This story is a lot less impressive when you start learning the details.
Such as the fact that the motorcycle messengers traveled at the speed of light to instantaneously transmit orders. The fact that the salvo of cruise missiles came from boats which could not carry them, and the fact that simulator's fleet defenses were turned off to prevent them from targeting commercial air and commercial shipping.
"Van Riper famously used "motorcycle couriers" to get around the destruction of his C2 network. The problem was that this was handled as simple handwaving, with him saying that he would use motorcycle messengers to handle all the message traffic. Despite supposedly doing so, he continued to relay messages as if he doing so with a normal communications network. Essentially, his motorcycle messengers were treated as being just as efficient as an electronic communications network. Clearly, that wouldn't be possible, hence the folks joking about "light speed motorcycles"."
Such as the fact that the motorcycle messengers traveled at the speed of light to instantaneously transmit orders. The fact that the salvo of cruise missiles came from boats which could not carry them, and the fact that simulator's fleet defenses were turned off to prevent them from targeting commercial air and commercial shipping.