seventh nineteen forty five president truman announced the atomic bombing of hiroshima with these words the experiment he said has been an overwhelming success three days later the destruction of nagasaki was officially described as having achieved good results these announcements and especially the words used experiment success good results to describe the unique and horrific carnage of nuclear war with the first public examples of a new kind of propaganda by using reassuring even soothing language a language which allowed both the politicians and us to distance ourselves from the horror of nuclear war this new kind of propaganda created acceptable images of war and the illusion that we could live securely with nuclear weapons even those first two bombs on japan had nice comic book names little boy and fat man and soon bombs were no longer bombs at all but devices and hardware with names enemy but at the british people it was all very simple our side was simply the good guys of the west and the other side where the back and guys  dark threat seldom the trade in human terms surely what has been overlooked is that we are a democracy unlike the soviet union and that in a democracy secrecy and propaganda or not to control how we think especially in matters of national survival and that principle is assumed throughout this documentary today for many of us the nuclear war has become the thinkable although we may not be aware that we have been led across the threshold today we are guided by new reassuring words like theater nuclear war and limited nuclear war that is a nuclear war limited to europe a nuclear war in which victory is possible a victory for the good guys all the bad guy had proved beyond doubt that germany did not possess an atomic bomb this vital information was classified top secret it meant in effect there was no longer a need to build a bomb but the military head of the manhattan project general leslie grows was obsessed by one consuming fear that the wall would be before his bomb was ready even after germany surrendered droege said we must not lose a single day for they were still japan a rebellion broke out among leading scientists einstein and leo szilard sent a petition to the white house pleading for the ball not to be used but this was still on roosevelt's desk when he died in distortion of language thought and culture was now well on the way the word bomb was not used officially it was a gadget and the first explosion must be called a trinity and if this bomb was successful it will be called a boy daily express correspondent wilford that was the first western journalist to recherch mouth after eighty thousand people had died in the first nuclear people scratching away with their hands in ruins and try to find some bits of family physicians burchett was on his mind while other reporters were being closely shepherded by public relations offices victims were carefully avoided radiation sickness was absolutely suppressed it is not surprising that burchett story was publicly denied for three times as many people died in the five year period after the bomb fell on hiroshima then on the day of the explosion most of them from the effects of radiation what we in the west got used to seeing was physical damage in hiroshima even film of what really happened to the victims was suppressed the film on the right of the screen represents what we mostly saw on news reel and television right hundred sixty eight this film was shot by a japanese cameraman and the only hospitals operating the japanese cell most complicated and shipped to washington where it was classified secret and not really the twenty the war on official it was an experiment in tokyo the military held a press conference to deny purchase story about a new dangers of radiation and stayed at that level until the nine hundred fifty s although this was not reported at the time the official truth was quite different and even as propaganda was extraordinary here in the new york times the war  denies categorically that the bomb produced dangerous radioactivity in japan they are still dying this is the atomic bomb hospital in hiroshima where last year as every year more than a thousand people died from cancers resulting from that one bomb in one hundred forty five the was acted upon as a result perhaps half a million asians have died often slow and terrible deaths what is truly unthinkable is that it now might happen to us said proved that the russians were ahead in missile technology but this was not true and they had the very notion of a missile gap was ridiculous as every american scientist working on  york one of the most distinguished and key figures in the early development of nuclear weapons wrote this in his book race to oblivion by nine hundred fifty five the principle into service battle had become a power struggle over who would get the juiciest and sexiest roles and missions and long range missiles when sputnik went up each of the services hoped to take advantage of the public confusion and consternation lead on part of the soviets the two programs that the fundamental level that is the american missile program missile the space program the soviet missile and space program were rather evenly balanced in fact the american program was bigger and somewhat ahead in terms of the technological base but the russians put up the first satellite and so for the man in the street to that was what counted and not more detailed questions about what the technological how the technological basis compared as a result and unprecedented missile building program began in the united states this arms race was fueled by intelligence reports which credited the russians with all kinds of technological wonders including atomic powered boma again to quote dr york today it is quite obvious that no such nuclear aircraft ever existed in the soviet union and that stories to that effect were simply one more very clear attempt to generate what may be called self serving intelligence admiral jima rock united states navy was number two in strategic plans division in the pentagon that means he was a senior nuclear strategist and before that he was admiral commanding the mediterranean nuclear topps group we have been three to five years ahead of the soviet union in the development of every strategic weapon system that has come down the pike since we developed then exploded the atomic bomb in hiroshima and nagasaki the hydrogen bomb we deployed our i c b m s first we had the first jet aircraft to carry the bombs to the soviet union the first nuclear powered submarines the first solid propellant missiles in our submarines we went to merv ten years before the soviets came up with their multiple independent reentry vehicles when you say that the united states is three to five years ahead that flies in the face of everything that we've heard from the white house whitehall everything our governments tell us well you just have to look at the facts john we have more strategic nuclear weapons on the soviets have we have nine thousand two hundred today the soviets at the highest estimate by our government is seven thousand strategic nuclear weapons we have a bomber force of about four hundred strategic bombers all planes we have most of our nuclear weapons at sea where they're secure we have five thousand nuclear weapons in our submarines and we keep three thousand nuclear weapons off the soviet union they  done so for twenty years the soviets on the other hand have only a thousand nuclear weapons and all of their submarines and they keep two hundred nuclear weapons off of the u s coast every criterion that you can think of the united states is ahead today in absolute terms and we're building in such a way that we are going to stay ahead no matter what the soviets do professionally lawrence freedman  when i last went to the salvage union in one hundred seventy seven i interviewed many of those called dissidents people who dared to speak out in a police state simple kratz you might call them like the courageous a lot just left back now in prison and i mean again now in the west with her husband alexander ginzburg what i learned from these people was this when international tension is relaxed they talk we used to call it a salvia iraq or see find it more difficult to justify open repression and as a result there is a dialogue private and cautious certainly but a dialogue on matters of war and peace and in a country ever mindful that twenty two million of its people died in the last war eventually this dialogue finds an echo in the soviet leadership burdened by another free spending and i able to feed its own people without imported american grain when tension is relaxed these reformist elements having flown and the result has been a partial test ban treaty and strategic arms limitations but when the west rattles its missiles there is no dialogue and no way it's only a state of siege only danger in no agreed facts can you develop that from those diagrams with the tanks lined up against each other and what's been left out of those the age of the tax for example some of the warsaw pact tanks so nearly thirty years tank weapons are left that nato has got about a quarter of a million anti tank guided weapons and it's got numerous other weapon systems which are capable of destroying time tanks with quite extraordinary and really rather nasty that the cruise missiles would balance russia's s s twenty missiles which are aimed at western europe the unofficial truth is that the cruise was designed for a nuclear war in europe and will be controlled by the united states parliament was and september night in eighty a civil defense exercise was carried out based on what british intelligence understood would happen in a nuclear attack the first three nubia bombs fell here greenham common and you do is as one does with any advertising one's thinking about catholic if you want to buy a life insurance policy you really start asking some hard questions about it and i got back into part to begin with it's headed the balance of longer range land  in july not in fifty six the united states b forty seven crashed into an atomic bomb store at lakenheath base in suffolk road jammed with people escaping in panic from the base president eisenhower ordered all mention of nuclear americans would like to fight world war three in europe if we have to fight another world war the united states for many years really since world war two has had this concept of a forward based system we want to keep a forward base system kingdom europe southern europe that whole tier so that if we do become involved with it in a war with the soviets we can fight the war there  fight the war in the united states britain has more foreign bases on its soil than most countries all of them american and many of them soviet nuclear targets according to british and started information at lakenheath walls a two feet  with special air filters to protect their american personnel from radioactive dumps hardly any of these american bases are directly committed to the defenses but instead they are here to provide americans  new television game called find the missing bases in june nineteen eighty bob try the labor and pay off the then defense secretary francis pin to provide a total list of american bases in britain three more bases including as it happens the largest american underwater spy base in the world so that makes fifty six but that wasn't all the journalist duncan campbell  statesman found enlisted another forty seven bases making a grand total of one hundred three that's a long way from this is the ministry of defense in london where we have sought cooperation in making this documentary we did get permission to film a three british installation and a ministry of public relations man offered us government film some of it fourteen grounds refer to it as the bull singing pole dancing show if the game has been a reality they would now be about eight minutes to impact of the first nuclear bomb to hit britain minutes to impact if i can do is wait and in all probability we would not nothing about it this diagram inspired by the book london after the bomb shoshu second by second how london would be destroyed immediately up to detonation the flash of light will blind anyone looking at this within three seconds blinded and received second degree and this is the effect of only a one megaton bomb and such a small bomb it has been calculated will make a crater large enough to swallow ten wembley say impossible to tell whether they for survivors dragging them from the wreckage of their skin were so badly burned it was actually melting because the bunker is designed not to collapse and is only for police military and public servants the government published civil defense plans called protect and survive tell you to take off the handles of your toilet and getting lots of tin soup and put your head in a bag like being snowed in a christmas nuclear war sounds almost fun however there are no evacuation plans and this means that most of the population is to be the most widespread danger from nuclear explosions is for  from the ground by the explosion miraculously on touched and of course nothing looks like hiroshima its main aim is to pacify us and to keep us literally in our place stay where you are if you leave your home your local authority may over the homeless families and if you will the authorities in the new place will not help you with food accommodations or other essential tools you are better off in your own home manual of home defense or restrict the document priority is given before an attack to detention or restriction of movement arbs of verses or potentially subversive people lowest on the list as advice to the rest of the population on how to survive this is the land battle tactics manual of the british armed forces of the year nineteen sixty on page twelve it says this nuclear weapons are varying hales will be used in  but not unlimited numbers in other words the planning for a limited nuclear war in europe began at least twenty two years ago but haven't we been led to believe that nuclear war as a practical military option is only a recent development and was there any debate at the time in parliament and the press no that was not it says here restricted the information given in this document is not to be communicated either directly or indirectly to the press or to any person not authorized to receive it and that meant almost everybody except of course the generals who russians and there was all fact allies including the bad german these are known in this war as the orange or outside of the americans and they nato allies including the british and the good germans and these are known as the blue forces now in this limited nuclear war nah still fashion terms of death and destruction have been done away with and not before time horrible bombs and now with collateral damage that old favorite from vietnam game and nato war game but such new big games are being played regularly in europe i think humanized rehearsal for the kind of limited nuclear war endorsed by nato in december nineteen seventy nine when the this is one of the means of conditioning you the public to accept the nuclear arms race is secrecy and you play city that is you're told one thing by government and the very opposite happens in secret when the labor party was returned to power in nineteen seventeen for its manifesto it was clear on one issue we have announced it said any intention of moving to a new generation of strategic nuclear weapons and they had mr callahan on becoming prime minister promised a full and informed debate on nuclear weapons during nine hundred seventy eight a series of extraordinary meetings took place in the cabinet office in whitehall these meetings were convened by mr callahan and were attended by foreign secretary david owen chancellor of the exchequer denis healey defense secretary fred mali and senior civil servants from the foreign office and the ministry of defense parliament knew nothing about these meetings nor did all the members of the cabinet so secret was this committee that it didn't have a name or a number it took the decision to spend a thousand million pounds to massively increase the british nuclear arsenal in what was called the chevrolet in program this thousand million pounds was buried without trace in civil service accounts and no one questioned it and of course you knew nothing about it powerful new three stage missile range of four thousand miles capable of delivering multiple warheads to widely scattered targets britain's new so called independent of terror and grew out of the chevalier program and is to be based on 's the soviet union cannot feed itself and concealed the growing poverty in hock shop of its people in the united states unemployment in cities like detroit and in the black ghettos is more than half the united kingdom had known that they are well i think they'd be in a much stronger bargain position now they're captive appendages to the united states is today jake and other nuclear weapon systems are just a little adjunct here of our total no clear capability in the united states or there are contingency plans in the nato doctrine to fire a nuclear weapon for demonstrative purposes went straight to the other side and they are exceeding the limits of toleration in the conventional area