Duck & Cover: British Pamphlets Advising on Nuclear War

What should you do if a nuclear war starts today? That’s the question answered by this infamous booklet, Protect and Survive, which was published by the UK Home Office and tells citizens how to react in the event of a nuclear attack.

Described by Imperial War Museum curator Matt Brosnan as, ‘deeply unnerving’, (‘Armageddon Advice Guide to Be Republished’, the Guardian, March 16^th, 2017), Protect and Survive was based on civil defence guidelines developed during the 1970s. These were originally meant to be kept secret until hostilities broke out, but rising Cold War tensions led the Thatcher government to publish them in May of 1980.

Instructions are given for ‘duck and cover’ style responses to the immediate flash and blast-wave, but most of the contents explain how to shelter in place from radioactive fallout for up to two weeks. The advice is to create an ‘inner refuge’ in the home using wood, sandbags, and household objects like tables and pillows.

There’s a list of supplies to have in readiness, including a bucket for a toilet. Most gruesomely, readers are advised to place the bodies of the deceased in a separate room with a note for identification. Notably, few suggestions are made for those living in smaller homes or without access to building supplies. In that situation, the advice is to plan ahead to stay with someone else, but the complications of travel and negotiating over space and supplies during a nuclear emergency are left unspoken.

Domestic Nuclear Shelters, the companion volume to Protect and Survive, was published the following year, and gives detailed plans for more permanent structures that could be built in gardens and basements. The back provides a handy list of long-life foods to stock, though one pound of sweets per person for two weeks seems, given the circumstances, a serious underestimate.

Naturally, this earnest yet oblivious approach to the end of the world received immediate pushback, especially from disarmament activists. The wave of responses included serious polemics like E.P. Thompson’s Protest and Survive, and the heart-rending depictions in Raymond Briggs’ When the Wind Blows and the BBC drama Threads. But there was also a great deal of humour.

Meet Mr. Bomb: A Practical Guide to Nuclear Extinction by the Ministry of Futile Preparedness (1983), was one of the satirical responses, poking fun at governments that place the burden of nuclear war on ordinary citizens, while making policy choices that raise the odds of disaster. Its authors were staff of the US humour magazine National Lampoon, which explains the noticeably American tone, including parody ads for products like running shoes to help you escape.

These rare first editions of all three booklets are available as a set and are featured in our new catalogue of modern physics books.

By Laura Massey

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