Britain, Australia and the Bomb: The Nuclear Tests and Their Aftermath

337 Pages·2006·1.21 MB·English

by  Lorna Arnold

Britain, Australia and the Bomb
Also by Lorna Arnold
BRITAIN AND THE H-BOMB
WINDSCALE 1957
Also by Mark Smith
NATO ENLARGEMENT DURING THE COLD WAR
Britain, Australia and the
Bomb
The Nuclear Tests and Their
Aftermath
Second Edition
Lorna Arnold
Official Historian
and
Mark Smith
Lecturer, Department of Politics and International Relations
University of Wales, Swansea
Second edition © Lorna Arnold and Mark Smith 2006
First edition © MoD 1987
Softcover reprint of the hardcover 2nd edition 2006 978-1-4039-2101-7
This work is a revised edition of a Crown Copyright work that was authored
by Lorna Arnold and published by HMSO in 1987 (‘The First Edition’).Those
parts of the work that were first published in the First Edition remain
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Designs and Patents Act 1988.
First published 2006 by
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Arnold,Lorna.
Britain,Australia and the bomb :the nuclear tests and their aftermath /
Lorna Arnold and Mark Smith.– 2nd ed.
p.cm.
Rev.ed.of:A very special relationship.1987.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
1.Nuclear weapons – Testing.2.Great Britain – Military relations –
Australia.3.Australia – Military relations – Great Britain.I.Smith,Mark,
1965 July 1– II.Title.
U264.A77 2006
355.8(cid:2)251190941—dc22 2006050312
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
15 14 13 12 11 10 09 08 07 06
Contents
List of Tables, Figures and Maps vii
List of Photographs viii
Foreword ix
Preface xi
List of Abbreviations xiii
1 Atomic Policies and Policymakers 1
2 Why Australia? 17
3 Hurricane– 1952 29
4 Totem– 1953 49
5 A Pregnant Pause: 1953–56 73
6 Maralinga – A Permanent Proving Ground 87
7 Mosaic– 1956 106
8 Buffalo– 1956 138
9 ‘There Must be Further Trials to Come’: Weapons 172
Planning, 1956–57
10 Antlerand After 189
11 Kittens,RatsandVixens 215
12 The Maralinga Range after 1963 235
13 Health and Safety and the National Radiological 254
Protection Board Studies
14 In Retrospect 268
Appendix A Memorandum of Arrangements between 287
the United Kingdom and Australian Governments
v
vi Contents
Appendix B Memorandum Respecting the Termination 291
of the Memorandum of Arrangements between the
United Kingdom and Australian Governments of 7 March 1956,
concerning the Atomic Weapons Proving Ground-Maralinga
Notes 293
Bibliography 314
Index 317
List of Tables, Figures and Maps
Tables
7.1 The six places in Australia with the highest fallout 135
reading after Mosaic
7.2 Doses of gamma radiation exposure at Port Hedland 136
and ICRP annual and lifetime limits
8.1 The AWTSC radiation doses and comparative 169
AIRAC doses for Buffalo
8.2 External radiation doses from Buffalofor 169
Coober Pedy and Ingomar
9.1 Four highest radiation values, and the revised 203
figures calculated by the Australian Ionizing
Radiation Advisory Council in 1983, for Antler
Figures
13.1 The distribution of radiation dosage as a percentage 263
of total doses among test participants
Maps
1 Australia, showing the Monte Bello islands 19
2 The Monte Bello islands 31
3 The Emu/Maralinga area 51
4 Maralinga and Woomera prohibited areas 91
5 The Maralinga range 147
vii
List of Photographs
1 Cable laying in the Monte Bellos. For Hurricanesome 150 miles
of cable had to be laid between the islands.
2 Before Hurricane—Dr W. G. Penney confers with the Scientific
Superintendent, Dr L. C. Tyte.
3 On board HMS Campaniaat Monte Bello. Right to left: L. C. Tyte,
W.A. S. Butement (Chief Scientist, Commonwealth Department of
Supply and Development), Captain A. B. Cole RN, Rear Admiral A. D.
Torlesse, W. G. Penney, L.H.Martin (Melbourne University)
O. M. Solandt (Chairman, Canadian Defence Research Board).
4 A re-entry party at Hurricane, wearing protective clothing.
Light-coloured clothing was used for later trials to minimize
heat stress.
5 At Emu Field––Sir William Penney with C. A. Adams (left) and
E. Titterton (right).
6 The terrain at Emu Field.
7 Operation Hotbox—the aircrew and their Canberra at Totem.
Right to left: Group Captain D. A. Wilson (observer),
Wing Commander G.Dhenin (pilot) and Wing Commander
E. W. Anderson (navigator).
8 Firing Control—Ieuan Maddock at Mosaic.
9 Maralinga—Eleven Mile Camp, the home of the Buffalo
Indoctrinee Force.
10 The warhead for the ‘Marcoo’ test at the Buffaloseries being lowered
into its pit. Uniquely at Maralinga, the test was conducted at ground
level to provide information about cratering effects.
11–13 This dramatic ‘before, during and after’ sequence shows the effects
of an atomic explosion on a Land Rover placed 600 yards from
ground zero at the Buffalotrials. Photograph 11 was taken shortly
before detonation; Photograph 12 by remote camera as the blast
wave engulfs the vehicle; Photograph 13 shows the same jeep after
the explosion. The experiment was part of the Target Response
programme to assess the effects of nuclear explosions on military
equipment.
14 Dummies were used to study the effects of atomic explosion
on Servicemen and to determine the best methods of protection.
The dummies used at Buffalowere well made and very
life-like.
Photographs 10–13 are reproduced by kind permission of The National
Archives.
viii
Foreword
Those of us who have sat at the controls of a V-bomber, ready to carry a
British nuclear bomb to targets behind the Iron Curtain, had little
insight at the time into the complexity and ingenuity that had made our
independent deterrent possible. Lorna Arnold, assisted in this new edi-
tion by Mark Smith, has brought us the technical, political and practical
problems which faced the architects of Britain’s nuclear weapons pro-
gramme. When US cooperation ceased in 1946, the postwar British gov-
ernment might have decided to concentrate its meagre resources on the
welfare state. That both the Attlee and Churchill governments pressed
on, first with atomic and then with thermonuclear weapon develop-
ments demonstrated the political importance attached to nuclear
weapons and great power status at that time.
This book tells the human story behind those decisions, and what
that meant in terms of turning policy into a working device. The gen-
erous cooperation from Australia harps back to an age when the dan-
gers from atmospheric nuclear tests were less well understood. The
Aboriginals also paid a particular price to their way of life.
Nevertheless, it is a story of scientific achievement and organisational
mastery. Arranging complex tests on the other side of the world, which
involved thousands of people and new engineering and physics, was
all done without e-mail, satellite communications or desktop comput-
ers. Britain and Australia cooperated in an astonishingly successful
project. The development of the thermonuclear H-bomb was done in a
much shorter timescale than the United States or the Soviet Union had
managed.
This history appears at an important time in the continuing story of
nuclear weapons. In the UK, discussion has started about the future of
the British deterrent, which is now much smaller in number than dur-
ing the Cold War. It is also less independent than the early days. There
is less attachment to the arguments of the 1940s about world power sta-
tus, but concerns remain about the continuing need for a deterrent
against possible threats from emerging nuclear powers. States such as
Iran, North Korea and others, which perhaps aspire to nuclear weapon
status, face many of the hurdles which are detailed in these pages. Before
commentators or politicians talk glibly about the easy development of
nuclear weapons, they would do well to read this book.
ix