334 DASA 2019-2 TAYLOR: to take over. AYRES: In the hit area I don't think anyone has been designated The leaders will rise out of the crowd. No. There are plans. I don't know if they are uniform in every state and I don’t know what they are, but the OEP is the office where the plans are, TAYLOR: They have all kinds of lines of authority. There's one man in Manhattan, maybe he's dead. UPTON: Did this function during the blackout? over? Did it work? AYRES: It usually goes through the states. has people, and so on, Did he then take The state governor I can't tell you the details. UPTON: We had such an experience in the blackout, work? Did he take over? AYRES: Did the plan That wasn't sucha situation. HEMLER: Just to give you an example of what could occur—and I've been through some of these scenarios in military courses and war games— the United States is broken up into districts, military districts, and we have First Army Headquarters located in New York. All of the First Army is not located in the New York area, and the commander of the First Army and his alternate designees have criteria established for them whereby they take over, the first condition being that they must contact local or state authorities, if possible, and work with them, It’s not a question of the military taking over; they work together with civilian authorities. If the city authorities are no longer available or the borough authorities are no longer available and can't be reached, the military commander reaches progressively up the civilian chain of command, if you will, until, if necessary, he reaches the state governor; then he works with the state governor. AYRES: But in the blackout case there was no breakdown, ‘“HEMLER: There was no breakdown, communication, They were in constant : CONARD: The civil defense set-up in Albany, New York, is quite elaborate. I've seen it and it has multiple lighting systems for all