It’s funny a lot of strange things happened that prevented nuclear war. Miracles I think.
Nah. Just a switch. SPST, SPDT, whatever.
Of course, admittedly, given the stakes, it should have been a very robust switch! (not that it wasn't).
But, even if it had failed, and the bomb had gone off, there would not have been a nuclear war.
It would have been obvious, even to Jack (D-MA), that no attack was in progress, but, rather, that one B-52, one Air Force Base, and a large number of South Carolinians were gone. But nothing else. The requisite reports from the DEW Line of the invading armada of Soviet bombers would have been absent. So, Jack would have left the football in the hands of the Marine, and WW III would not have happened.
(Would have loved to be the fly on the wall at the Kremlin when Niki got the news, however).
We may have averted a nuclear detonation in January of 1961, but we suffered a “nuclear birth” in August of the same year. August 4th to be exact:)