Like a nuclear missile silo, my agency's Vatican file had its own doomsday file - a hardbound manila folder on which a typewritten sticky label had emblazoned in telex font capitals: WHAT TO DO IN CASE THE POPE DIES. While many of the instructions dated back to 1961 and could be safely ignored, it was still an interesting study in panic.

CNN: Pope's resignation a new angle to a tough news beat

Colonel Myron Pankiv, the farm's director, used to command a nuclear-missile silo in Kazakhstan.

ECONOMIST: The land that time forgot