up to date. Furniture and bedding were orderly, bathrooms spotless.
Yet there would have been few luxuries for the nuclear nomads. Far from the caviar and champagne world in the hotel above, the bunker would have offered lawmakers no windows or privacy.
Fortunately, Greek Island was never used. Unfortunately, it was a colossal waste of taxpayer money.
Even after U.S.-Soviet relations thawed, the government spent hundreds of thousands of dollars a year to keep the bunker ready. Since it was built in 1956, government workers, under the guise of a phony television repair company called Forsythe Associates, had maintained the facility. Very few people knew about the bunker, even among the hotel's management.
The bunker's existence was finally exposed in a 1992 Washington Post article that confirmed what locals had known for years: Something mysterious was taking place below the Greenbrier, a national historic landmark.
After hearing of how the media broke open the secret, one woman on our tour told me she was angry. Angry about the waste of tax dollars? Angry that members of Congress and their families would have been whisked away while the rest of us would have inhaled plutonium? No, she said. She was angry that a reporter exposed the bunker.
Yet unearthing the money-draining, anachronistic installation was a service to America. With the Soviet Union no more and the threat of nuclear attack close to nil, now's the time to reveal other secret installations. Opening the eyes of the nation to such a waste is a meritorious service we need more of.
I even wonder if the Greenbrier bunker would have worked. With no advance notice to evacuate, it would have been difficult to secretly move Congress in unison through the mountains of West Virginia.
But there may still be a future for the bunker.
Let's use it for its original purpose: to house members of Congress. Any time there's an impasse, such as the federal budget debate, we could lock up lawmakers until they reach an agreement. No one comes out until the issue is settled.
While guests in the hotel above dine on filet mignon, members of Congress would have to survive on freeze-dried food (``Powdered pears again?''), shower in communal stalls (``Pass the soap, Senator'') and sleep in bunk beds (``Hey, Newt, stop snoring'').
Not to worry, though. The bunker is wired for cable.
Thomas Becher, editor of the communications office at the University of Connecticut, is a former wire service reporter.
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