In this flat, windy expanse just south of the Canadian border, U.S. Air Force pilots fly the same bombers their grandfathers flew, using mid-20th century cables and pulleys.
Each spring, the airmen and airwomen must clear melting snow from the steel and concrete doors of the silos that house 150 nuclear-tipped ballistic missiles scattered across thousands of square miles of the upper Great Plains.
The U.S. nuclear arsenal, patched, welded, and re-skinned countless times, was built between 25 and 62 years ago when the United States found itself locked in an arms race with a rival superpower, the Soviet Union. Now, its future is an issue in the campaign for the Nov. 8 presidential election.