A special bomb shelter for Congress was dug into the West Virginia hills alongside the luxurious Greenbrier resort hotel during the height of the Cold War and has been maintained ever since in case of nuclear attack.
The concrete and steel facility, built in 1958 at a cost of $14 million, is about five hours' drive from Washington. It includes halls where Congress could meet, communications equipment and a well-equipped underground bunker.It was not built to sustain a direct nuclear strike. So its location was kept top secret, with only a few executive branch officials and the top leaders in Congress supposed to be aware of it.
Existence of the shelter was confirmed Friday in reaction to stories by The Washington Post and Washington Times. Congressional leaders, including House Speaker Thomas S. Foley, tried without success to convince the Post not to publish its Sunday magazine account. The Times published its story Friday, before the Post magazine was distributed to subscribers.
According to the magazine story, one wing of the sprawling, antebellum-style hotel - a wing also used by guests - was specially built with massive steel doors and large rooms that would allow the nation's legislature to meet during a nuclear war.
A secret hallway leads from the wing into the underground bunker, built into a hill. Inside is a dormitory with hundreds of bunk beds, communications equipment, power plant and a dining room with false windows, apparently to relieve the sensation of entombment, The Post said.
The congressional facility is just one of several maintained by the federal government since the advent of the nuclear age, including underground shelters for the president, the Cabinet and Supreme Court justices.
A statement Friday signed by the top Democrats and Republicans in Congress decried the reporting on the congressional shelter, which they said was classified.
"It was always clear that if the secret of the facility's location were to be compromised, the effectiveness and security of the Underneath Greenbrier resort and hotel in West Virginia hills is a super-secret hideaway for Congress ordered by President Eisenhower.
"The joint bipartisan leadership of Congress sought in several meetings with Washington Post editors to persuade the Post not to reveal the location of the facility," they said. "We regret their decision to do so."
Leonard Downie Jr., the Post's executive editor, said the effectiveness of the facility was already much in doubt, citing, among other things, changes in the world and the underlying assumption of a 1950s scenario, including a long warning time before a nuclear strike.
Wesley Pruden, managing editor of the Times, said, "It never occurred to me that Mr. Foley or his colleagues could consider this a national security issue since the Cold War is over and they are trying to eliminate much of the defense budget."
House Majority Leader Richard Gephardt, D-Mo., said in his own statement Friday, "This is a relic of the Cold War which probably ought to be mothballed. Viewed from today's vantage point, this facility has clearly outlived its usefulness."
The congressional statement said the Greenbrier project was begun at the request of President Eisenhower more than 35 years ago, and the Department of Defense selected a site and constructed it.
"The program was operated by executive branch personnel, principally the military," it said.
The Pentagon said in a statement Friday, "The U.S. government for decades has engaged in efforts designed to ensure the continuity of government in the face of disaster, ranging from natural disasters to nuclear war. We do not discuss details of those efforts for security reasons."
While the Greenbrier's main function is leisure, with its spa, golf course, bowling alleys, riding stables, swimming pools, shooting ranges and gourmet restaurant, the resort is no stranger to government functions.
During the Civil War, it became a hospital for first the Confederates and then the Yankees.
At the beginning of World War II, 1,700 Japanese, German, Italian, Hungarian and Bulgarian diplomats were interned there.
In the 1980s, the House Democrats used it as the site of their annual legislative retreats - few of them ever aware that they might be returning under less happy circumstances.