Seraphim
03-28-2004, 07:44 PM
LONDON, (AFP) - Queen Elizabeth II (news - web sites) would have been spirited out of Britain had the Soviet Union launched a nuclear attack, according to previously top-secret documents which will go on public view later this week.
Written in 1965 in blue ink on the back of a brown envelope, the plan was to move the British monarch to a secret cabinet bunker, than fly her out of the country, possibly to Canada, the Sunday Telegraph reported.
The unsigned document is among a host of declassified Cold War intelligence papers to be exhibited by the National Archives in Kew, southwest London, from Friday through August 14.
Another document, from 1967, predicted that London would be hit by several Soviet hydrogen bombs with a total yield of eight megatons, equal to 616 Hiroshima-sized bombs, the Sunday Telegraph said.
The Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ) at Cheltenham, in the west of England, a specialist intelligence agency that eavesdrops on telecommunications worldwide, was deemed the second most likely target.
Further down the list, in the "possible" target category, were the university city of Cambridge, the English Channel port of Dover, and the Scottish capital Edinburgh.
Written in 1965 in blue ink on the back of a brown envelope, the plan was to move the British monarch to a secret cabinet bunker, than fly her out of the country, possibly to Canada, the Sunday Telegraph reported.
The unsigned document is among a host of declassified Cold War intelligence papers to be exhibited by the National Archives in Kew, southwest London, from Friday through August 14.
Another document, from 1967, predicted that London would be hit by several Soviet hydrogen bombs with a total yield of eight megatons, equal to 616 Hiroshima-sized bombs, the Sunday Telegraph said.
The Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ) at Cheltenham, in the west of England, a specialist intelligence agency that eavesdrops on telecommunications worldwide, was deemed the second most likely target.
Further down the list, in the "possible" target category, were the university city of Cambridge, the English Channel port of Dover, and the Scottish capital Edinburgh.