Gen. Eugene Habiger flew B-52 bombers for the Strategic Air Command in its Cold War glory days, back when U.S. and Soviet pilots drilled relentlessly for the nuclear Armageddon that never happened.
But after the decades-long conflict ended in the early 1990s, Habiger, as commander of SAC’s post-Cold War successor, U.S. Strategic Command, championed military-to-military exchanges with his former Russian adversaries.Â
After his retirement, he became a strong advocate for scaling back the world’s arsenal of nuclear weapons, co-founding the Nuclear Threat Initiative with former U.S. Sen. Sam Nunn of Georgia and media mogul Ted Turner.
Habiger died March 18, at his home in San Antonio, Texas. He was 82.
In an online tribute, his longtime friend, retired Maj. Gen. Ken Israel, called Habiger "a warrior, aviator and champion of all things strategic" who "venerated his family and drew strength from his close family ties."
Habiger grew up in Oakland, California, where he was a high school tennis star and was elected class president, according to on .
Habiger enrolled at the University of California-Berkeley but dropped out in 1959 to join the Army. Two years later, still on active duty, he met his future wife, Barbara on a blind date. He joined her as a student at the University of Georgia, where he earned a bachelor’s degree in 1963 while serving in the Army Reserve.
After graduating, Habiger attended Air Force officer candidate school, and became a pilot. He later flew KC-135s, KC-10s, C-7As, and T-39s, in addition to B-52s, chalking up more than 5,000 flight hours, including 150 combat missions.
Even as the Air Force promoted him into command positions that kept him mostly behind a desk, Habiger still found ways to climb into a cockpit, said Al Buckles, StratCom’s director of Command, Control, Communications, and Computer Systems during Habiger’s tenure. Buckles, of Papillion, also served under him at bases in Michigan and Louisiana in the mid-1980s.
“He was really focused on his crews. He flew a lot of sorties,†Buckles said, using a military term for combat missions. “We called him ‘Gene the Flying Machine.’ â€
Habiger served twice at Offutt in the SAC era. The first, from 1977-80, was on the Joint Target Planning Staff, where he helped map out bombing sites for a hypothetical nuclear war. The second time, in 1987-88, was as SAC’s inspector general.
The end of the Cold War between 1989 and 1991 also signaled the end of the Strategic Air Command, which had been tasked with preparing for and executing it. The unit stood down in 1992 and was replaced by StratCom, a new joint-services command in charge of the nuclear arsenal.
Habiger returned to Omaha to take over StratCom in 1996 while the unit was still finding its way in an era of post-Cold War downsizing. He paved the way for the transition of the famous "Looking Glass" nuclear command-post mission from Air Force EC-135 jets to Navy E-6Bs.
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He took an active interest in StratCom’s computer security as hackers began to attack U.S. military sites through the burgeoning internet.Â
“He really got on that in a hurry,†Buckles said. “StratCom was one of the first commands that was able to lock down our networks.â€
Also during his tenure, Habiger pressed for revisions to StratCom’s nuclear plans that would allow the U.S. to hit the same number of targets with fewer weapons — a move that would clear the way for future arms reductions.
Habiger’s outreach to Russia included a groundbreaking personal tour of bases for strategic missiles, bombers and naval forces, as well as nuclear storage sites. He hosted similar tours in the U.S. for his Russian counterpart.
“I have confidence that the Russians are indeed very serious about the safety of nuclear weapons,†Habiger told The World-Herald in 1998, just before he retired to San Antonio and took a job as the “security czar†at the Department of Energy.
Arms reduction and outreach to Russians continued to occupy him in his retirement years. Habiger joined the Harvard Kennedy School’s “Elbe Group†of retired U.S. and Russian military and intelligence leaders who maintained an informal communications channel between the two countries even as U.S.-Russia relations grew strained over the years.
In 2000, the CBS news magazine “60 Minutes†interviewed Habiger and his Russian counterpart, who both advocated for arms reductions. That interview inspired Turner and Nunn to form NTI, and to bring Habiger on as a founding board member.
“Gene was a passionate advocate for strengthening U.S. security while reducing global nuclear threats,†Nunn said in a  on the organization’s website, .
Habiger’s retirement did allow him more time with Barbara, his wife of 60 years, and his family. He crafted itineraries for family visits, hitting San Antonio's favorite restaurants and tourist attractions — "displaying a laser focus on creating lasting memories for his children and grandchildren," according to his obituary.
He is survived by his wife, his sons Karl and Kurt, and five grandchildren. No funeral services have been announced.
Buckles said Habiger's outspokenness about nuclear arms reduction after retiring diverged with the views of some of his former Offutt colleagues. But he was respected for his stewardship of StratCom in its early years, and for managing the transition from war to peace.Â
“That was a very turbulent time as SAC-slash-StratCom was trying to reshape itself,†Buckles said. "He was the right commander at the right time."
Gen. Eugene Habiger, then commander of U.S. Strategic Command, prepares to make the first flight as emergency action officer on the new back-up nuclear command post airplane, the Navy E-6B TACAMO, in 1998.