1.
Ministry of Defence (United Kingdom)
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The Ministry of Defence is the British government department responsible for implementing the defence policy set by Her Majestys Government and is the headquarters of the British Armed Forces. The MoD states that its objectives are to defend the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and its interests and to strengthen international peace. The MoD also manages day-to-day running of the forces, contingency planning. As rearmament became a concern during the 1930s, Stanley Baldwin created the position of Minister for Coordination of Defence. Winston Churchill, on forming his government in 1940, created the office of Minister of Defence to exercise control over the Chiefs of Staff Committee. The post was held by the Prime Minister of the day until Clement Attlees government introduced the Ministry of Defence Act of 1946, the new ministry was headed by a Minister of Defence who possessed a seat in the Cabinet. These departments merged in 1964, the functions of the Ministry of Aviation Supply merged into the Ministry of Defence in 1971. The Ministers in the Ministry of Defence are as follows, The Ministers and Chiefs of the Defence Staff are supported by a number of civilian, scientific, the Permanent Under-Secretary of State for Defence is the senior civil servant at the MoD. His or her role is to ensure the MoD operates effectively as a department of the government, Permanent Under-Secretary of State, Stephen Lovegrove—commencing April 2016 Defence Equipment & Support CEO - Tony Douglas — commencing 2016 Chief Scientific Adviser, Professor Vernon C. He is supported by the Vice Chief of the Defence Staff, vice-Chief of the Defence Staff, General Sir Gordon Messenger, Royal Marines. First Sea Lord and Chief of the Naval Staff, Admiral Sir Philip Jones, Royal Navy Chief of the General Staff, General Sir Nick Carter, the Surgeon General, represents the Defence Medical Services on the Defence Staff, and is the clinical head of that service. These forces must be capable of representing Britain as lead nation in any coalition operations, the ability, at longer notice, to deploy forces in a large-scale operation while running a concurrent small-scale operation. The MoD has since been regarded as a leader in elaborating the post-Cold War organising concept of defence diplomacy, the UK is establishing air and naval bases in the Persian Gulf, located in the UAE and Bahrain. A presence in Oman is also being considered, the Strategic Defence and Security Review 2015 included £178 billion investment in new equipment and capabilities. The review set a policy with four primary missions for the Armed Forces, Defend and contribute to the security and resilience of the UK. Contribute to improved understanding of the world through strategic intelligence and the defence network. Reinforce international security and the capacity of our allies, partners. Conduct operations to restore peace and stability, conduct major combat operations if required, including under NATO Article 5
2.
RAF Aldermaston
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Royal Air Force Aldermaston or more simply RAF Aldermaston is a former Royal Air Force station located 8 miles east of Newbury, Berkshire and 9.8 miles southwest of Reading, Berkshire, England. Originally built as an RAF Bomber Command airfield during 1941-1942, Aldermaston was transferred to the United States Army Air Forces in August 1942, placed under the jurisdiction of Eighth Air Force, it was home to several Douglas C-47 Skytrain Troop Carrier Groups. It was transferred to Ninth Air Force in 1943 primarily as a Troop Carrier Command base, returned to RAF Control at the end of 1945, it was used by Technical Training Command before being placed on Care and Maintenance. In 1946, it was transferred to the Ministry of Civil Aviation, Aldermaston was initially planned as an RAF Bomber Command airfield, being constructed in 1941-1942. RAF92 Group was programmed to occupy the facility with Vickers Wellington bombers, the facility was constructed as a Class A bomber airfield with three concrete runways. The main was 1, 830m aligned 06/24, with two secondary runways of 1, 280m aligned 11-29 and 17-35. The airfield had a perimeter track with both the pan and loop-type aircraft hardstands for aircraft parking. The technical site was on the side of the airfield, consisting of various administrative buildings, maintenance shops. However, to support the United States Army Air Forces Eighth Air Force in August 1942, the USAAF assigned station No.467 to the facility. It is a country house which was purchased from the Keyser family by the British Government at the outbreak of World War II. Taken over by the USAAF, it became the headquarters of the XIX Tactical Air Command and it was given the designation of AAF-476. 60th Troop Carrier Group Due to Aldermastons location in Berkshire, Eighth Air Force decided to use the base to station as a C-47 Troop Carrier base. It flew its only combat mission on 8 November 1942 when it transported airborne paratroopers from Aldermaston, with the successful operation, the group moved to Relizane Airfield, Algeria on 8 November 1942. There, it was transferred to the new Twelfth Air Force where it continued operations as part of the Mediterranean Theater of Operations until the end of the war. 107th Observation Squadron With the 60ths move to North Africa, the 107th Reconnaissance Squadron and it flew a mixture of light observation L-4 Grasshopper single engine and Douglas A-20 Havoc two-engine reconnaissance aircraft. It also had several Supermarine Spitfires, the squadron remained only until 8 January 1943 when it was moved back to Membury. 315th Troop Carrier Group Replacing the 60th TCG was the 315th Troop Carrier Group, on 25 May 1943, twenty-one of the 315ths aircraft left for Algeria to support combat operations in North Africa. Although not participating in the phase of the invasions of Sicily and Italy
3.
Government of the United Kingdom
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Her Majestys Government, commonly referred to as the UK government or British government, is the central government of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. The government is led by the Prime Minister, who all the remaining ministers. The prime minister and the other most senior ministers belong to the supreme decision-making committee, the government ministers all sit in Parliament, and are accountable to it. After an election, the monarch selects as prime minister the leader of the party most likely to command a majority of MPs in the House of Commons. Under the uncodified British constitution, executive authority lies with the monarch, although this authority is exercised only by, or on the advice of, the prime minister, the Cabinet members advise the monarch as members of the Privy Council. They also exercise power directly as leaders of the Government Departments, the current prime minister is Theresa May, who took office on 13 July 2016. She is the leader of the Conservative Party, which won a majority of seats in the House of Commons in the election on 7 May 2015. Prior to this, Cameron and the Conservatives led a government from 2010 to 2015 with the Liberal Democrats. A key principle of the British Constitution is that the government is responsible to Parliament, Britain is a constitutional monarchy in which the reigning monarch does not make any open political decisions. All political decisions are taken by the government and Parliament and this constitutional state of affairs is the result of a long history of constraining and reducing the political power of the monarch, beginning with the Magna Carta in 1215. Parliament is split into two houses, the House of Lords and the House of Commons, the House of Commons is the lower house and is the more powerful. The House of Lords is the house and although it can vote to amend proposed laws. Parliamentary time is essential for bills to be passed into law, Ministers of the Crown are responsible to the House in which they sit, they make statements in that House and take questions from members of that House. For most senior ministers this is usually the elected House of Commons rather than the House of Lords, since the start of Edward VIIs reign, in 1901, the prime minister has always been an elected member of Parliament and therefore directly accountable to the House of Commons. Under the British system the government is required by convention and for reasons to maintain the confidence of the House of Commons. It requires the support of the House of Commons for the maintenance of supply, by convention if a government loses the confidence of the House of Commons it must either resign or a General Election is held. The support of the Lords, while useful to the government in getting its legislation passed without delay, is not vital, a government is not required to resign even if it loses the confidence of the Lords and is defeated in key votes in that House. The House of Commons is thus the Responsible house, the prime minister is held to account during Prime Ministers Question Time which provides an opportunity for MPs from all parties to question the PM on any subject
4.
Nuclear weapon
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A nuclear weapon is an explosive device that derives its destructive force from nuclear reactions, either fission or a combination of fission and fusion. Both reactions release vast quantities of energy from small amounts of matter. The first test of a bomb released the same amount of energy as approximately 20,000 tons of TNT. The first thermonuclear bomb test released the same amount of energy as approximately 10 million tons of TNT, a thermonuclear weapon weighing little more than 2,400 pounds can produce an explosive force comparable to the detonation of more than 1.2 million tons of TNT. A nuclear device no larger than traditional bombs can devastate a city by blast, fire. Nuclear weapons are considered weapons of destruction, and their use. Nuclear weapons have been used twice in nuclear warfare, both times by the United States against Japan near the end of World War II, the bombings resulted in the deaths of approximately 200,000 civilians and military personnel from acute injuries sustained from the explosions. The ethics of the bombings and their role in Japans surrender remain the subject of scholarly, since the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, nuclear weapons have been detonated on over two thousand occasions for the purposes of testing and demonstration. Only a few nations possess such weapons or are suspected of seeking them, israel is also believed to possess nuclear weapons, though in a policy of deliberate ambiguity, it does not acknowledge having them. Germany, Italy, Turkey, Belgium and the Netherlands are nuclear weapons sharing states, south Africa is the only country to have independently developed and then renounced and dismantled its nuclear weapons. Modernisation of weapons continues to occur, all existing nuclear weapons derive some of their explosive energy from nuclear fission reactions. Weapons whose explosive output is exclusively from fission reactions are commonly referred to as bombs or atom bombs. This has long noted as something of a misnomer, as their energy comes from the nucleus of the atom. The latter approach is considered more sophisticated than the former and only the approach can be used if the fissile material is plutonium. A major challenge in all nuclear weapon designs is to ensure that a significant fraction of the fuel is consumed before the weapon destroys itself. The amount of energy released by fission bombs can range from the equivalent of just under a ton to upwards of 500,000 tons of TNT, all fission reactions necessarily generate fission products, the radioactive remains of the atomic nuclei split by the fission reactions. Many fission products are highly radioactive or moderately radioactive. Fission products are the radioactive component of nuclear fallout
5.
Nuclear weapons and the United Kingdom
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The United Kingdom was the third country to test an independently developed nuclear weapon, in October 1952. It is one of the five nuclear-weapon states under the NPT, since the 1958 US–UK Mutual Defence Agreement, the United States and the United Kingdom have cooperated extensively on nuclear security matters. The special relationship between the two countries has involved the exchange of classified data and materials such as plutonium. The UK retains a stockpile of 215 thermonuclear warheads, of which 120 are operational as of 2016, since 1998, the Trident nuclear programme has been the only operational nuclear weapons system in British service. The delivery system consists of four Vanguard class submarines based at HMNB Clyde in Scotland, each submarine is armed with up to 16 Trident II missiles, each carrying warheads in up to eight MIRV re-entry vehicles. With at least one submarine always on patrol, the Vanguards perform a strategic role and are also believed to have a sub-strategic capability. The UK has not run a programme to develop an independent delivery system since the cancellation of the Blue Streak in 1960, instead it has purchased US delivery systems for UK use, fitting them with warheads designed and manufactured by the UKs Atomic Weapons Establishment and its predecessor. The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute has estimated the figure as about 170, at the same time, the UK government indicated that warheads required to provide a necessary processing margin and for technical surveillance purposes were not included in the fewer than 200 figure. These surveillance rounds are used to monitor deterioration in the many components of the warhead. The SIPRI figures correspond accurately with the announcements and are likely to be the most accurate. The Natural Resources Defense Council speculates that a figure of 200 is accurate to within a few tens, in 2008 the National Audit Office stated that the UK stockpile was of fewer than 160 operationally available nuclear warheads. Until the 1990s the UK deployed a variety of nuclear weapons around the world, such as V bombers in Singapore in the 1960s, aircraft on Cyprus. Until August 1998, the UK retained the WE.177 nuclear weapon manufactured in the mid-1960s to late 1970s, in air-dropped free-fall bomb and its withdrawal left the four Vanguard class submarines, which replaced the Polaris ones in the early 1990s, as Britains only nuclear weapons platform. It has been estimated by the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists that the United Kingdom has built around 1,200 warheads since the first Hurricane device of 1952, at its peak, these numbered 327 for the British Army of the Rhine in Germany alone. The United Kingdom tested its first nuclear weapons in Australia during the 1950s, on the Montebello Islands, the first detonation, codenamed Operation Hurricane, occurred on 3 October 1952, in a shallow bay on Trimouille Island. Two further tests were held on the Montebello Islands during 1956, the second of these, codenamed G2, included the largest nuclear explosion in Australia, with a yield of 98 kilotons. Seven further nuclear tests were conducted on the Australian mainland between 1955 and 1963, within the Woomera Prohibited Area, at Emu Field and Maralinga in South Australia, the first British hydrogen bombs were tested during Operation Grapple at Malden Island and Christmas Island in the Central Pacific Ocean. The operation consisted of nine tests in the period 1957–1959, ultimately proving that the UK had developed thermonuclear weapons, different sources give the total number of test explosions that the UK has conducted as either 44 or 45
6.
Burghfield
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Burghfield /ˈbɜːr. fiːld/ is a village and large civil parish in West Berkshire, England, with a boundary with Reading. Burghfield can trace its history back to before the Domesday book and they are also a habitat for migrating geese, water fowl and other wildlife. A few higher pits/quarries in this area have been drained, clay-lined and used as landfill, Burghfield has many amenities — the majority are sports clubs and facilities, including a leisure centre, educational or religious. The boundaries of ancient burhs can often still be traced to modern urban borough limits, some were based on pre-existing Roman structures, some newly built, though some may have been built later. Athelstan granted these burhs the right to mint coinage, and in the tenth and eleventh centuries the rule was that no coin was to be struck outside a burh. A 10th-century document called the Burghal Hidage cites 30 burhs in Wessex, the Old English word was related to the verb beorgan, meaning to keep, save, make secure. A place, probably in Berkshire, appearing as Yerburghfeld is seen in 1381 and it may refer to Burghfield, or perhaps, Arborfield Burghfield is about 4 miles southwest of Reading. The area is large and of varying density. In 1923 the parish of Burghfield had 4,309 acres of land, of which 1,660 acres were arable,1,940 acres permanent pasture and 163 acres woods and plantations. The land lies low in the valley of the Kennet, at an altitude of a little over 100 feet above the ordnance datum. The main settlements of Burghfield parish lie along Burghfield Road, the road out of Reading. The south-eastern part of Burghfield Common is known as Great Auclum, a corner of north-western Burghfield Common is actually in Sulhamstead parish. In the north of the parish, the Kennet River valley, is surrounded by a number of man made lakes, marshland and willow scrub, with old water meadows and Osier beds to the north of the river. Further south, between the M4 motorway and Burghfield Village the ground is flat, and consists of farmland and pastureland with occasional small stands of deciduous woodland. The plateau gravels support grassland, deciduous woodland and Scots pine, the grasslands within the Parish are grazed by a wide variety of cattle, sheep and horses. The parish is served by a number of footpaths and bridleways across the fields and these paths and bridleways can be enjoyed by walkers and nature lovers, and are an important resource for the Parish. There are a number of paths and cut-throughs allowing pedestrians to move freely around the Parish. The parish lies in an area of clay, gravel and sand which was laid down in shallow, marine, the oldest sediments comprise sands deposited in a shallow sea overlain by reddish-brown Reading Formation clays
7.
RNAD Coulport
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Coulport redirects here, for the neighbouring village, see Coulport. The base, near the village of Coulport, has up to 16 reinforced concrete built into the hillside on the eastern shore of Loch Long. It is the last depot in Britain to retain the RNAD designation, the depot was established during the Cold War as the storage and loading facility for Polaris nuclear weapons. Today, Coulport is mainly used for handling Trident warheads and it also stores conventional weapons, e. g. the Spearfish torpedo. Two docks are located on the shoreline at the foot of the hill, there, weapons are loaded onto Vanguard nuclear submarines before they go on patrol and unloaded before they return to base at nearby Faslane. An older jetty is known as the Polaris Jetty, while the newer, Coulport had originally been best known as a summer holiday retreat for wealthy Glaswegians, with its most notable feature being Kibble Palace, now relocated to the Glasgow Botanic Gardens. It is the site of the farm of Duchlage, the Nassau Agreement was signed in December 1962, and the Polaris Sales Agreement was signed in April 1963. Initial construction took place between 1963, when Faslane was chosen as the new Polaris base, and 1968, when the first Polaris boat began its patrol, Coulport, on the opposite peninsula, met both of these requirements. The Trident Works Programme at Coulport and Faslane, co-ordinated by the Property Services Agency, planning work at Coulport began in 1982, and the estimated final cost for the entire programme, at 1994 prices, was approximately £1.9 billion. This made it the second most expensive procurement project in the UK after the Channel Tunnel project. However, since the Scottish electorate voted against independence, the area along with the rest of Scotland remained UK territory and so the bases, and the equipment housed there, were unaffected. A covered floating dry dock for the Trident submarines was built at Hunterston in Ayrshire and this Explosive Handling Jetty is one of the worlds largest floating concrete structures. The missiles are not owned by the UK, which has mingled asset ownership rights to 58 missiles from a pool shared with the US Navy. The Trident warheads are designed and manufactured by the Atomic Weapons Establishment at Aldermaston, Berkshire, England, exercise Bowline is the annual test of the emergency response routines to a nuclear weapon accident at Coulport. It is conducted by the Office for Nuclear Regulation, in 2011 the test failed as a number of command and control aspects of the exercise were not considered to have been adequately demonstrated. The exercise was repeated later in the year and recorded a marked improvement, the main logistical movement of nuclear weapons in the United Kingdom is between the Atomic Weapons Establishment in Berkshire and RNAD Coulport in Argyll, in both directions. Because the warheads need to be refurbished, batches are shuttled by road convoy several times a year. Convoys use staging posts and crew change locations during this journey, the Truck Cargo Heavy Duty carriers containing the weapons are escorted in a convoy of MoD vehicles commanded by a Ministry of Defence Police Chief Inspector
8.
Public limited company
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A public limited company is a type of public company under the United Kingdom company law, some Commonwealth jurisdictions, and the Republic of Ireland. It is a liability company whose shares may be freely sold and traded to the public, with a minimum share capital of £50,000. Similar companies in the United States are called publicly traded companies, public limited companies will also have a separate legal identity. A PLC can be either an unlisted or listed company on the stock exchanges, in the United Kingdom, a public limited company usually must include the words public limited company or the abbreviation PLC or plc at the end and as part of the legal company name. Welsh companies may choose to end their names with ccc. However, some public limited companies incorporated under special legislation are exempted from bearing any of the identifying suffixes. The term public limited company and the PLC/plc suffix were introduced in 1981, prior to this, all limited companies bore the suffix Limited, which is still used by private limited companies. When a new company incorporates in England and Wales or in Scotland, it must register with Companies House, Formation of a public limited company requires a minimum of one director and one secretary. In England and Wales and in Scotland, the male/female is under 16 years old, some people who are not British citizens are restricted as to what work they may do while in the UK, which may exclude them from being a director. The members must agree to some, or all, of the shares when the company is registered. The memorandum of association must show the names of the people who have agreed to take shares and these people are called the subscribers. There is a share capital for public limited companies, Before it can start business. A quarter of them, £12,500, must be paid up, each allotted share must be paid up to at least one quarter of its nominal value together with the whole of any premium. A company can increase its share capital by passing an ordinary resolution. A copy of the resolution – and notice of the increase on Form 123 – must reach Companies House within 15 days of being passed, no fee is payable to Companies House. A company can decrease its authorised share capital by passing a resolution to cancel shares which have not been taken or agreed to be taken by any person. Notice of the cancellation, on Form 122, must reach Companies House within one month, no fee is payable to Companies House. A company may have as different types of shares as it wishes
9.
Jacobs Engineering Group
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Jacobs Engineering Group Inc. is an international technical professional services firm. Jacobs Engineering was founded in 1947 by Joseph J. Jacobs, as of 2016 the Chairman and CEO is Steven J. Demetriou. The previous President and CEO was Craig L. Martin from 2006 until 2014, the company is publicly traded as a Fortune 500 company, and as of October 2016 had 50,000 employees globally. Jacobs has more than 250 offices in North America, South America, Europe, the Middle East, Australia, Africa, the company is structured around four lines of business, Aerospace & Technology, Buildings & Infrastructure, Industrial, and Petroleum & Chemicals. In October 2016, the company moved its headquarters from California to Dallas, Texas, list of United States companies Top 100 Contractors of the U. S. federal government Jacobs Engineering Group, Inc
10.
Serco
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Serco Group plc is a British outsourcing company based in Hook, Hampshire. It operates public and private transport and traffic control, aviation, military weapons, detention centres, call centres, prisons, Serco has been involved in a variety of controversies having a history of problems, failures, fatal errors and overcharging. It is listed on the London Stock Exchange and is a constituent of the FTSE250 Index, Serco operates in Continental Europe, the Middle East, the Asia Pacific region and North America, but the majority of its turnover comes from the UK. Serco was founded in 1929 as RCA Services Limited, a United Kingdom division of the Radio Corporation of America, following the takeover of RCA by General Electric in late 1985, RCA Services Limited was bought out by its local management. It changed its name to Serco in 1987 and has been a London Stock Exchange listed company since 1988, on 29 December 2008, Serco acquired SI International. In November 2014 its share price, which stood at 674p before the scandal broke in 2013 collapsed to 218. 7p. The new chief executive Rupert Soames sold off scores of divisions, on 17 November 2014, it was announced that Alastair Lyons would resign from his position as chairman of Serco. Lyons referred to “operational mis-steps” for which he took “ultimate responsibility”, Serco made a loss of £991 million in 2014, reducing to a loss of £69.4 million in 2015. Sir Roy Gardner was appointed as Non-Executive Chairman on 28 May 2015, Serco, as well as its rival G4S, was accused of overcharging the Ministry of Justice on its contract to tag offenders. The firm issued a warning for 2014 as a result of the costs of becoming embroiled in an electronic tagging scandal. Serco repaid £68.5 million to the government for its overcharging on the contract and we Own It held a protest outside the companys annual general meeting on 8 May called Sick of Serco. The group brought sick bags and proposed a Public Service Users Bill that would provide better, Serco operates the National Border Targeting Centre for UK Visas and Immigration and provides the carrier gateway—the interface between carriers and the agency. Serco operates the Santander Cycles scheme and the NorthLink Ferries Northern Isles lifeline ferry service in Scotland, Serco also has a joint venture with Abellio, the international arm of Dutch national rail operator Nederlandse Spoorwegen, to operate passenger trains in the UK. Serco-Abellio has a 25-year concession for Merseyrail in Liverpool until 2028 and it previously operated the Docklands Light Railway. On 31 March 2015, Serco commenced a 15-year contract to operate the Caledonian Sleeper between London and Scotland, Serco managed the UKs National Physical Laboratory until 2015 and also provides IT Services, Industrial Support and Cryogenic Operations Support and Maintenance at CERN. Serco also was part of a running the National Nuclear Laboratory under contract. In Britain Serco supplies electronic tagging devices for offenders and asylum seekers and it runs four prisons, a Young Offenders Institution and a Secure Training Centre. It has also operated two Immigration Removal Centres since 2007, Serco is also responsible for the contracted-out court escort services in the south-east area
11.
Golden share
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This share gives the government organization, or other shareholder, the right of decisive vote, thus to vote all other shares, in a shareholders-meeting. NATS Holdings, the UKs main air service provider, is an example of a company with a golden share. It was introduced in Russia by law on November 16,1992, other golden shares ruled illegal include the Spanish governments golden shares in Telefonica, Repsol YPF, Endesa, Argentaria and Tabacalera. The golden share structure of Volkswagen AG and the travails of the German Land of Niedersachsen are discussed by Johannes Adolff, Turn of the Tide. com
12.
Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament
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It opposes military action that may result in the use of nuclear, chemical or biological weapons and the building of nuclear power stations in the UK. CND was formed in 1957 and since that time has periodically been at the forefront of the movement in the UK. It claims to be Europes largest single-issue peace campaign, between 1959 and 1965 it organised the Aldermaston March, which was held over the Easter weekend from the Atomic Weapons Establishment near Aldermaston to Trafalgar Square, London. CNDs current strategic objectives are, The elimination of British nuclear weapons and it campaigns for the cancellation of Trident by the British government and against the deployment of nuclear weapons in Britain. The abolition of weapons of destruction, in particular chemical and biological weapons. CND wants a ban on the manufacture, testing and use of depleted uranium weapons A nuclear-free, less militarised and it supports the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe. It opposes US military bases and nuclear weapons in Europe and British membership of NATO, the closure of the nuclear power industry. It also organised a vigil for the victims of the 2005 London bombings, CND campaigns against the Trident missile. In March 2007 it organised a rally in Parliament Square to coincide with the Commons motion to renew the weapons system, the rally was attended by over 1,000 people. In the House of Commons,161 MPs voted against the renewal of Trident, in 2006 CND launched a campaign against nuclear power. Its membership, which had fallen to 32,000 from a peak of 110,000 in 1983, there are five specialist sections, Trade Union CND, Christian CND, Labour CND, Green CND and Ex-Services CND, which have rights of representation on the governing council. There are also parliamentary, youth and student groups, the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament was founded in 1957 in the wake of widespread fear of nuclear conflict and the effects of nuclear tests. In the early 1950s Britain had become the third power, after the USA and the USSR. Priestley wrote an article for the New Statesman magazine, Britain, Collins was chosen as its Chairman, Bertrand Russell as its President and Peggy Duff as its organising secretary. The other members of its executive committee were Martin, Priestley, Ritchie Calder, journalist James Cameron, Howard Davies, Michael Foot, Arthur Goss, and Joseph Rotblat. The Campaign was launched at a meeting at Central Hall, Westminster. After the meeting a few hundred left to demonstrate at Downing Street, the new organisation attracted considerable public interest and drew support from a range of interests, including scientists, religious leaders, academics, journalists, writers, actors and musicians. Other prominent founding members of CND were Fenner Brockway, E. P. Thompson, A. J. P. Taylor, Anthony Greenwood, Lord Simon, D. H. Pennington, Eric Baker and Dora Russell
13.
Trafalgar Square
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Trafalgar Square is a public square in the City of Westminster, Central London, built around the area formerly known as Charing Cross. Its name commemorates the Battle of Trafalgar, a British naval victory in the Napoleonic Wars with France and Spain that took place on 21 October 1805 off the coast of Cape Trafalgar, Spain. The site of Trafalgar Square had been a significant landmark since the 13th century, after George IV moved the mews to Buckingham Palace, the area was redeveloped by John Nash, but progress was slow after his death, and the square did not open until 1844. The 169-foot Nelsons Column at its centre is guarded by four lion statues, a number of commemorative statues and sculptures occupy the square, but the Fourth Plinth, left empty since 1840, has been host to contemporary art since 1999. The square has been used for community gatherings and political demonstrations, including Bloody Sunday, the first Aldermaston March, anti-war protests, a Christmas tree has been donated to the square by Norway since 1947 and is erected for twelve days before and after Christmas Day. The square is a centre of celebrations on New Years Eve. It was well known for its feral pigeons until their removal in the early 21st century, the square contains a large central area with roadways on three sides and a terrace to the north, in front of the National Gallery. The roads around the square part of the A4, a major road running west of the City of London. The square was surrounded by a one-way traffic system, but works completed in 2003 reduced the width of the roads. At the top of the column is a statue of Horatio Nelson who commanded the British Navy at the Battle of Trafalgar, surrounding the square are the National Gallery on the north side and St Martin-in-the-Fields Church to the east. To the south west is The Mall leading towards Buckingham Palace via Admiralty Arch, while Whitehall is to the south, Charing Cross Road passes between the National Gallery and the church. London Undergrounds Charing Cross tube station on the Northern and Bakerloo lines has an exit in the square, other nearby tube stations are Embankment connecting the District, Circle, Northern and Bakerloo lines, and Leicester Square on the Northern and Piccadilly lines. London bus routes 3,6,9,11,12,13,15,23,24,29,53,87,88,91,139,159,176,453 pass through Trafalgar Square. Building work on the side of the square in the late 1950s revealed deposits from the last interglacial. Among the findings were the remains of cave lion, rhinoceros, straight-tusked elephant, the site of Trafalgar Square has been a significant location since the 13th century. During Edward Is reign, the area was the site of the Kings Mews, running north from the original Charing Cross, from the reign of Richard II to that of Henry VII, the mews was at the western end of the Strand. The name Royal Mews comes from the practice of keeping hawks here for moulting, after a fire in 1534, the mews were rebuilt as stables, and remained here until George IV moved them to Buckingham Palace. After 1732, the Kings Mews were divided into the Great Mews and the smaller Green Mews to the north by the Crown Stables and its site is occupied by the National Gallery
14.
London
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London /ˈlʌndən/ is the capital and most populous city of England and the United Kingdom. Standing on the River Thames in the south east of the island of Great Britain and it was founded by the Romans, who named it Londinium. Londons ancient core, the City of London, largely retains its 1. 12-square-mile medieval boundaries. London is a global city in the arts, commerce, education, entertainment, fashion, finance, healthcare, media, professional services, research and development, tourism. It is crowned as the worlds largest financial centre and has the fifth- or sixth-largest metropolitan area GDP in the world, London is a world cultural capital. It is the worlds most-visited city as measured by international arrivals and has the worlds largest city airport system measured by passenger traffic, London is the worlds leading investment destination, hosting more international retailers and ultra high-net-worth individuals than any other city. Londons universities form the largest concentration of education institutes in Europe. In 2012, London became the first city to have hosted the modern Summer Olympic Games three times, London has a diverse range of people and cultures, and more than 300 languages are spoken in the region. Its estimated mid-2015 municipal population was 8,673,713, the largest of any city in the European Union, Londons urban area is the second most populous in the EU, after Paris, with 9,787,426 inhabitants at the 2011 census. The citys metropolitan area is the most populous in the EU with 13,879,757 inhabitants, the city-region therefore has a similar land area and population to that of the New York metropolitan area. London was the worlds most populous city from around 1831 to 1925, Other famous landmarks include Buckingham Palace, the London Eye, Piccadilly Circus, St Pauls Cathedral, Tower Bridge, Trafalgar Square, and The Shard. The London Underground is the oldest underground railway network in the world, the etymology of London is uncertain. It is an ancient name, found in sources from the 2nd century and it is recorded c.121 as Londinium, which points to Romano-British origin, and hand-written Roman tablets recovered in the city originating from AD 65/70-80 include the word Londinio. The earliest attempted explanation, now disregarded, is attributed to Geoffrey of Monmouth in Historia Regum Britanniae and this had it that the name originated from a supposed King Lud, who had allegedly taken over the city and named it Kaerlud. From 1898, it was accepted that the name was of Celtic origin and meant place belonging to a man called *Londinos. The ultimate difficulty lies in reconciling the Latin form Londinium with the modern Welsh Llundain, which should demand a form *lōndinion, from earlier *loundiniom. The possibility cannot be ruled out that the Welsh name was borrowed back in from English at a later date, and thus cannot be used as a basis from which to reconstruct the original name. Until 1889, the name London officially applied only to the City of London, two recent discoveries indicate probable very early settlements near the Thames in the London area
15.
Direct Action Committee
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It existed from 1957 to 1961. The DAC was formed in response to the British H-Bomb tests carried out between 1956 and 1958, in 1957, at the time of one of the tests on Christmas Island, Harold Steele planned to sail into the test area in protest. He was unable to do so but his supporters formed a committee, the original committee comprised, J. Allen Skinner Hugh Brock and Arlo Tatum. They were soon joined by, Michael Randle April Carter Pat Arrowsmith Michael Scott, by the end of 1958 the Committees members also included Alex Comfort, Frances Edwards, Michael Howard, Sheila Jones and Francis Jude. The Aldermaston March was subsequently run as an event by CND. The DAC organized meetings, marches, vigils and pickets, campaigned in parliamentary elections, after the 1958 Aldermaston march, the DAC stayed in the Aldermaston area to try to stop work at the Atomic Weapons Establishment. They picketed, met with trades unions, held factory gate meetings, as a result, five workers resigned from their jobs, three job applicants withdrew and five drivers refused to deliver to the establishment. The DAC then moved to Norfolk to campaign against the Thor nuclear missiles at an RAF base at North Pickenham, one worker left the base and others said they would do so if they could find other jobs. They then moved to Stevenage, Hertfordshire, to campaign against the de Havilland and English Electric factories, the DAC ran a No votes for the H-bomb campaign in the South West Norfolk by-election,1959. Their final action before being wound up was a demonstration against the Polaris nuclear submarine in spring,1961, most of its members were active in the Committee of 100. As long as it lasted, the DAC was effectively the direct-action wing of CND, there was an overlap between supporters of CND and supporters of the DAC. The sponsors of the DAC included the president of CND, three members of CNDs executive committee and other CND leaders, Pat Arrowsmith, a pacifist and consistent supporter of direct action, was appointed assistant secretary of CND after the first Aldermaston March. The DAC depended on the support of many local CND groups and was given money by the CND executive committee. However, there were differences in age, background and political experience between the members of DAC and the CND leadership, and there were differences in tactics. Christopher Driver in his book on the years of CND says of the DAC. List of anti-war organizations List of peace activists
16.
World War II
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World War II, also known as the Second World War, was a global war that lasted from 1939 to 1945, although related conflicts began earlier. It involved the vast majority of the worlds countries—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing alliances, the Allies and the Axis. It was the most widespread war in history, and directly involved more than 100 million people from over 30 countries. Marked by mass deaths of civilians, including the Holocaust and the bombing of industrial and population centres. These made World War II the deadliest conflict in human history, from late 1939 to early 1941, in a series of campaigns and treaties, Germany conquered or controlled much of continental Europe, and formed the Axis alliance with Italy and Japan. Under the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact of August 1939, Germany and the Soviet Union partitioned and annexed territories of their European neighbours, Poland, Finland, Romania and the Baltic states. In December 1941, Japan attacked the United States and European colonies in the Pacific Ocean, and quickly conquered much of the Western Pacific. The Axis advance halted in 1942 when Japan lost the critical Battle of Midway, near Hawaii, in 1944, the Western Allies invaded German-occupied France, while the Soviet Union regained all of its territorial losses and invaded Germany and its allies. During 1944 and 1945 the Japanese suffered major reverses in mainland Asia in South Central China and Burma, while the Allies crippled the Japanese Navy, thus ended the war in Asia, cementing the total victory of the Allies. World War II altered the political alignment and social structure of the world, the United Nations was established to foster international co-operation and prevent future conflicts. The victorious great powers—the United States, the Soviet Union, China, the United Kingdom, the Soviet Union and the United States emerged as rival superpowers, setting the stage for the Cold War, which lasted for the next 46 years. Meanwhile, the influence of European great powers waned, while the decolonisation of Asia, most countries whose industries had been damaged moved towards economic recovery. Political integration, especially in Europe, emerged as an effort to end pre-war enmities, the start of the war in Europe is generally held to be 1 September 1939, beginning with the German invasion of Poland, Britain and France declared war on Germany two days later. The dates for the beginning of war in the Pacific include the start of the Second Sino-Japanese War on 7 July 1937, or even the Japanese invasion of Manchuria on 19 September 1931. Others follow the British historian A. J. P. Taylor, who held that the Sino-Japanese War and war in Europe and its colonies occurred simultaneously and this article uses the conventional dating. Other starting dates sometimes used for World War II include the Italian invasion of Abyssinia on 3 October 1935. The British historian Antony Beevor views the beginning of World War II as the Battles of Khalkhin Gol fought between Japan and the forces of Mongolia and the Soviet Union from May to September 1939, the exact date of the wars end is also not universally agreed upon. It was generally accepted at the time that the war ended with the armistice of 14 August 1945, rather than the formal surrender of Japan
17.
Royal Air Force
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The Royal Air Force is the United Kingdoms aerial warfare force. Formed towards the end of the First World War on 1 April 1918, following victory over the Central Powers in 1918 the RAF emerged as, at the time, the largest air force in the world. The RAF describe its mission statement as, an agile, adaptable and capable Air Force that, person for person, is second to none, and that makes a decisive air power contribution in support of the UK Defence Mission. The mission statement is supported by the RAFs definition of air power, Air power is defined as the ability to project power from the air and space to influence the behaviour of people or the course of events. Today the Royal Air Force maintains a fleet of various types of aircraft. The majority of the RAFs rotary-wing aircraft form part of the tri-service Joint Helicopter Command in support of ground forces, most of the RAFs aircraft and personnel are based in the UK, with many others serving on operations or at long-established overseas bases. It was founded on 1 April 1918, with headquarters located in the former Hotel Cecil, during the First World War, by the amalgamation of the Royal Flying Corps, at that time it was the largest air force in the world. The RAFs naval aviation branch, the Fleet Air Arm, was founded in 1924, the RAF developed the doctrine of strategic bombing which led to the construction of long-range bombers and became its main bombing strategy in the Second World War. The RAF underwent rapid expansion prior to and during the Second World War, under the British Commonwealth Air Training Plan of December 1939, the air forces of British Commonwealth countries trained and formed Article XV squadrons for service with RAF formations. Many individual personnel from countries, and exiles from occupied Europe. By the end of the war the Royal Canadian Air Force had contributed more than 30 squadrons to serve in RAF formations, additionally, the Royal Australian Air Force represented around nine percent of all RAF personnel who served in the European and Mediterranean theatres. In the Battle of Britain in 1940, the RAF defended the skies over Britain against the numerically superior German Luftwaffe, the largest RAF effort during the war was the strategic bombing campaign against Germany by Bomber Command. Following victory in the Second World War, the RAF underwent significant re-organisation, during the early stages of the Cold War, one of the first major operations undertaken by the Royal Air Force was in 1948 and the Berlin Airlift, codenamed Operation Plainfire. Before Britain developed its own nuclear weapons the RAF was provided with American nuclear weapons under Project E and these were initially armed with nuclear gravity bombs, later being equipped with the Blue Steel missile. Following the development of the Royal Navys Polaris submarines, the nuclear deterrent passed to the navys submarines on 30 June 1969. With the introduction of Polaris, the RAFs strategic nuclear role was reduced to a tactical one and this tactical role was continued by the V bombers into the 1980s and until 1998 by Tornado GR1s. For much of the Cold War the primary role of the RAF was the defence of Western Europe against potential attack by the Soviet Union, with many squadrons based in West Germany. With the decline of the British Empire, global operations were scaled back, despite this, the RAF fought in many battles in the Cold War period
18.
United States Army
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The United States Armed Forces are the federal armed forces of the United States. They consist of the Army, Marine Corps, Navy, Air Force, from the time of its inception, the military played a decisive role in the history of the United States. A sense of unity and identity was forged as a result of victory in the First Barbary War. Even so, the Founders were suspicious of a permanent military force and it played an important role in the American Civil War, where leading generals on both sides were picked from members of the United States military. Not until the outbreak of World War II did a standing army become officially established. The National Security Act of 1947, adopted following World War II and during the Cold Wars onset, the U. S. military is one of the largest militaries in terms of number of personnel. It draws its personnel from a pool of paid volunteers. As of 2016, the United States spends about $580.3 billion annually to fund its military forces, put together, the United States constitutes roughly 40 percent of the worlds military expenditures. For the period 2010–14, the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute found that the United States was the worlds largest exporter of major arms, the United States was also the worlds eighth largest importer of major weapons for the same period. The history of the U. S. military dates to 1775 and these forces demobilized in 1784 after the Treaty of Paris ended the War for Independence. All three services trace their origins to the founding of the Continental Army, the Continental Navy, the United States President is the U. S. militarys commander-in-chief. Rising tensions at various times with Britain and France and the ensuing Quasi-War and War of 1812 quickened the development of the U. S. Navy, the reserve branches formed a military strategic reserve during the Cold War, to be called into service in case of war. Time magazines Mark Thompson has suggested that with the War on Terror, Command over the armed forces is established in the United States Constitution. The sole power of command is vested in the President by Article II as Commander-in-Chief, the Constitution also allows for the creation of executive Departments headed principal officers whose opinion the President can require. This allowance in the Constitution formed the basis for creation of the Department of Defense in 1947 by the National Security Act, the Defense Department is headed by the Secretary of Defense, who is a civilian and member of the Cabinet. The Defense Secretary is second in the chain of command, just below the President. Together, the President and the Secretary of Defense comprise the National Command Authority, to coordinate military strategy with political affairs, the President has a National Security Council headed by the National Security Advisor. The collective body has only power to the President
19.
Eighth Air Force
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The Eighth Air Force is a numbered air force of the United States Air Force Global Strike Command. It is headquartered at Barksdale Air Force Base, Louisiana, the command serves as Air Forces Strategic – Global Strike, one of the air components of United States Strategic Command. The Eighth Air Force includes the heart of Americas heavy bomber force, the B-2 Spirit stealth bomber, the B-1 Lancer supersonic bomber, and it was the largest of the deployed combat Army Air Forces in numbers of personnel, aircraft, and equipment. Elements of 8 AF engaged in operations during the Korean War, Vietnam War. Eighth Air Force is one of two active duty numbered air forces in Air Force Global Strike Command, Eighth Air Force, with headquarters at Barksdale AFB, in the Bossier City – Shreveport, Louisiana, metro area, supports U. S. Joint Forces Command, and is designated as U. S. Strategic Commands Task Force 204, providing on-alert, the mission of The Mighty Eighth is to safeguard Americas interests through strategic deterrence and global combat power. Eighth Air Force controls long-range nuclear-capable bomber assets throughout the United States and its flexible, conventional and nuclear deterrence mission provides the capability to deploy forces and engage enemy threats from home station or forward positioned, anywhere, any time. The 8th Air Force motto is Peace Through Strength and this air power includes the heart of Americas heavy bomber force, the B-2 Spirit and the B-52 Stratofortress. The B-2 force consists of 20 bombers assigned to the 509th Bomb Wing at Whiteman AFB, for additional history and lineage, see United States Air Forces in Europe The history of Eighth Air Force begins on 2 January 1942 with its activation at Savannah Air Base, Georgia. In quick order, on 5 January, Major General Carl Spaatz assumed command of HQ Eighth Air Force at Bolling Field, Washington, on 8 January the order activating the U. S. Air Forces in the British Isles was announced. On 12 May, the first contingent of USAAF personnel arrived in England to join the Eighth Air Force, on 15 June, Spaatz arrived in England to establish the Headquarters of Eighth Air Force at Bushy Park,15 miles WSW of London. Eighth Air Force was the command and control organization over its operational components, VIII Bomber Command Strategic bombardment using heavy, VIII Fighter Command Provide fighter escort of heavy bombers VIII Air Support Command Provide reconnaissance, troop transport, and tactical bombardment using twin-engine medium bombers. VIII Air Service Command Service and logistical support, VIII Bomber Command was activated at Langley Field, Virginia, It was reassigned to Savannah Air Base, Georgia on 10 February 1942. The first combat group of VIII Bomber Command to arrive in the United Kingdom was the ground echelon of the 97th Bombardment Group, during World War II, the offensive air forces of the United States Army Air Forces came to be classified as strategic or tactical. In Europe, Eighth Air Force was the first USAAF strategic air force, Eighth Air Force carried out strategic daytime strategic bombing operations in Western Europe from airfields in eastern England. On 4 January 1944, the B-24s and B-17s based in England flew their last mission as a part of VIII Bomber Command. On 22 February 1944, a reorganization of American airpower took place in Europe. VIII Bomber Command was redesignated as Eighth Air Force, with VIII Fighter and this is from where the present-day Eighth Air Forces history, lineage and honors derive
20.
Ninth Air Force
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The Ninth Air Force is a numbered air force of the United States Air Forces Air Combat Command. It has been headquartered at Shaw Air Force Base, South Carolina, from 1990, units were deployed to the Middle East against Iraq, and from 2001 against threats emanating from Afghanistan. In this role, the organization was known as United States Air Forces Central, until August 2009, the Ninth Air Force shared its commander with USAFCENT. S. This article deals with the current organization, as the lineage of the organization currently belongs to USAFCENT. This article incorporates public domain material from the Air Force Historical Research Agency website http, archives of the Ninth Air Force Association Digital Collection at The University of Akron Archival Services Ninth Air Force Association
21.
William Penney, Baron Penney
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William George Penney, Baron Penney OM KBE FRS FRSE, was an English mathematician and professor of mathematical physics at the Imperial College London and later the rector of Imperial College. As the head of the British delegation working in the Manhattan Project, after the test, Penney became chief adviser to the newly created British governments United Kingdom Atomic Energy Authority. He was later chairman of the authority, which he used in negotiations to control nuclear testing with the Partial Nuclear Test Ban Treaty. William George Bill Penney was born in Gibraltar, British Overseas Territory and his father was a sergeant-major in the British Armys Ordnance Corps who was then serving overseas. Penney was raised in Sheerness, Kent and was educated at Sheerness Technical School for Boys from 1924 to 1926 and he then attended the local technical school in Colchester where he completed his technical studies. His talent was recognised by the Governors Prize for Mathematics from the faculty of science, in 1929 Penney graduated, obtaining the B. Sc. in Mathematics with First Class Honours at age 20. Penney was admitted to the department that year, and earned his M. Sc. in mathematics in 1931. Then he was offered a position at the London University. In 1932, Penney was awarded the Ph. D. in Mathematics after submitting his doctoral thesis containing work on optimization and cross section of the physical properties of sold-state crystals. Penney accepted a Commonwealth Fund Fellowship and first traveled to United States where he became foreign research associate at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, in England, Penney was granted the 1851 Exhibition Scholarship to attend the Trinity College at Cambridge University. He changed his career to physics, and conducted a thorough research and theoretical investigation into the structure of metals. As a recognized prodigy at Imperial College he was set for an academic career until World War II intervened. At the start of World War II, Penneys leading-edge research into the applications of physics was noticed and he had made significant contributions made to the application of collisions, explosion events that created shock waves, and applications involving military use of hydrodynamics and gravity waves. With Royal Navy engineer officers he designed and supervised development of the Mulberry harbours to be placed off the Normandy beaches during the D-Day invasion and these mobile breakwaters would protect the landing craft and troops from the Atlantic rollers. In 1943, he was released from his Royal Navy work, Penney and others went to the Los Alamos Laboratory. At Los Alamos Penney worked on the use of the atomic bomb and he quickly gained recognition for his scientific talents, and also for his leadership qualities and ability to work in harmony with others. Within a few weeks of his arrival he was added to the group of scientists making key decisions in the direction of the program. Other members of that team included J. Robert Oppenheimer, John von Neumann, Norman F. Ramsey, one of Penneys assignments at Los Alamos was to predict the damage effects from the blast wave of an atomic bomb
22.
British Nuclear Fuels Ltd
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British Nuclear Fuels Limited was a nuclear energy and fuels company owned by the UK Government. Until 2003 its headquarters were based at Risley, near Warrington, BNFLs headquarters were then moved to Daresbury Park industrial estate, also near Warrington. On 1 April 2005, BNFL formed a new holding company, in 2005, it transferred all of its nuclear sites to the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority. It then sold its Westinghouse Electric Company subsidiary in February 2006, later, BNFL sold the separate companies that made up its major subsidiary, British Nuclear Group, leaving a decommissioning and reprocessing organisation which became Sellafield Ltd. By May 2009, BNFL had completed the sales of all its assets and had no remaining operational activities or businesses, BNFL continued to exist only as a legal entity to meet all pension liabilities and any obligations arising from disposal programmes. However, on 14 October 2010, the Minister for the Cabinet Office, Francis Maude, British Nuclear Fuels Limited was set up in February 1971 from the demerger of the production division of the UK Atomic Energy Authority. In 1984 BNFL became a limited company as British Nuclear Fuels plc. Under the chairmanship of Christopher Harding, the Windscale plant was renamed as Sellafield, US subsidiary BNFL Inc was established in 1990 and specialised in decontamination and decommissioning of nuclear sites. In 1996 the UKs eight most advanced plants, seven Advanced Gas Cooled Reactor and one Pressurised Water Reactor were privatised as British Energy. The oldest reactors, the Magnox sites, were not attractive for commercial operations, on 30 January 1998 Magnox Electric was merged into BNFL as BNFL Magnox Generation. In 1999 it was discovered that BNFL staff had been falsifying some MOX fuel quality assurance data since 1996, a Nuclear Installations Inspectorate investigation concluded that the level of control and supervision. BNFL had to pay compensation to the Japanese customer, Kansai Electric, BNFLs Chief Executive John Taylor resigned, after initially resisting resignation when the NIIs damning report was published. As a consequence of crisis, a possible partial privatisation of BNFL was delayed by two years. In 1999 BNFL acquired Westinghouse Electric Company, the nuclear power businesses of CBS. Westinghouses businesses are fuel manufacture, decommissioning of nuclear sites and reactor design, construction, Westinghouse was acquired as a possible core for the privatisation of a portion of BNFL. In 2000 BNFL also purchased the businesses of ABB for £300 million. This company, which was merged into Westinghouse, had interests in the United States, Europe. In June 2000 BNFL took a 22. 5% stake in Pebble Bed Modular Reactor Ltd in South Africa, in January 2003 the research and development arm of BNFL was relaunched as Nuclear Sciences and Technology Services
23.
Royal Ordnance
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It owned some 16 factories, and employed about 19,000 staff. Royal Ordnance plc was bought by British Aerospace in April 1987, the name Royal Ordnance was retained for almost another twenty years, and the sites retained their former names, either as Royal Ordnance or later RO Defence sites. The Royal Ordnance name was dropped in 2004 and after having traded as Land Systems, the Royal Ordnance Factories can trace their history back to 1560 with the founding of the Royal Gunpowder Factory at Waltham Abbey, Essex. This was linked to the Royal Small Arms Factory at Enfield Lock, all three were based near London— but not too close in case of explosion. The title of Royal Arsenal was introduced in 1805 to encompass the Royal Laboratories, Royal Gun Factory, and the Royal Carriage, which were originally separate and based in Greenwich. In 1927 these three Royal Factories were transferred, within the War Office, from the Ministry of Munitions to the Department of the Master-General of the Ordnance. As World War II loomed, a further 40 ROFs were built by the Ministry of Supply, from the late 1930s into the 1940s, the number of factory sites and personnel employed shrank considerably after the end of the Second World War. Other parts of the UKs defence research and design capability were later closed down, remained with the UK Ministry of Defence, later to become Dstl, or became part of the privatised QinetiQ. The small number of ROFs involved in weapons production, ROF Burghfield and ROF Cardiff, were removed from ROF management. They were transferred to the control of AWRE, which became the Atomic Weapons Establishment. Its headquarters was moved to ROF Chorley, Lancashire, with its office located in central London. The intention of the government at this stage was to privatise Royal Ordnance as soon as possible through a stock market flotation. In mid-1985 a target date of July 1986 was set, however, by June 1986 the government announced that flotation would not be possible and that it intended to sell the company privately. The following problems were identified as barriers to a flotation, The future of ROF Leeds, the future relationship between the MOD and the company. The financial position of the company.2 million, Vickers became Alvis Vickers and, in 2004, became part of BAE Systems, and the Leeds factory was closed. The relationship with the MOD was resolved by certain guarantees given to the company by the MOD regarding future procurement strategies, the financial position of the company was resolved by a Treasury cash injection and the proceeds of the ROF Leeds sale. Bids for Royal Ordnance Plc were invited in October 1986, resulting in six offers and these were eventually reduced to two, one from British Aerospace and one from Guest, Keen & Nettlefolds. The £188.5 million GBP BAe offer was accepted, at the time of the sale, RO Defence had 16 factories, and some 19,000 personnel were employed
24.
KBR (company)
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KBR, Inc. is an American engineering, procurement, and construction company, formerly a subsidiary of Halliburton. The company also has offices in Arlington, Virginia, Birmingham, Alabama. KBR and its predecessors have received contracts with the U. S. military including during World War II, the Vietnam War. The companys corporate offices are in the KBR Tower in Downtown Houston, in 1901 Morris Woodruff Kellogg founded The M. W. Kellogg Company in New York City. The company was incorporated in 1905 and its headquarters was moved to Jersey City, Kellogg was announced the number one construction company for years 1993 to 1995. This is mainly due to their work in the Dulles Greenway, Kellogg set up one of the first petroleum laboratories in the country in 1926 to commercialize and then license the technology. This led to Kellogg building some 130 units in the United States, in the 1930s and 1940s, Kellogg worked with leading refiners on various technologies. For the war effort, these led to the construction of six hydroreformer units, twenty fluid catalytic cracking units. Even bigger than the work was K-25, the gaseous diffusion plant at Oak Ridge, Tennessee. This period also included the development of the Benedict–Webb–Rubin equation of state which has become an industry mainstay. In 1970, Kellogg moved from New York City to Houston, Texas, the 1970s saw Kellogg become the first American contractor to receive contracts from the Peoples Republic of China. The 1980s saw continuation of global activity in LNG and ethylene with millisecond furnaces starting up in the United States, ten years later, Halliburton acquired Dresser, and combined Kellogg with Brown & Root to create a new, larger subsidiary — Kellogg Brown & Root. Brown & Root was founded in Texas in 1919 by Herman Brown and Daniel Root, Root soon died and Herman Browns younger brother, George R. Brown, joined the company in 1922. The company began its operations by building roads in Texas, one of its first large-scale projects, according to the book Cadillac Desert, was building a dam on the Texas Colorado River near Austin during the Depression years. For assistance in federal payments, the company turned to the local Congressman, after other very profitable construction projects for the federal government, Brown & Root gave massive sums of cash for Johnsons first run for the U. S. Senate in 1941. During World War II, Brown & Root built the Naval Air Station Corpus Christi, in 1947 Brown & Root built one of the worlds first offshore oil platforms. According to Tracy Kidders book Mountains Beyond Mountains, Brown & Root was a contractor in the Péligre Dam project, the project was designed by the U. S. Army Corps of Engineers and financed by the Export-Import Bank of the United States. Following the death of Herman Brown, Halliburton Energy Services acquired Brown & Root in December 1962, at the height of the anti-war movement of the 1960s, Brown & Root was derided as Burn & Loot by protesters
25.
WE.177
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WE.177 was the designation of a range of tactical and strategic nuclear bombs used by the British Armed Forces. There were three versions, WE. 177A was a fission weapon, while WE. 177B. All could be delivered by fixed-wing aircraft and also, in the case of the WE. 177A in anti-submarine mode, by helicopters, all types could be parachute retarded. The Navy weapons were retired by 1992 and all weapons with the RAF were retired by 1998. The WE.177 was the last nuclear bomb in service with the Royal Air Force, in May 1960 Prime Minister Harold Macmillan signed an agreement with President Eisenhower to purchase 144 AGM-48 Skybolt missiles for the V bomber force. Along with the missiles, the UK would receive the design of the Skybolts W59 warhead, the UK version would be known by the codename RE.179. However, the W59 primary used PBX-9404 and was considered by the British to be due to the potential for shocks to set off the PBX. They proposed adapting the Super Octopus design for use in RE.179, Cleo designs were tested underground at the Nevada Test Site in 1962. The secondary of RE.179 remained identical to the W59s, at the time, the UKs only tactical nuclear weapon was Red Beard, a relatively large weapon of 2,000 lb weight. While work continued on Cleo, it was decided to adapt it as a weapon of its own to replace Red Beard, the adapted version of the primary, now the only part of the physics package, became Katie. Katie would be used in a new bomb casing to produce WE. 177A, replacing Red Beard with a weapon of roughly 1/3 the weight and much smaller size. WE. 177A would also be used by the Royal Navy, when Skybolt was cancelled, part of the resulting Nassau Agreement was the replacement of Skybolt with the Polaris missile. Polaris A3T used its own design, W58. The W-58 was also rejected by the British because it also used PBX-9404 in its primary, the UK solution was to adapt their RE.179 for the UK Polaris, and assigned the codename ET.317. The need for ET.317 warheads for UK Polaris was urgent and development of the Improved Kiloton Bomb was temporarily halted until the Polaris warhead programme was completed. WE.177 was adapted to produce an interim strategic weapon for the five-year period while the Polaris submarine force was building. Halting work on the original WE.177, now known as the A model and this version required a lengthened bomb casing, and was somewhat longer and heavier than WE. 177A. There were also concerns that ET and these problems led to the development of the Chevaline system to improve the warheads chance of avoiding ABMs, along with a new super-hardened primary that would be more resistant to radiation
26.
Tritium
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Tritium is a radioactive isotope of hydrogen. The nucleus of tritium contains one proton and two neutrons, whereas the nucleus of protium contains one proton and no neutrons, naturally occurring tritium is extremely rare on Earth, where trace amounts are formed by the interaction of the atmosphere with cosmic rays. It can be produced by irradiating lithium metal or lithium bearing ceramic pebbles in a nuclear reactor, the name of this isotope is derived from the Greek word τρίτος meaning third. While tritium has several different experimentally determined values of its half-life and it decays into helium-3 by beta decay as in this nuclear equation, and it releases 18.6 keV of energy in the process. The electrons kinetic energy varies, with an average of 5.7 keV, beta particles from tritium can penetrate only about 6.0 mm of air, and they are incapable of passing through the dead outermost layer of human skin. The unusually low energy released in the beta decay makes the decay appropriate for absolute neutrino mass measurements in the laboratory. The low energy of tritiums radiation makes it difficult to detect tritium-labeled compounds except by using liquid scintillation counting, Tritium is produced in nuclear reactors by neutron activation of lithium-6. This is possible with neutrons of any energy, and is an exothermic reaction yielding 4.8 MeV, in comparison, the fusion of deuterium with tritium releases about 17.6 MeV of energy. High-energy neutrons can produce tritium from lithium-7 in an endothermic reaction. This was discovered when the 1954 Castle Bravo nuclear test produced a high yield. High-energy neutrons irradiating boron-10 will also produce tritium, A more common result of boron-10 neutron capture is 7Li. The reactions requiring high neutron energies are not attractive production methods for peaceful applications, Tritium is also produced in heavy water-moderated reactors whenever a deuterium nucleus captures a neutron. This reaction has a quite small absorption cross section, making water a good neutron moderator. Even so, cleaning tritium from the moderator may be desirable after several years to reduce the risk of its escaping to the environment. Ontario Power Generations Tritium Removal Facility processes up to 2,500 tonnes of water a year. Deuteriums absorption cross section for thermal neutrons is about 0.52 millibarns, whereas that of oxygen-16 is about 0.19 millibarns and that of oxygen-17 is about 240 millibarns. Tritium is a product of the nuclear fission of uranium-235, plutonium-239. The release or recovery of tritium needs to be considered in the operation of reactors, especially in the reprocessing of nuclear fuels
27.
Plutonium
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Plutonium is a transuranic radioactive chemical element with symbol Pu and atomic number 94. It is a metal of silvery-gray appearance that tarnishes when exposed to air. The element normally exhibits six allotropes and four oxidation states and it reacts with carbon, halogens, nitrogen, silicon and hydrogen. When exposed to moist air, it forms oxides and hydrides that can expand the sample up to 70% in volume and it is radioactive and can accumulate in bones, which makes the handling of plutonium dangerous. Plutonium was first produced and isolated on December 14,1940 by Dr. Glenn T. Seaborg, Joseph W. Kennedy, Edwin M. McMillan, wahl by deuteron bombardment of uranium-238 in the 60-inch cyclotron at the University of California, Berkeley. They first synthesized neptunium-238 which subsequently beta-decayed to form a new element with atomic number 94. Uranium had been named after the planet Uranus and neptunium after the planet Neptune, and so element 94 was named after Pluto, wartime secrecy prevented them from announcing the discovery until 1948. Plutonium is the heaviest element to occur in nature as trace quantities arising similarly from the capture of natural uranium-238. Both plutonium-239 and plutonium-241 are fissile, meaning that they can sustain a chain reaction, leading to applications in nuclear weapons. Plutonium-240 exhibits a high rate of fission, raising the neutron flux of any sample containing it. The presence of plutonium-240 limits a plutonium samples usability for weapons or its quality as reactor fuel, plutonium-238 has a half-life of 88 years and emits alpha particles. It is a source in radioisotope thermoelectric generators, which are used to power some spacecraft. Plutonium isotopes are expensive and inconvenient to separate, so particular isotopes are usually manufactured in specialized reactors, producing plutonium in useful quantities for the first time was a major part of the Manhattan Project during World War II that developed the first atomic bombs. The Fat Man bombs used in the Trinity nuclear test in July 1945, Human radiation experiments studying plutonium were conducted without informed consent, and several criticality accidents, some lethal, occurred after the war. Disposal of plutonium waste from power plants and dismantled nuclear weapons built during the Cold War is a nuclear-proliferation. Other sources of plutonium in the environment are fallout from numerous above-ground nuclear tests, Plutonium, like most metals, has a bright silvery appearance at first, much like nickel, but it oxidizes very quickly to a dull gray, although yellow and olive green are also reported. At room temperature plutonium is in its α form and this, the most common structural form of the element, is about as hard and brittle as gray cast iron unless it is alloyed with other metals to make it soft and ductile. Unlike most metals, it is not a conductor of heat or electricity
28.
Lockheed Martin
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Lockheed Martin is an American global aerospace, defense, security and advanced technologies company with worldwide interests. It was formed by the merger of Lockheed Corporation with Martin Marietta in March 1995 and it is headquartered in Bethesda, Maryland, in the Washington, DC, area. Lockheed Martin employs 126,000 people worldwide, Marillyn Hewson is the current President and Chief Executive Officer. Lockheed Martin is one of the largest companies in the aerospace, defense, security and it is the worlds largest defense contractor based on revenue for fiscal year 2014. In 2013, 78% of Lockheed Martins revenues came from sales, it topped the list of US federal government contractors. In 2009 US government contracts accounted for $38.4 billion, foreign government contracts $5.8 billion, Lockheed Martin operates in five business segments, Aeronautics, Information Systems & Global Solutions, Missiles and Fire Control, Rotary and Mission Systems, and Space Systems. The company also invests in healthcare systems, renewable energy systems, intelligent energy distribution, merger talks between Lockheed Corporation and Martin Marietta began in March 1994, with the companies announcing their $10 billion planned merger on August 30,1994. The deal was finalized on March 15,1995, when the two companies approved the merger. The segments of the two companies not retained by the new company formed the basis for the present L-3 Communications, Lockheed Martin also later spun off the materials company Martin Marietta Materials. Both companies contributed important products to the new portfolio, Lockheed products included the Trident missile, P-3 Orion, F-16 Fighting Falcon, F-22 Raptor, C-130 Hercules, A-4AR Fightinghawk and the DSCS-3 satellite. Martin Marietta products included Titan rockets, Sandia National Laboratories, Space Shuttle External Tank, Viking 1 and Viking 2 landers, the Transfer Orbit Stage and various satellite models. On April 22,1996, Lockheed Martin completed the acquisition of Loral Corporations defense electronics and system integration businesses for $9.1 billion, the remainder of Loral became Loral Space & Communications. Lockheed Martin abandoned plans for a $8, the development of the spacecraft cost $193.1 million. In May 2001, Lockheed Martin sold Lockheed Martin Control Systems to BAE Systems, on November 27,2000, Lockheed completed the sale of its Aerospace Electronic Systems business to BAE Systems for $1.67 billion, a deal announced in July 2000. This group encompassed Sanders Associates, Fairchild Systems, and Lockheed Martin Space Electronics & Communications. In 2001, Lockheed Martin won the contract to build the F-35 Lightning II, in 2001, Lockheed Martin settled a nine–year investigation conducted by NASAs Office of Inspector General with the assistance of the Defense Contract Audit Agency. The company paid the United States government $7.1 million based on allegations that its predecessor, Lockheed Engineering Science Corporation, submitted false lease costs claims to NASA. On August 31,2006, Lockheed Martin won a $3.9 billion contract from NASA to design and build the CEV capsule, in 2009, NASA reduced the capsule crew requirements from the initial six seats to four for transport to the International Space Station
29.
Y-12 National Security Complex
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The Y-12 National Security Complex is a United States Department of Energy National Nuclear Security Administration facility located in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, near the Oak Ridge National Laboratory. It was built as part of the Manhattan Project for the purpose of enriching uranium for the first atomic bombs, in the years after World War II, it has been operated as a manufacturing facility for nuclear weapons components and related defense purposes. Y-12 is managed and operated under contract by Consolidated Nuclear Security, LLC, ATK Launch Systems, Inc. and SOC LLC, with Booz Allen Hamilton, Inc. as a teaming subcontractor. CNS also operates Pantex Plant in Texas, Y-12 is the World War II code name for the electromagnetic isotope separation plant producing enriched uranium at the Clinton Engineer Works in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, as part of the Manhattan Project. Construction began in February 1943 under the management of Stone and Webster, because of a wartime shortage of copper, the massive electromagnetic coils were made with 14,700 tons of coinage silver from U. S. government vaults at West Point. Colonel Kenneth D. Nichols met with the Under Secretary of the Treasury, Daniel W. Bell, bells stunned reply was, Colonel, in the Treasury we do not speak of tons of silver, our unit is the troy ounce. Thus the Manhattan Engineer District requested and was loaned 395 million troy ounces of silver from the West Point Depository for the duration of the Manhattan Project. The Y-12 facility began operating in November 1943, separating uranium-235 from natural uranium, Y-12 separated the uranium-235 for Little Boy, the nuclear weapon that was dropped on Hiroshima, Japan on August 6,1945. K-25, another facility in Oak Ridge, produced enriched uranium using gaseous diffusion, the S-50 Thermal Diffusion Plant at the K-25 site also provided feed material for Y-12s Beta Calutrons. Tennessee Eastman was hired by the Army Corps of Engineers to manage Y-12 during the Manhattan Project, the company transferred scientists from Kingsport, Tennessee to Y-12 and operated the plant from 1943 to May 1947. The Y-12 electromagnetic plant units were operated by scientists from Berkeley to remove bugs. They were then turned over to trained Tennessee Eastman operators who had only a school education. Nichols compared unit production data, and pointed out to physicist Ernest Lawrence that the young hillbilly girl operators were outproducing his PhDs and they agreed to a production race and Lawrence lost, a morale boost for the Tennessee Eastman workers and supervisors. The girls were trained like soldiers not to reason why, while the scientists could not refrain from time-consuming investigation of the cause of even minor fluctuations of the dials, BWXT Y-12 succeeded Lockheed Martin as the Y-12 operator in November 2000. At 11 p. m. on 16 June 1958 a criticality accident occurred in the C-1 Wing of Building 9212 at the facility, in the incident, a solution of highly enriched uranium was mistakenly diverted into a steel drum, causing a fission reaction of 15–20 minutes duration. Eight workers were hospitalized for moderate to severe radiation sickness or exposure, in June 1960 the eight workers, Bill Wilburn, O. C. Collins, Travis Rogers, R. D. Jones, Howard Wagner, T. W. Stinnett, Paul McCurry, Wilburn, who had received the highest radiation dose, was awarded $18,000. Under the Energy Employees Occupational Illness Compensation Program, the eight later received additional compensation from the government, most, if not all, of the eight victims were diagnosed with cancer at some point during their lives
30.
Oak Ridge, Tennessee
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Oak Ridge is a city in Anderson and Roane counties in the eastern part of the U. S. state of Tennessee, about 25 miles west of Knoxville. Oak Ridges population was 29,330 at the 2010 census and it is part of the Knoxville Metropolitan Area. Oak Ridges nicknames include the Atomic City, the Secret City, the Ridge, Oak Ridge was established in 1942 as a production site for the Manhattan Project—the massive American, British, and Canadian operation that developed the atomic bomb. As it is still the site of Oak Ridge National Laboratory, scientific development still plays a role in the citys economy. The earliest substantial occupation of the Oak Ridge area occurred during the Woodland period, two Woodland mound sites—the Crawford Farm Mounds and the Freels Farm Mounds—were uncovered in the 1930s as part of the Norris Basin salvage excavations. Both sites were located just southeast of the former Scarboro community, the Bull Bluff site, which was occupied during both the Woodland and Mississippian periods, was uncovered in the 1960s in anticipation of the construction of Melton Hill Dam. Bull Bluff is a cliff located immediately southeast of Haw Ridge, the Oak Ridge area was largely uninhabited by the time Euro-American explorers and settlers arrived in the late 18th century, although the Cherokee claimed the land as part of their hunting grounds. According to local tradition, John Hendrix, a local resident regarded as a mystic. Upset by the death of his daughter and the subsequent departure of his wife and remaining family, he became religious. When he described his visions, people thought he was insane, for this reason, maj. Gen. Leslie Groves, military head of the Manhattan Project, liked the area for several reasons. Finally, the location was established within a 17-mile-long valley. The new District Engineer Kenneth Nichols had to placate him, cooper came to see the project on November 3,1943, and he appreciated the bourbon-laced punch served. CEW and HEW accommodation in houses and dormitories was basic, with rather than oil or electric furnaces. But it was of a higher standard than Groves would have liked, medical care was provided by Army doctors and hospitals, with civilians paying $2.50 per month to the medical insurance fund. The location and low population also helped keep the town a secret, the K-25 uranium-separating facility by itself covered 44 acres and was the largest building in the world at that time. The name Oak Ridge was chosen for the settlement in 1943 from among suggestions submitted by project employees, the name related to the settlements location along Black Oak Ridge, and officials thought the rural-sounding name held outside curiosity to a minimum. The name wasnt formally adopted until 1949, and the site was referred to as the Clinton Engineer Works until then, the town was surrounded by guard towers and a fence with seven gates. Starting in October 1942, the United States Army Corps of Engineers began acquiring more than 60,000 acres in the Oak Ridge area for the United States Manhattan Project, many residents came home to find eviction notices tacked to their doors
31.
Poisoning of Alexander Litvinenko
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Alexander Litvinenko was a former officer of the Russian Federal Security Service and KGB, who fled from court prosecution in Russia and received political asylum in the United Kingdom. On November 1,2006, Litvinenko suddenly fell ill and was hospitalized and he died three weeks later, becoming the first confirmed victim of lethal polonium-210-induced acute radiation syndrome. Litvinenkos allegations about the misdeeds of the FSB and his public deathbed accusations that Russian president Vladimir Putin was behind his unusual malady resulted in media coverage. Subsequent investigations by British authorities into the circumstances of Litvinenkos death led to serious diplomatic difficulties between the British and Russian governments. Another witness stated that Dmitry Kovtun had been speaking openly about the plan to kill Litvinenko that was intended to set an example as a punishment for a traitor. The main suspect in the case, a officer of the Russian Federal Protective Service, Andrey Lugovoy. As a member of the Duma, he now enjoys immunity from prosecution, before he was elected to the Duma, the British government tried to have him extradited without success. At the same time, Litvinenkos father, now residing in Italy, believes Boris Berezovsky, Berezovsky was found dead at his home in England on 23 March 2013. Alexander Litvinenko was an officer of the Russian Federal Security service who escaped prosecution in Russia. In his books, Blowing up Russia, Terror from Within and Lubyanka Criminal Group and he alleged that a key element of the FSBs strategy was to frighten Russians by bombing apartment buildings in Moscow and other Russian cities. He accused Russian secret services of having arranged the Moscow theater hostage crisis, through their Chechen agent provocateur and he also stated that the terrorist Ayman al-Zawahiri was under FSB control when he visited Russia in 1997. Upon his arrival in London, he continued to support the Russian oligarch in exile, Boris Berezovsky, just two weeks before his death, Litvinenko accused Putin of ordering the assassination of Anna Politkovskaya. On 1 November 2006, Litvinenko suddenly fell ill, earlier that day he had met two former KGB officers, Andrey Lugovoy and Dmitry Kovtun. Lugovoy is a bodyguard of Russian ex-Prime Minister Yegor Gaidar. He passed Litvinenko papers supposedly concerning her fate, on 20 November, it was reported that Scaramella had gone into hiding and feared for his life. For several days after 1 November, Litvinenko experienced severe diarrhoea, at one point, he could not walk without assistance. As the pain intensified, Litvinenko asked his wife to call an ambulance for assistance, for several weeks, Litvinenkos condition worsened as doctors searched for the cause of the illness. Surrounded by friends, Litvinenko became physically weak, and spent periods unconscious, a photograph was taken of Litvinenko on his deathbed and released to the public
32.
BBC
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The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. It is headquartered at Broadcasting House in London, the BBC is the worlds oldest national broadcasting organisation and the largest broadcaster in the world by number of employees. It employs over 20,950 staff in total,16,672 of whom are in public sector broadcasting, the total number of staff is 35,402 when part-time, flexible, and fixed contract staff are included. The BBC is established under a Royal Charter and operates under its Agreement with the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport. The fee is set by the British Government, agreed by Parliament, and used to fund the BBCs radio, TV, britains first live public broadcast from the Marconi factory in Chelmsford took place in June 1920. It was sponsored by the Daily Mails Lord Northcliffe and featured the famous Australian Soprano Dame Nellie Melba, the Melba broadcast caught the peoples imagination and marked a turning point in the British publics attitude to radio. However, this public enthusiasm was not shared in official circles where such broadcasts were held to interfere with important military and civil communications. By late 1920, pressure from these quarters and uneasiness among the staff of the licensing authority, the General Post Office, was sufficient to lead to a ban on further Chelmsford broadcasts. But by 1922, the GPO had received nearly 100 broadcast licence requests, John Reith, a Scottish Calvinist, was appointed its General Manager in December 1922 a few weeks after the company made its first official broadcast. The company was to be financed by a royalty on the sale of BBC wireless receiving sets from approved manufacturers, to this day, the BBC aims to follow the Reithian directive to inform, educate and entertain. The financial arrangements soon proved inadequate, set sales were disappointing as amateurs made their own receivers and listeners bought rival unlicensed sets. By mid-1923, discussions between the GPO and the BBC had become deadlocked and the Postmaster-General commissioned a review of broadcasting by the Sykes Committee and this was to be followed by a simple 10 shillings licence fee with no royalty once the wireless manufactures protection expired. The BBCs broadcasting monopoly was made explicit for the duration of its current broadcast licence, the BBC was also banned from presenting news bulletins before 19.00, and required to source all news from external wire services. Mid-1925 found the future of broadcasting under further consideration, this time by the Crawford committee, by now the BBC under Reiths leadership had forged a consensus favouring a continuation of the unified broadcasting service, but more money was still required to finance rapid expansion. Wireless manufacturers were anxious to exit the loss making consortium with Reith keen that the BBC be seen as a service rather than a commercial enterprise. The recommendations of the Crawford Committee were published in March the following year and were still under consideration by the GPO when the 1926 general strike broke out in May. The strike temporarily interrupted newspaper production and with restrictions on news bulletins waived the BBC suddenly became the source of news for the duration of the crisis. The crisis placed the BBC in a delicate position, the Government was divided on how to handle the BBC but ended up trusting Reith, whose opposition to the strike mirrored the PMs own
33.
Trident nuclear programme
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It is operated by the Royal Navy and based at Clyde Naval Base on the west coast of Scotland,25 miles from Glasgow—Scotlands largest city and the UKs third largest city. At least one submarine is always on patrol to provide a continuous at-sea capability, each one is armed with up to 8 missiles and 40 warheads, their capacity is much larger. The programme was announced in July 1980 and patrols began in December 1994, since tactical WE.177 free-fall bombs were decommissioned in 1998, Trident has been the only nuclear weapon system that is operated by the UK. Its stated purpose by the Ministry of Defence is to deter the most extreme threats to our security and way of life. Trident replaced the submarine-based Polaris system, in operation from 1968 until 1996, a programme for the replacement of the Vanguard-class is under way. Trident would replace the Polaris system of four Resolution-class submarines equipped with U. S. -built Polaris A3 missiles and these missiles were originally armed with triple ET.317 warheads aimed at a single target, later upgraded by the UK Chevaline programme to two hardened warheads. Following the acceleration of the U. S. Trident II D-5 programme, under the agreement, the UK would lease 65 Trident II D-5 missiles from a larger pool of weapons based at Naval Submarine Base Kings Bay in the United States. The U. S. would maintain and support the missiles, the option for a fifth submarine was discussed at the time but later discounted, and the number of missiles leased was later reduced from 65 to 58. Tridents future was secured the year when the Conservative Party won the 1983 general election. The Vanguard-class submarines were built between 1986 and 1998 by Vickers at Barrow-in-Furness, Cumbria, the first British Trident missile was test-fired from HMS Vanguard on 26 May 1994, and the submarine began its first patrol in December of that year. According to the Royal Navy, at least one submarine has always been on ever since. Trident has been the UKs sole nuclear weapons system since the retirement of the WE.177 tactical nuclear weapon following the 1998 Strategic Defence Review, subsequent media reports said the delay was at the request of the United States. Successful Royal Navy test firings had occurred in 2000,2005,2009 and 2012 and they are infrequent due to the missiles £17 million price tag. In total, there have been 161 successful test flights of the D5 missile since design completion in 1989, fewer than 10 test flights have been failures, and the Royal Navy is not known to have had a previous failure. The Trident programme was initiated during the Cold War, and its capabilities were designed to deter powerful Warsaw Pact forces. By the time of the first Vanguard patrol in December 1994, the Soviet Union no longer existed, the final decision on firing the missiles is the responsibility of the prime minister of the United Kingdom. Upon taking office, the prime minister writes four identical letters of last resort, if contact with the UK is lost, the commanding officer of a submarine has to follow the instructions in the letter if they believe that the United Kingdom has suffered an overwhelming attack. Options include retaliating with nuclear weapons, not retaliating, and putting the submarine under the command of an ally, the exact content of the letters is never disclosed, and they are destroyed without being read upon the election of a new prime minister
34.
Trident (missile)
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The Trident missile is a submarine-launched ballistic missile equipped with multiple independently targetable reentry vehicles. Originally developed by Lockheed Missiles and Space Corporation, the missile is armed with thermonuclear warheads and is launched from nuclear-powered ballistic missile submarines, Trident missiles are carried by fourteen US Navy Ohio-class submarines, with US warheads, and four Royal Navy Vanguard-class submarines, with British warheads. The missile is named after the mythological trident of Neptune, in 1971, The US Navy began studies of an advanced Undersea Long-range Missile System. A Decision Coordinating Paper for the ULMS was approved on 14 September 1971, ULMS program outlined a long-term modernization plan, which proposed the development of a longer-range missile termed ULMS II, which was to achieve twice the range of the existing Poseidon missile. In addition to a missile, a larger submarine was proposed to replace the James Madison. The ULMS II missile system was designed to be retrofitted to the existing SSBNs, in May 1972, the term ULMS II was replaced with Trident. The Trident was to be a larger, higher-performance missile with a capacity greater than 6000 mi. Trident I was deployed in 1979 and retired in 2005 and its objective was to achieve performance similar to Poseidon but at extended range. Trident II had the objective of improved circular error probable, and was first deployed in 1990, Trident missiles are provided to the United Kingdom under the terms of the 1963 Polaris Sales Agreement which was modified in 1982 for Trident. British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher wrote to President Carter on 10 July 1980, however, in 1982 Thatcher wrote to President Reagan to request the United Kingdom be allowed to procure the Trident II system, the procurement of which had been accelerated by the US Navy. This was agreed in March 1982, under the agreement, the United Kingdom paid an additional 5% of their total procurement cost of 2.5 billion dollars to the US government as a research and development contribution. In 2002, the United States Navy announced plans to extend the life of the submarines and this requires a D5 Life Extension Program, which is currently underway. The main aim is to replace obsolete components at minimal cost by using commercial off the shelf hardware, in 2007, Lockheed Martin was awarded a total of $848 million in contracts to perform this and related work, which also includes upgrading the missiles reentry systems. On the same day, Draper Labs was awarded $318 million for upgrade of the guidance system, then-British Prime Minister Tony Blair was quoted as saying the issue would be fully debated in Parliament prior to a decision being taken. Blair outlined plans in Parliament on 4 December 2006, to build a new generation of submarines to carry existing Trident missiles and it is called the Dreadnought-class submarine. The first flight test of a D-5 LE subsystem, the MK6 Mod 1 guidance system, in Demonstration and Shakedown Operation -23 and this was almost exactly 22 years after the first Trident II missile was launched from Tennessee in February 1990. The total cost of the Trident program thus far came to $39.546 billion in 2011, the launch from the submarine occurs below the sea surface. The missiles are ejected from their tubes by igniting an explosive charge in a container which is separated by seventeen titanium alloy pinnacles activated by a double alloy steam system
35.
Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty
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The Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty is a multilateral treaty that bans all nuclear explosions, for both civilian and military purposes, in all environments. It was adopted by the United Nations General Assembly on 10 September 1996 but has not entered into force as eight specific states have not ratified the treaty. The movement for control of nuclear weapons began in 1945, with a call from Canada. The plan, which would serve as the basis for United States nuclear policy into the 1950s, was rejected by the Soviet Union as a US ploy to cement its nuclear dominance. Between the Trinity nuclear test of 16 July 1945 and the signing of the Partial Test Ban Treaty on 5 August 1963,499 nuclear tests were conducted. Between 1945 and 1963, the US conducted 215 atmospheric tests, the Soviet Union conducted 219, the UK conducted 21, and France conducted three. In 1954, following the Castle Bravo test, Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru of India issued the first appeal for an agreement on testing. Negotiations on a comprehensive test ban, primarily involved the US, UK, of primary concern throughout the negotiations, which would stretch with some interruptions to July 1963, was the system of verifying compliance with the test ban and detecting illicit tests. On the Western side, there were concerns that the Soviet Union would be able to circumvent any test ban and these fears were amplified following the US Rainier shot of 19 September 1957, which was the first contained underground test of a nuclear weapon. On the Soviet side, conversely, the on-site compliance inspections demanded by the US, disagreement over verification would lead to the Anglo-American and Soviet negotiators abandoning a comprehensive test ban in favor of a partial ban, which would be finalized on 25 July 1963. The PTBT, joined by 123 states following the three parties, banned detonations for military and civilian purposes underwater, in the atmosphere. On the one hand, enactment of the treaty was followed by a drop in the atmospheric concentration of radioactive particles. On the other hand, nuclear proliferation was not halted entirely, compared to the 499 tests from 1945 to the signing of the PTBT,436 tests were conducted over the ten years following the PTBT. Furthermore, US and Soviet underground testing continued venting radioactive gas into the atmosphere, additionally, though underground testing was generally safer than above-ground testing, underground tests continued to risk the leaking of radionuclides, including plutonium, into the ground. From 1964 through 1996, the year of the CTBTs adoption, the final non-underground test was conducted by China in 1980. The PTBT has been seen as a step towards the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty of 1968, under the NPT, non-nuclear weapon states were prohibited from possessing, manufacturing, and acquiring nuclear weapons or other nuclear explosive devices. All signatories, including nuclear weapon states, were committed to the goal of nuclear disarmament. In 1974, a step towards a comprehensive test ban was made with the Threshold Test Ban Treaty, ratified by the US and Soviet Union, which banned underground tests with yields above 150 kilotons
36.
Los Alamos National Laboratory
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Los Alamos National Laboratory is one of two laboratories in the United States in which classified work towards the design of nuclear weapons has been undertaken. LANL is a United States Department of Energy national laboratory, managed and operated by Los Alamos National Security, located in Los Alamos, the laboratory is one of the largest science and technology institutions in the world. It conducts multidisciplinary research in such as national security, space exploration, renewable energy, medicine, nanotechnology. General Leslie Groves wanted a central laboratory at a location for safety. It should be at least 200 miles from international boundaries and west of the Mississippi, major John Dudley suggested Oak City, Utah or Jemez Springs, New Mexico but both were rejected. Manhattan Project scientific director J. Robert Oppenheimer had spent much time in his youth in the New Mexico area, Dudley had rejected the school as not meeting Groves’ criteria, but as soon as Groves saw it he said in effect This is the place. Oppenheimer became the laboratorys first director, during the Manhattan Project, Los Alamos hosted thousands of employees, including many Nobel Prize-winning scientists. The location was a total secret and its only mailing address was a post office box, number 1663, in Santa Fe, New Mexico. Eventually two other post office boxes were used,180 and 1539, also in Santa Fe, though its contract with the University of California was initially intended to be temporary, the relationship was maintained long after the war. The work of the laboratory culminated in the creation of several devices, one of which was used in the first nuclear test near Alamogordo, New Mexico, codenamed Trinity. The other two were weapons, Little Boy and Fat Man, which were used in the attacks on Hiroshima, the Laboratory received the Army-Navy ‘E’ Award for Excellence in production on October 16,1945. Many of the original Los Alamos luminaries chose to leave the laboratory, in the years since the 1940s, Los Alamos was responsible for the development of the hydrogen bomb, and many other variants of nuclear weapons. In 1952, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory was founded to act as Los Alamos competitor, Los Alamos and Livermore served as the primary classified laboratories in the U. S. national laboratory system, designing all the countrys nuclear arsenal. Additional work included basic research, particle accelerator development, health physics. Many nuclear tests were undertaken in the Marshall Islands and at the Nevada Test Site, during the late-1950s, a number of scientists including Dr. J. Robert Bob Beyster left Los Alamos to work for General Atomics in San Diego. Three major nuclear-related accidents have occurred at LANL, criticality accidents occurred in August 1945 and May 1946, and a third accident occurred during an annual physical inventory in December 1958. Several buildings associated with the Manhattan Project at Los Alamos were declared a National Historic Landmark in 1965, Los Alamos nuclear work is currently thought to relate primarily to computer simulations and stockpile stewardship. The development of the Dual-Axis Radiographic Hydrodynamic Test Facility will allow complex simulations of nuclear tests to take place without full explosive yields, the lab has made intense efforts for humanitarian causes through its scientific research in medicine
37.
Critical mass
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A critical mass is the smallest amount of fissile material needed for a sustained nuclear chain reaction. The critical mass of a material depends upon its nuclear properties, its density, its shape, its enrichment, its purity, its temperature. The concept is important in nuclear weapon design, when k =1, the mass is critical, and the chain reaction is barely self-sustaining. A subcritical mass is a mass of material that does not have the ability to sustain a fission chain reaction. A population of neutrons introduced to an assembly will exponentially decrease. A steady rate of spontaneous fissions causes a steady level of neutron activity. The constant of proportionality increases as k increases, a supercritical mass is one where there is an increasing rate of fission. The material may settle into equilibrium at an elevated temperature/power level or destroy itself, in the case of supercriticality, k >1. The mass where criticality occurs may be changed by modifying certain attributes such as fuel, shape, temperature, density and these attributes have complex interactions and interdependencies. This section explains only the simplest ideal cases, varying the amount of fuel It is possible for a fuel assembly to be critical at near zero power. If the perfect quantity of fuel were added to a subcritical mass to create an exactly critical mass. Changing the shape A mass may be exactly critical without being a homogeneous sphere. More closely refining the shape toward a sphere will make the mass supercritical. Conversely changing the shape to a perfect sphere will decrease its reactivity. Changing the temperature A mass may be critical at a particular temperature. Fission and absorption cross-sections increase as the neutron velocity decreases. As fuel temperature increases, neutrons of a given energy appear faster and this is not unrelated to Doppler broadening of the U238 resonances but is common to all fuels/absorbers/configurations. Neglecting the very important resonances, the neutron cross section of every material exhibits an inverse relationship with relative neutron velocity
38.
Nevada Test Site
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Nuclear testing at the Nevada Test Site began with a 1-kiloton-of-TNT bomb dropped on Frenchman Flat on 27 January 1951. Many of the images of the nuclear era come from the NTS. During the 1950s, the clouds from the 100 atmospheric tests could be seen for almost 100 mi. The city of Las Vegas experienced noticeable seismic effects, and the distant mushroom clouds, St. George, Utah, received the brunt of the fallout of above-ground nuclear testing in the Yucca Flats/Nevada Test Site. Winds routinely carried the fallout of these tests directly through St. George, the vast majority—828 of the 928 total nuclear tests—were underground. Those arrested included the astronomer Carl Sagan and the actors Kris Kristofferson, Martin Sheen, the Nevada Test Site contains 28 areas,1,100 buildings,400 miles of paved roads,300 miles of unpaved roads, ten heliports, and two airstrips. The Nevada Test Site was established as a 680-square-mile area by President Harry Truman on December 18,1950, within the Nellis Air Force Gunnery, the Nevada Test Site was the primary testing location of American nuclear devices from 1951 to 1992,928 announced nuclear tests occurred there. The site is covered with subsidence craters from the testing, the NTS was the United States primary location for tests in the 500-to-1,000 kt range. 126 tests were conducted elsewhere, including most larger tests, many of these occurred at the Pacific Proving Grounds in the Marshall Islands. During the 1950s, the clouds from atmospheric tests could be seen for almost 100 mi. The city of Las Vegas experienced noticeable seismic effects, and the distant mushroom clouds, the last atmospheric test detonation at the Nevada Test Site was Little Feller I of Operation Sunbeam, on 17 July 1962. Although the United States did not ratify the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, it honors the articles of the treaty, subcritical tests not involving a critical mass continue. It created a crater 1,280 feet wide and 320 feet deep that can still be seen today, the site was scheduled to be used to conduct the testing of a 1, 100-ton conventional explosive in an operation known as Divine Strake in June 2006. The bomb is an alternative to nuclear bunker busters. After objections from Nevada and Utahs members of Congress, the operation was postponed until 2007, on 22 February 2007, the Defense Threat Reduction Agency officially canceled the experiment. On December 7,2012 the most-recent explosion was conducted, an underground sub-critical test of the properties of plutonium, NTS also performed piggyback testing of effects of nuclear detonation during the above-ground tests. Vehicles, shelters, utility stations, and other structures were placed at distances from the Ground Zero detonation point of each weapon. Homes and commercial buildings were built to typical of American and European cities
39.
Radioactive waste
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Radioactive waste is waste that contains radioactive material. Radioactive waste is usually a by-product of nuclear generation and other applications of nuclear fission or nuclear technology, such as research. Radioactive waste is hazardous to most forms of life and the environment, and is regulated by government agencies in order to protect human health and the environment. Radioactivity naturally decays over time, so radioactive waste has to be isolated and confined in appropriate facilities for a sufficient period until it no longer poses a threat. The time radioactive waste must be stored for depends on the type of waste, Radioactive waste typically comprises a number of radionuclides, unstable configurations of elements that decay, emitting ionizing radiation which can be harmful to humans and the environment. These isotopes emit different types and levels of radiation, which last for different periods of time, the radioactivity of all radioactive waste diminishes with time. Certain radioactive elements will remain hazardous to humans and other creatures for hundreds or thousands of years, other radionuclides remain radioactive for millions of years. Thus, these wastes must be shielded for centuries and isolated from the environment for millennia. Since radioactive decay follows the rule, the rate of decay is inversely proportional to the duration of decay. In other words, the radiation from a long-lived isotope like iodine-129 will be less intense than that of a short-lived isotope like iodine-131. The two tables show some of the radioisotopes, their half-lives, and their radiation yield as a proportion of the yield of fission of uranium-235. The energy and the type of the radiation emitted by a radioactive substance are also important factors in determining its threat to humans. The chemical properties of the element will determine how mobile the substance is and how likely it is to spread into the environment. Exposure to radioactive waste may cause harm or death. In humans, a dose of 1 sievert carries a 5. 5% risk of developing cancer, ionizing radiation causes deletions in chromosomes. If a developing organism such as a child is irradiated, it is possible a birth defect may be induced. The incidence of radiation-induced mutations in humans is small, as in most mammals, because of natural cellular-repair mechanisms, Radioactive waste comes from a number of sources. Waste from the front end of the fuel cycle is usually alpha-emitting waste from the extraction of uranium
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