United Kingdom (1983: Doomsday)

Before Doomsday


The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland (commonly known as the United Kingdom, the UK, or Britain) was a country and sovereign state located off the northwestern coast of continental Europe. It was an island nation, spanning an archipelago including Great Britain, the northeastern part of the island of Ireland, and many smaller islands. Northern Ireland was the only part of the UK with a land border with another sovereign state, sharing it with the Republic of Ireland (which became independant from the UK in 1922). Apart from this land border, the UK was surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean, the North Sea, the English Channel and the Irish Sea.

The United Kingdom was a constitutional monarchy (headed by Queen Elizabeth II) and unitary state consisting of four countries: England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales. It was governed by a parliamentary system with its seat of government the Palace of Westminster (otherwise known as the Houses of Parliment) in London, the capital.

The Channel Island bailiwicks of Jersey and Guernsey, and the Isle of Man were Crown Dependencies, which means they are constitutionally tied to the British monarch but were not part of the UK. The UK had fourteen overseas territories that are not constitutionally part of the UK. These territories were remnants of the British Empire, which at its height in 1922 encompassed almost a quarter of the world's land surface, the largest empire in history.

Government of the UK

The United Kingdom was a constitutional monarchy: Queen Elizabeth II was the head of state of the UK as well as many other Commonwealth countries, putting the UK in a personal union with those other states. The Crown had sovereignty over the Crown Dependencies of the Isle of Man and the Bailiwicks of Jersey and Guernsey, which were not part of the United Kingdom though the UK government managed their foreign affairs and defence and the UK Parliament had the authority to legislate on their behalf.

The UK had a parliamentary government based on the Westminster system that had been emulated around the world — a legacy of the former British Empire. The Parliament of the United Kingdom that met in the Palace of Westminster had two houses:


 * An elected House of Commons held 650 elected Members of Parliment or MP's, each represented a single area of the country known as a constiuancy, They were elected in General Elecetions. General elections were called by the Monarch when the Prime Minister so advises. Though there was no minimum term for a Parliament, the Parliament Act (1911) requires that a new election needed to be called within five years of the previous general election.


 * Also there was an appointed House of Lords taken from the aristocracy as well as nominated lords from the general population,

The position of Prime Minister, the UK's head of government, belonged to the Member of Parliament who can obtain the confidence of a majority in the House of Commons, usually the leader of the largest political party in that chamber. The Prime Minister and Cabinet are formally appointed by the Monarch to form Her Majesty's Government, though the Prime Minister chooses the Cabinet, and by convention HM The Queen respects the Prime Minister's choices. The Prime Minster at the time of the attack was Margerat Thatcher.



Doomsday
At approximately 1:42am GMT on September 26, 1983, American satellites picked up Soviet ballistic missiles heading for targets in Great Britian. Upon confirmation by ground-based radar, an official from the Home Office stationed at RAF High Wycombe in Buckinghamshire, authorized the issue of the dreaded "Four Minute Warning".

Immideately the alert of an imminent nuclear attack was sent to all military headquarters, police stations, hopsitals, and other key installations. A nationwide network of sirens were sounded. Radio and television broadcasts were interrupted and the warning message was broadcast from an emergency studio located at the BBC Broadcast House in London.

BBC Emergency Broadcast

The entire British nuclear arsenal (which primarily consisted of Resolution class submarines carrying Polaris SLBMs) was launched in a counterstrike against targets in the Soviet Union and other Warsaw Pact countries. British military policy was that of the four boats, three were on duty and one in for refit. Each Submarine carried 16 Chevaline Polaris SLBM's, each with 48 200KT nuclear warheads. On DD HMS Repulse was in dry dock in Faslaine in Scotland, unable to launch whilst not underwater it was destroyed when Faslaine was hit by a tactical nuclear missile. HMS Resolution, HMS Renown and HMS Revenge were on duty and launched their weapons before the first bombs landed in the UK, in total the UK launched 142 nuclear warheads, it is unknown how many detonated.

Despite the little time available, military personnel managed to evacuate some people before the missiles struck. Among those evacuated were Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Phillip (The Duke of Edinburgh) who were at Windsor at the time of the attack. They, along with at least twenty minor government officials, were taken in helicopters specially designed to withstand the effects of EMP burst. Prime Minster Thatcher was in Canada at the time of the attack, contact was lost immediatly and she was declared dead (even though she wasn't) on 27th September. Prince Andrew who was serving aboard a Royal Navy vessel in the North Atlantic at the time of the attack arrived on the Isle of Wight on the 22nd October 1983.

Waves of Attacks
Doomsday in the UK

There were three waves of Nuclear detonations accross the UK,


 * The first wave of tactical nuclear weapons detonated across the UK military bases between 1.52am and 1.58am. 150 kilotonnes detonations occured over Portsmouth, Southamton and Plymouth (probably due to their large military bases) as well as two one megatonne detonations over the City of London.


 * Less than 10 minutes later a second wave hit the 15 largest population centres across the UK between 2.02am and 2.11am. These were London (seven seperate blasts), Birmingham, Glasgow (missed, detonated to the west of the city over Dunbarton), Liverpool (missed, detonated over the north of the city near Aintree), Leeds, Sheffield, Edinburgh, Bristol, Manchester, Leicester, Coventry, Kingston upon Hull, Bradford, Cardiff and Belfast.


 * The third and final wave hit the remaining population centres and re-hit some of the population centres hit in the first and second waves. These hit between 2.22am and 2.36am.


 * In total betwen 65 and 70 large (100 kilotonne+) nuclear weapons fall on major UK cities and around 70 tactical nuclear weapons (10 kilotonnes) fall on military base throughout the UK on doomsday. Nuclear blast totals in the UK exceded 15 megatonnes.

Due to the time of the attack the first many people knew of the attack was a bright flash that woke them up followed by the blast wave that killed them. Of those who were awake at the time of the attack and survived to tell their stories, tell of seeing a new (or in some cases a second or third) sun in the sky followed by hurricane force winds that were burning hot.

Although details of the destruction of London are sketchy, it is believed that at least 12 nuclear detonations occured in the Greater London area, two detonation in first wave (over the City of London), seven detonations in second wave, three more in the third wave. A Celtic Alliance pilot on a reconnaissance flight over the area in 2007 described it as "craters, rubble, and glass". The Greater London area is currently off limits to all but official scientific and military personnel. A comprehensive expedition into the wasteland is scheduled for 2012.

Other major cities hit included:


 * Manchester - second wave (200 KT), re-hit with third wave (100KT)
 * Birmingham - second wave (200 KT), re-hit with third wave (100 KT)
 * Belfast - second wave (200 KT)
 * Edinburgh - second wave (200KT)
 * Leeds - second wave (200KT), re-hit with third wave (100KT)
 * Sheffield - second wave (200KT), re-hit with third wave (100KT)
 * Bradford - second wave (100KT)
 * York - third wave (100KT)
 * Kingston upon Hull - second wave (100KT)
 * Newcastle - third wave (200KT)
 * Sunderland - third wave (200KT)
 * Bristol - second wave (100KT)
 * Leicester - second wave (200KT)
 * Norwich- third wave (100KT)
 * Coventry - second wave (100KT)
 * Cardiff - second wave (200KT)
 * Stoke on Trent - third wave (100KT)
 * Wolverhamton - third wave (100KT)
 * Nottingham -third wave (200KT)
 * Plymouth - three or possibly four detonations over naval bases. - first wave (150KT), re-hit in third wave 2 or 3 (200KT)
 * Portsmouth - two or possibly three detonations over HMNB Portsmouth (HMS Nelson) area.- first wave (150KT), re-hit in third wave 2 or 3 (200KT)
 * Southampton - three detonations over port area.- first wave (150KT), re-hit in third wave (2 x 200KT). Also destroyed in the attack was RMS Queen Elizabeth 2 which was still undergoing a major refit after the Falklands war.
 * Reading - third wave (100KT)
 * Dudley - third wave (100KT)
 * Northamton - third wave (200KT)
 * Durham - third wave (100KT)
 * Luton - third wave (200KT)
 * Swansea - third wave (200KT)
 * Bournmouth - third wave (200KT)
 * Southend on Sea - third wave (100KT)
 * Swindon - third wave (100KT)
 * Huddersfield - third wave (100KT)
 * Oxford - third wave (100KT)
 * Cambridge - third wave (100KT)
 * Stockport - third wave (100KT)
 * Peterborough - third wave (100KT)
 * Slough - third wave (100KT)
 * Dover - third wave (100KT)
 * Brighton - third wave (100KT)
 * Gloucester - third wave (100KT)
 * Rotherham - third wave (100KT)
 * Newport - third wave (100KT)

Several major cities in the United Kingdom avoided complete destruction, due to malfunctioning missiles, these included.
 * Middlesbrough - one 100KT hit over the North Sea NE of Hartlepool, one 100KT over the North Yorkshire Moors, and one 100 KT bomb discovered unexploded in 2010.
 * Liverpool - (200KT) hit to the north of the city, over Aintree.
 * Glasgow - (200KT) hit to the west of the city, over Dunbarton.

Deaths in the United Kingdom on Doomsday and within 1 week of the attack were estimated from 30-48 million.

The First Few Months
About three weeks after the attack, the surviving military, Government and Monarchy evacuated to the Isle of Wight off the south coast of England. The Isle of Wight survived the attacks fairly well with only light radioactive fallout. The Isle was picked for evacuation to because it was hoped that it would act as a natural barrier to refugees who may try to storm the refuge for its supplies. Several thousand refugees tried to make there way to the Isle of Wight believing it to be a safe haven, However many died as they failed to find seaworthy boats and tried to swim. The Royal Navy assisted in carrying some refugees to the Isle and it became home to the British Provincial Administration which was based in Newport and headed by Acting Prime Minister William Whitelaw. The Isle of Wight retained some form of order in the days following Doomsday, especially after the arrival of the known surviving members of the Royal Family (Queen Elizabeth II, Prince Phillip and Prince Andrew).

Queen Elizabeth II died in early 1984 of radiation induced liver and kidney failure, King Andrew I (Andrew Albert Christian Edward Windsor) is crowned in Osbourne House on 23rd April 1984.

The only Members of Parliment known to have survived were five members of the Scottish National Party who were on the Outer and Inner Hebrides at the time of the attack. One of those was Gordon Wilson M.P., the leader of the SNP and a member of the Privy Council, which made him the de facto head of the UK government. The five MPs were rescued by Irish Republic military forces and sent to Ireland. In 1986, they would sign the official merger of the states of the United Kingdom and the Republic of Ireland, creating the Celtic Alliance.

Aftermath
Due to the education about nuclear war that the British people had been given since the 1960's most people realised that the best place to be was undercover or inside. It had been decided by government scientists that it would be best to stay undercover for a minimum of three days, five would be better. Many people survived due to this education.

Many people however had no choice but to go outside and move around the irradiated landscape, particularly in areas on the outskirts of bombed cities.

Within a week of the attack law and order had almost totally collapsed throughout the country, records of this time are scarse due to the chaos however it is known that certain areas former military units and police units became feral bandits and started attacking bands of survivors for food, water and medical supplies.

It is estimated that of the UK population of 56.3 million approximatly 20 million died within 1 hour of the attacks, mainly due to the blasts and severe burns, another 12-14 million died within two weeks from radiation poisoning and lack of clean water. Many more died during the winter due to the cold and disease that struck many evacuation camps. By September 1984 the UK population is estimated to be between 16 - 18 million people, most living in coastal Wales, Northern England and Scotland.

The population continued to decrease due to radiation related diseases, famine and other contagious diseases such as Cholera and TB: it reached its low in early 1989 at roughly 14 million.

Doomsday + 25
2008, 25 years after the doomsday nuclear war the population of the area formally known as the UK stands at roughly 20 million, mostly in the Celtic Alliance (North Scotland and islands, and Ulster).

Approximatley 1,800,000 people live in the area that used to be England, this is roughly the level that was found in the country shortly after the Norman invasion in 1066AD.

After the attacks many warlords (usually former military or police force officers) began building small personal empires based on fear and hunger, it took several years for these warlords to either be overthrown by their subjects or replaced by more democratic system of government. In a similar way to the way the English nation continued after the Black Death in the late 1340's, many small villages which had a population less than 1500 people on DD have been abandoned, with people moving onto farmland in small farming co-operatives or into larger market townships for protection and for trade.

Many of these market townships have population of less than 2500. There are few towns or cities across the former UK with more than 25,000 citizens.

Large areas of land around the nuked cities were declared quarintined zones to protect humans from the radiation, these areas have returned to the wildwood that would naturally exist in the UK. The majority of former central England has begun to return to this 'wildwood' state due to the lack of population and agriculture, it is assumed that some of the human populations in that area have reverted to a hunter/gatherer style of living, thus reducing the radiation doses they aquire by moving in and out of irradiated zones.

Many new species have started developing:
 * A wild boar type animal has appeared from domesticated pigs that escaped after DD.
 * Many larger breeds of dogs have gone feral and become a mid-sized wolf type animal.
 * Feral cows and horses have appeared in woodland and heathland particularly in Northern Britain.
 * There are even rumours of big cats in some of the more remote areas and in quaranine zones, possibly from escaped pets and zoo animals

Successor States

 * East Britain - established 1984, South Lincolnshire. Population - 240,000.
 * Duchy of Lancaster - Established 1984, former county of Lancashire. Population - 215,000.
 * Woodbridge - established 1986, Former Norfolk and Suffolk. Population - 150,000.
 * Celtic Alliance - established 1986, former Irish Republic, Ulster, Isle of Man, parts of coastal Wales, parts of coastal Cornwall and Devon, the majority of Scotland, the Channel Islands and parts of former French Brittany. Population - 5,500,000.
 * New Britain (In Africa) - established 1987, parts of former Republic of South Africa. Population - 2,500,000.
 * Matlock - established 1988, founded around town of Matlock, Derbyshire. Population - 9000.
 * Essex - established 1991, former counties of Essex, Hetfordshire and parts of outer London. Population - 786,000.
 * Federal Republic of the Isle of Wight and Sussex (Known as Southern England) established 1992, Isle of Wight, parts of mainland. Population - 189,000.
 * Kingdom of Northumbria - established 1993, Former county of Northumberland. Population - 114,000.
 * Kingdom of Cleveland - established 1995, Former counties of Cleveland, Durham, North, East, West and South Yorkshire. Population - 210,000.
 * Rheged - Small independant townships, Former county of Cumbria. Population 37,000.
 * Scottish New State - Fascist police state. Former southern Scotland. Population - 32,000.

Due to the locations of the nuclear impacts on doomsday the majority of the central UK is still uninhabitable due to radiation, as such many successor states have been set up around the coastline or in areas that were semi-rural pre-doomsday.

Evacuation Order
In early 1987 radio announcements accross all bands tell anyone who wants to be evacuated to the New Britain and can make it before December 31st 1989 are to make their way to the Isle of Wight, due to the radioactivity still in the lower atmosphere coming from London and other central English cities that had been nuked, as well as the destroyed recievers across the country the radio announcement only reaches as far north as the M4 corridor. This leads to only 17,000 people getting to the Isle of Wight by the end of 1989 and not the expected 100,000+ that the military were expecting. Due to the lack of people arriving scientists mistakingly believe that the UK has been hit much harder than they expected.

In the next three years the Isle of Wight was a base for Royal Navy ships searching for a suitable new home for the British people and when they eventually secured an area of South Africa it was the base for the evacuation of the country. The last Evacuation ship left for New Britain in mid 1992

Military
Across the UK many military bases were hit with tactical nuclear weapons (less than 10 Kiloton). They are believed to have been launched from Soviet nuclear submarines based in the North Sea and the North Atlantic Ocean.

Many of the Royal navy vessels were destroyed in attacks on Plymouth, Portsmouth and Southampton. However, many vessels out at sea survived the attack and assisted in the evacuation of the UK to the Isle of Wight and on to New Britain, where they became part of the Navy of New Britain.

The Royal Air Force (RAF) was particulary badly hit with almost every airbase hit with tactical nuclear weapons, many older planes in the sky at the time of the attack crashed due to the severe turbulance and the EMP, those which had hardened electronics discovered their air fields had been destroyed on their return to base, many flew on until they ran out of fuel and then crashed, many airmen bailed out into the irradiated countryside and died of radiation poisoning. By the 30th September 1983 95% of the RAF personnel had been killed or seroiusly injured.

The British Army was also hit badly with it's bases and even some training grounds hit, it was estimated that four-fifths of the UK based army died with 1 hour of the attacks, many survivors were on home leave and on returning to their bases found then obliterated. Of the surviving leading commanders of the army, several set up survivor states, as well as some small military dictatorships and some founded the racist True British Army.

Military Bases after DD
Many nations declared the bombed former military bases safe to enter in late 2009, as scientists have assertained that the radiation levels are now safe. However due to the time between DD and the 'all clear' the majority of any surviving military equipment had deterioatated to such a point that they are unuseable and the bases themselves are compleatly overgrown with wildwood regrowth.

Weather at time of attack
The weather conditions on DD varied depending on where in the country people were located. On DD a large low pressure area was located north of Scotland with its centre roughly between the Shetland islands and Orkney islands, with a pressure of 988 (millibar) at its centre, between Southern England and northern France was located a large high pressure system of 1003 (millibar). This configuration of pressure systems lead to northeast to easterly winds blowing across the UK.

In Scotland the winds were regestered between 30mph in Aberdeen and 20mph in Edinburgh, and across Scotland bands of heavy rain moved south west across the country. The wind strength decreased rapidly the further south in the country south from the town of Filey, East Yorkshire the wind was negligable, however the minimal amount of wind blowing off the North Sea was bringing heavy sea fog and drizzle far inland. In areas with little or no fog the air temperature had dropped to around 0 celsius.

Once south of Lincolnshire the skies were clear and due to the lack of wind the air temperature had dropped well below freezing to approximatly minius 4 celsius.

As the low cloud blew across the country it reached highlands in the east of the country and it began producing heavy rain over the highland areas of Wales, Cumbria, Devon and Cornwall.

Future Habitability of UK Cities
Scientists working for the Celtic Alliance have calculated that any UK cities hit with 100KT detonations will begin to be compleatley habitable again by roughly 2020 and cities hit by 200KT detonations will be habitable by roughly 2100.

Cities hit multiple times or with 1MT or larger total blasts will be uninhabitable indefinatley. These include Central London, Southampton, Portsmouth and Plymouth.