Brackla Site for RGHQ 8.2
|Introduction and Background|
At the end of the second world war, the allies felt that they could no longer trust their former allies of the USSR. Communism was the new Nazism, and relations between the super powers began to deteriorate very quickly. Winston Churchill , giving a speech in May 1946 made the following quote ; "From Stettin in the Baltic to Trieste in the Adriatic an iron curtain has descended across the Continent". The new enemy had been found, one which the western powers would fight during the next 40 odd years during the "Cold War".
When Truman ordered the usage of the first Atomic weapons in August 1945, the world entered the Atomic age. Weapons of mass destruction would be continued to be developed over the next few decades, being capable of killing more and more people, being delivered in many ways, and always under the tightest security. Defence against these weapons was also primary, and the United Kingdom, which would be home to many of these Nuclear weapons, and therefore a good target for the Soviets would also need to be defended. It is difficult to defend against these weapons; once they were unleashed and on target, they could never be intercepted. So, plans were made to enable regional governments to take control of parts of the United Kingdom in the event of a nuclear strike. Many sites were selected in the united kingdom; the history of these sites have been well documented. Visit the links page to see some of them. It is not my intention at this point in time to give a full history of the cold war, but more the history of Brackla RGHQ.
I have described earlier in this presentation why Bridgend and Brackla was selected for the site for the huge Ordnance factory prior to world war II. Bridgend and Brackla was later selected to become the home for the Wales Regional General Headquarters in case of Nuclear war. It was the original intention of the government to have a second base in North Wales, but this was not completed, therefore at the height of the cold war, Brackla was planned to govern the whole of Wales.
In 1961, two of the wartime "8 x's" originally designed to store ammunitions and explosives were selected to be converted into the two secret Nuclear bunkers buried into Brackla Ridge. Access was to be via the "back road" leading off the main road running through what is now the Brackla Industrial Estate. The original entrances of these tunnels were extended to accommodate the new Anti-Nuclear entrances with their filters, generators and complex sealed doors. The interior magazines were converted into a maze of rooms for personnel, canteen, recreation, work, planning and most importantly, communication.
|Click on the map for detail location of the Bunker.||Access road||Main gate||Security Fence||Security Fence||Security Fence|
|Beyond the fence||Towards No1 Bunker||Towards No1 Bunker||No1 Bunker||No1 Bunker|
|No 1 Bunker||Main Entrance No 1 Bunker||Main Entrance No 1 Bunker||Main Entrance No 1 Bunker||Diesel Store No 1 Bunker|
|Towards No 2 Bunker||Road to No 2 Bunker||Past Generator||Generator building||Access way from No1 Bunker|
|No 2 Bunker||Diesel Store No 1 Bunker|
|All images taken during November & December 2005 ©Richard Williams2007|
|ROC Posts||Civil Defence||Collection||Pictures||Cold war||Cold war Links|
All Images unless otherwise stated are the property of the author ©Richard Williams 2005-2007