Arriving from VQ-4 Sqn based at Tinker AFB in Oklahoma, will be an E-6B Mercury reconnaissance aircraft from the US Navy. The aircraft, which is derived from a commercial Boeing 707, provides a strategic airborne command post and communications relay platform. Not only does it convey instructions from the National Command Authority to its fleet ballistic missile submarines. It can also command and control US nuclear forces should ground base control become inoperable.