Description: SCP-980 is a featureless humanoid of average height 
and weight, indeterminate age and gender, and smooth gray-white 
skin. SCP-980 does not possess any facial characteristics, sensory 
organs, or features such as nails and hair. It is injured with relative 
ease, bleeding a viscous substance that appears similar to white 
paint. Analysis shows that SCP-980 possesses no internal organs, 
though it does have a skeletal structure comparable to that of a 
human. Despite the absence of eyes and ears, SCP-980 appears to 
display 20/20 vision and slightly above-average hearing. Extensive 
testing has not explained this, though no abnormalities or anything 
to suggest other methods of sensory capability have been shown. 
SCP-980 is able to write in English when prompted, though typing is 
inefficient due to its influence quickly rendering the keys as well as 
the monitor unresponsive. 


SCP-980 naturally inflicts a "simplification effect" on objects and 
beings within a sphere 8 meters in radius around it. Said effect 


guy? 
SACHS — Admiral, I’m ... [unintelligible] 
NIXON — Don’t worry about it, Tom. He’s OK. 


MEYER -— Mr. President, with respect sir, the Pentagon just usually 
cables ... 


KISSINGER -— [unintelligible] only a contingency ... 
MEYER - [unintelligible] ... orders over. 


NIXON -— I realize that this is a departure from your regular protocol. 
But | wanted to go over this with you in person because this is an 
unusual case, and | wanted to make sure that there is no mistake. 
To make sure that you didn’t think there was a transcription error or 
something. Hank, can you start? 


KISSINGER — Case COLD HARPER. How you people come up with 
these names | don’t know. These are the instructions to SAC if the 
balloon goes up on Case COLD HARPER. Here is the list of the 
bomber wings and the ICBM sites in the usual format and here are 
the coordinates of the target. You will ... 


MEYER — | don’t understand, it’s the same coordinates all the way 
down the list ... 


MOORER -— Some of these assets, sir, Anderson AFB, uh, that's in 
Guam, and Clark is in the Philippines. How can they even reach ... 


MEYER -— Hold it, yeah, you’re right, Tom. What is this? 
HAIG — [unintelligible ] ... if Case COLD HARPER goes hot ... 


NIXON — See, Hank, this is why | wanted them here in person. 
Admiral, general, this is not a mistake. If we have to call COLD 
HARPER, then, uh, then this location here is the target. 


MEYER - [unintelligible] ... somewhere in the Arctic Ocean. 


MOORER - Seventy-three point such and such north by fifty four 


point such and such east. Let me check the map ... It’s not in the 
ocean, it's the big Russian island here, Novaya Zemlya. 


MEYER -... that fifty-megaton job that Khrushchev dropped back in 
sixty-one? Tsar Bomba | think they called it? | think that was where 
they dropped it. 


HAIG — ... show you some U-2 photographs of the location. 
MEYER — So we would be bombing a test range? | don’t ... 
KISSINGER -— [unintelligible] ... not exactly a testing facility. 
MOORER -— I’m sorry? 


KISSINGER - | said that it’s not a testing facility. A garbage 
incinerator would be a better analogy. If you want to be technical, it’s 
not even a Soviet facility, strictly speaking. 


SACHS -— Dr. Kissinger, | don't think ... 


HAIG — Mr. President, | should point out that General Meyer isn’t on 
the list, and Admiral Moorer ... 


NIXON — Al, they have to know enough to be able to do their jobs. 
HAIG — Sir, | agree of course but [unintelligible] 


MEYER — What list? Forgive me for not being in on the news that 
there’s a clearance level that is higher than the Commander of 
Strategic Air Command, but that guy next to Dr. Kissinger who | 
don’t even recognize ... 


NIXON — I’m going to tell them ... 

HAIG — Mr. President, | really [unintelligible] 

NIXON — ... no, not everything. Just what they need ... 
MOORER - [unintelligible] a little out of the loop ... 


NIXON — Admiral, General, it will have to suffice for me to say that 
there is a... there is an object, let’s say, at this place on that island. 


These are contingency targeting instructions. If |... if the 
Commander in Chief, gives the command to activate COLD 
HARPER, which would only be done if Christ help us the trigger 
condition had been satisfied, then ... 


MEYER -... then that site becomes the priority target. 


NIXON -— ... the only target. It is not just the priority target, it’s the 
only target. 


MOORER - Sir, you have us sending three, four, wait ... all, all of 
our bomber wings, and ... all of our intercontinental missiles ... 


KISSINGER -— That’s correct, Admiral ... 
MOORER - ... targeting just this one location ... 


MEYER - Sir, the way we run our bombers, when we hit something 
once with these payloads, the target is gone, so | don't see ... 


MOORER - ... not even LeMay would have ... [unintelligible] 


MEYER -... [unintelligible] would have to be a one-way trip for a lot 
of these boys, at this range ... 


NIXON — Look, Tom, John, I'm satisfied that it's necessary. 


MOORER — Whoever is there, you must really want us to get up 
there in a hell of a hurry and kill it. 


HAIG -— If it comes to that. | sure as hell hope not, since a lot of the 
guys up there are ours. Well, his, at any rate. 


MEYER — So who the hell are you guys, then? 


SACHS — We're keeping an eye on the ... object, as the President 
put it, until we can come up with a satisfactory way to get rid of it. 


MOORER - So this is your plan for disposing of the ... whatever it 
is? 


NIXON -— This is Plan B. Plan A is just holding the line, so to speak, 


for as long as they can in the way that they're doing it now. 


MEYER — With respect, sir, | don’t see how we can drill this, with 
everything that has to be put into place for Linebacker ... 


KISSINGER — General, first of all, it has been determined for the 
sake of operational security that the existence of COLD HARPER 
itself is Foxtrot-level from which it follows that there can be no drills. 
Nobody, not even SAC command staff, who have not been 
designated Foxtrot-level are cleared for this. If the balloon goes up, 
you just do what you have to do to aim your planes and target your 
missiles in accordance with these instructions. Secondly, if ... 


NIXON — Where Henry is going with this is that if we’re in COLD 
HARPER, then fuck Linebacker, fuck South Vietnam, it isn’t going to 
matter. 


MOORER - But we would no longer have our nuclear deterrence 
against the Soviets ... 


HAIG — It doesn’t matter because they will have already ... 


NIXON — I should have told Al not to bother showing you those 
photos, because if we do COLD HARPER then the location isn’t 
going to look like this by the time your boys get there, John. It will 
already be hot because the Russians, who are closer, obviously, will 
have already hit the location with everything that they’ve got. 


MEYER -— The Soviets would, uh, would bomb themselves? 
KISSINGER — Well, it was their own idea ... 


SACHS -— Technically, they'd be bombing my people, but under the 
circumstances that would hardly matter. 


MEYER — | have to ask because | really don’t know the answer. 
You're on our side, right? | mean, you’re not a Russian or ... 


SACHS -— Athens, Georgia sir. Go Bulldogs. 


MEYER - This whole thing just doesn’t make any damn sense ... 


MOORER — We would hit this thing with our whole nuclear triad 
after it's already nothing but a smoking irradiated crater from what 
the Soviets have? 


KISSINGER — Not the whole triad, Admiral. Just the missiles and 
bombers. The subs ... 


NIXON — The boomers we will need for Noah, which I'll go over with 
you and Elmo Zumwalt in another briefing in a few days. 


MEYER — NOAA as in the weather forecasting people? 


KISSINGER — Noah as in ark. Don't you remember from Sunday 
School? The animals march in, two by two ... 


HAIG — [unintelligible] ...seeds and frozen embryos, for the most 
part ... [unintelligible] ... offload the missiles to make room ... 


NIXON — We're not ready to talk about Noah yet. | want to get this 
targeting thing settled. Admiral Moorer, General Meyer, | assure you 
that | have thought this through. General, you have the order. Thank 
you both for coming. 


MOORER - Thank you, Mr. President. [ADM. MOORER AND GEN. 
MEYER LEAVE THE MEETING] 


NIXON -— That settles that bit. Satisfied, Agent Sachs? 
SACHS -— Yes, Mr. President. I'll report back to the ... [unintelligible] 


NIXON — Yes, thank you for coming. Please tell your people ... tell 
them that | appreciate the fine work they’re doing. 


SACHS -— Of course, sir. Thank you, Mr. President. [AGENT SACHS 
LEAVES THE MEETING] 


NIXON — Thanks, Al. Can Henry and | have the room? 


HAIG — Yes sir, Mr. President. [GENERAL HAIG LEAVES THE 
MEETING] 


NIXON — Should we get Ambassador Dobrynin over here to tell 


him? Or do you want to talk to Gromyko directly? 


KISSINGER -— I'll call Gromyko. I'll call him as soon as | get back 
over to the Executive Office Building. 


NIXON — Our boys here ... Henry, it wears on you, how they don’t 
see the big picture. 


KISSINGER -— To be fair, Mr. President, apart from the GOC and 
Foxtrot, and whatever the Soviets call their version of Foxtrot, they 
don’t know ... 


NIXON — They don’t know. And it makes you kind of jealous. 


KISSINGER — When you had told me, | didn’t really appreciate it. | 
didn’t, until Sachs and Marshal Yakubovsky took me up there last 
week and showed me... 


NIXON — I'm afraid that it will stay with you ... 


KISSINGER -— [unintelligible] ... not believe it. Even after the number 
of times they’ve dropped bombs on it. Even the Tsar Bomba barely 
... [unintelligible] 


NIXON -— ... including those times in '64 and '65 when Johnson had 
to give them some of our bombs to use because they had run out of 
their own ... 


KISSINGER - ... [unintelligible] still see it every time | close my 
eyes. 


NIXON — They brought me up there and showed it to me when | 
went to Russia under Ike in 1959. This was a couple of days after 
the Kitchen Debate. ... Ike knew, I'm certain of it. He asked me to go 
over there. | guess he wanted to see whether | was ready. Hand me 
the whiskey? 


KISSINGER — Let me pour us each one. 


NIXON -— [laughs] I'm going to need a taller one than that, uh, just 
give me the bottle back. You know, | didn’t even use to drink very 
much before that trip. But you do what it takes and you soldier on ... 


KISSINGER — Those men at the site, they have to be there every 
day. 


NIXON -— [unintelligible] ... the god-damn bravest bastards in the 
whole world. Especially that guy, uh, Vassily, with the eyepatch. 
Was he still there? 


KISSINGER — You had told me, and | asked about him. They told 
me that he’s still on the books as being assigned there, but they 
keep him sedated most of the time. 


NIXON — That’s a shame. They told me that he had been through 
Stalingrad, and Berlin, but | can’t ... | don’t think I’m surprised. 


KISSINGER -— [unintelligible] 


NIXON — You know, knowing that things like that ... [unintelligible] 
... puts the rest of it into perspective, China and Vietnam and all 
that. 


KISSINGER -— [unintelligible] ... what’s important, in the big picture. 


NIXON — The big picture, exactly. And that’s why it’s so god-damn 
frustrating. Those fuckers on the Hill and those fucking screaming 
college kids. If they knew the kinds of things that we, what the GOC 
and our other boys were doing, they'd have a god-damn parade 
every day. They'd build a god-damn statue, they'd say thank you, 
they ... [unintelligible] 


KISSINGER -— At least Brezhnev and Gromyko will have something 
that they can be grateful to you for, for a change. The Russians did 
admit that they needed our help ... 


NIXON — Speaking of gratitude, I'll tell you again, whatever we might 
say about the Russians, at least they, they and the GOC, are 
keeping that thing in its box. ... [unintelligible] you think that COLD 
HARPER will be enough to deal with it, if it gets out? 


KISSINGER — Sachs had told me that it ... his people think ... 
[unintelligible] ... least bad alternative, so to speak. Now as far as 
what those other bad alternatives were, you remember that | told 
you about that cable, from Dr. [unintelligible] ... who said they 


thought they had a way to contain [unintelligible] ... 


NIXON — | almost can't think of a worse approach than to let those 
egghead fuckers get their hands on ... 


KISSINGER — If COLD HARPER isn't enough, well, it wouldn't 
matter to you and me. It’s not like we’re going to be on Noah’s Ark. 


NIXON — What is it with you Jews and the gallows humor? 


KISSINGER — Mr. President, there have been too many times when 
it’s all that we have left. 


NIXON — Yeah, well we’re all in that boat, Hank. 


« Memorandum Dated 6 November 1944 | COLD HARPER | 
Transcript of telephone conversation, August 9, 1991 » 


Transcript of telephone conversation, August 9, 1991 


THE WHITE HOUSE 
WASHINGTON 
TRANSCRIPT OF TELEPHONE CONVERSATION 


SUBJECT: Telephone Conference to Discuss Transportation of 
Novaya Zemlya Object 


PARTICIPANTS: 


¢ The President 

« James Baker (Secretary of State) 

Dick Cheney (Secretary of Defense) 

¢ John Sununu (White House Chief of Staff) 

* Gen. Colin Powell (Chair, JCS) 

* Col. Gregory Sachs (GOC) 

¢ Eduard Shevardnadze (Minister of Foreign Affairs, USSR) (via 
telephone) 

¢ Boris Pugo (Minister of Interior Affairs, USSR) (via telephone) 

¢ Translator: G. Valentino (State) 

¢ Notetaker: S. Morrison (NSC) 


DATE, TIME: August 9, 1991, 08:36-08:44 a.m. EST 
PLACE: White House Situation Room - The Kremlin 


The President initiated the telephone call. 
THE PRESIDENT: Eduard? Are you on the line? 


SHEVARDNADZE: Yes. | am here. Boris Karlovich stepped out for 
tea, ah ... no, he is here. We are both here, Mr. President. 


THE PRESIDENT: Well, I’m glad, we’re glad that we could set this 
up, my friends. Let me tell you that Colonel Sachs is here in the 
room with me. 


PUGO: [indistinct, in Russian] 
SACHS: [replies in Russian] 


VALENTINO: [aside to the President] Ah, pleasantries, Mr. 
President. Minister Pugo inquires about the health of Colonel 
Sachs’s wife, and so on... 


THE PRESIDENT: Ah, at any rate, Colonel Sachs has informed me 
that the GOC’s evaluation of the situation up in Novaya Zemlya is 
that Team Zero is no longer capable of... 


SUNUNU: [aside to Baker] Team Zero? What is this? | didn’t get 
briefed ... 


BAKER: [aside to Sununu] Jesus Christ, John, you were just there 
last week. 


THE PRESIDENT: ... continuing, hold it. [conference call muted; 
aside to Sununu] John, when you and | were in Russia last week for 
the START | summit? We took the flight up north? 


SUNUNU: Um... I’m confused, sir. After Moscow we went straight to 
Kiev. 


THE PRESIDENT: [conference call unmuted] Eduard, now, come 
on. You didn’t have to go and give my chief of staff the yellow pill. 


SHEVARDNADZE: We did not ... 
SUNUNU: What the ... [unintelligible] 


SACHS: Mr. President, that was us. In fairness, sir, Mr. Sununu 
requested the amnestic after the [unintelligible]. 


SUNUNU: [unintelligible] ... what you’re talking about, if ... 
[unintelligible] 


THE PRESIDENT: We'll sort that out on our end. At any rate, 
Eduard, Colonel Sachs tells me that they can’t hold her down 
anymore, so we need to coordinate the handoff, so to speak.