Protect and Survive - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

Protect and Survive was a public information series on civil defence produced by the British

United Kingdom

The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...

government during the late 1970s and early 1980s. It was intended to inform British citizens on how to protect themselves during a nuclear attack, and consisted of a mixture of pamphlets, radio broadcasts, and public information film

Public information film

Public Information Films are a series of government commissioned short films, shown during television advertising breaks in the UK. The US equivalent is the Public Service Announcement .-Subjects:...

s. The series had originally been intended for distribution only in the event of dire national emergency, but provoked such intense public interest that the pamphlets were authorised for general release.

Origins

Protect and Survive had its origins in civil defence leaflets dating back to 1938, titled The Protection of Your Home Against Air Raids. These advised the homeowner on what to do in the event of air attack. This evolved as the nature of warfare and geopolitics

Geopolitics

Geopolitics, from Greek Γη and Πολιτική in broad terms, is a theory that describes the relation between politics and territory whether on local or international scale....

changed, with the leaflets concurrently updated into "Advising the Householder on Protection against Nuclear Attack" in 1963. The leaflets were accompanied by a series of public information films produced in 1964, called Civil Defence Information Bulletin
Civil Defence Information Bulletin
Civil Defence Information Bulletin were a series of seven public information films dealing with civil defence measures individuals and families could take in the event of a nuclear attack on Great Britain. They produced for the Home Office and the Scottish Home and Health Department by RHR...

s. These films were intended to be broadcast in a state of emergency

State of emergency

A state of emergency is a governmental declaration that may suspend some normal functions of the executive, legislative and judicial powers, alert citizens to change their normal behaviours, or order government agencies to implement emergency preparedness plans. It can also be used as a rationale...

. Leaflets similar to those prepared briefly appeared in Peter Watkins

Peter Watkins

Peter Watkins is an English film and television director. He was born in Norbiton, Surrey, lived in Sweden, Canada and Lithuania for many years, and now lives in France. He is one of the pioneers of docudrama. His movies, pacifist and radical, strongly review the limit of classic documentary and...

' controversial BBC Docudrama

Docudrama

In film, television programming and staged theatre, docudrama is a documentary-style genre that features dramatized re-enactments of actual historical events. As a neologism, the term is often confused with docufiction....

The War Game
The War Game
The War Game is a 1965 television documentary-style drama depicting the effects of nuclear war on Britain. Written, directed, and produced by Peter Watkins for the BBC's The Wednesday Play anthology series, it caused dismay within the BBC and in government and was withdrawn from television...

, in a scene where they were distributed to people's homes.

Wartime Broadcasting Service

During the early 1970s, the BBC and the Home Office produced a radio script advising the public of what to do in the event of nuclear attack. This was eventually published in October 2008 on the BBC's website, with the full correspondence made available to the public via The National Archives. The script used very similar language and style to the later Protect and Survive series. In particular, it emphasised the need for citizens to remain in their homes, and not to try and evacuate elsewhere.

During the exchange of correspondence between the BBC and various government departments, several letters seem to suggest that a booklet for public consumption was already being discussed. In a letter from the Central Office of Information, dated 12 March 1974, a request for information from The Home Office about a proposed booklet read as follows:

Meanwhile I should be grateful if you could let me have a copy of your revised advice to the householder. I will assume that this will form the text of the Official Announcement and that what Probert is discussing with your Information Division is the production of a booklet on public advice."

This was replied to on the 15th March 1974 by the Home Office, clearly stating that such a booklet was being produced, and that they were also targeting the same information at television:

It seems likely a basic booklet will be produced...we expect rather more attention to be paid to the dissemination of this advice through other media, in particular television."

Publication of the pamphlet

Protect and Survive was formally published in May 1980, but had come to the public's attention before that via a series of articles in The Times

The Times

The Times is a British daily national newspaper, first published in London in 1785 under the title The Daily Universal Register . The Times and its sister paper The Sunday Times are published by Times Newspapers Limited, a subsidiary since 1981 of News International...

newspaper in January 1980. This wave of interest had been preceded by numerous letters to The Times in December 1979 questioning what Civil Defence arrangements were in place in the UK.

This was then followed by a Times leader on 19 Jan 1980 which noted that: "In Britain, a Home Office booklet "Protect and Survive" remains unavailable." Following this unexpected publicity for Protect and Survive, The Minister of State at the Home Office, Leon Brittan, told parliament that:

This was not a secret pamphlet. There was no mystery about it. It had been available to all local authorities and chief police and fire officers. It had not been published for the simple reason that it was produced for distribution during a grave international crisis when war was imminent. It was calculated that it would have the most impact then.

The Minister then went on to say the Home Office had received over 200 letters from the public on Civil Defence. It seems extremely likely that from pressure inside and outside parliament, Protect and Survive was then published by the Government in May 1980. There is little to suggest that the Government ever intended the pamphlet to be made available for general sale had it not attracted this much attention. Just over 2000 copies were printed and only a few remain.

Political reaction

Organizations such as the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament protested that the pamphlet, by popularizing the idea that a nuclear war could be survived, made such a war more likely. The protest organizations published and sold large numbers of copies of the pamphlet, considering that widespread reading of the pamphlet could only discredit the government's policy. Counter-pamphlets such as "Protest and Survive" by E P Thompson or "Civil Defence, whose Defence," by the Disarmament Information Group replied to the pamphlet's arguments.

Media

The purpose of the Protect and Survive scheme was to provide members of the British public with instructions via print and broadcast media on how to protect themselves and survive a nuclear attack. The scheme was not intended to be made public during peacetime and it was only if a nuclear attack had been deemed likely by the Government during any international crisis, that the information would have been disseminated via print and broadcast media. All these information detailed a series of steps recommended to be undertaken by civilians of the UK to improve their chances of survival had nuclear attack happened.

Print

The primary instructional booklet under the same name was prepared in 1976 and released in May 1980: during peacetime, the booklet was priced at 50 pence, but would have been widely distributed freely to all households in the United Kingdom if the risk of nuclear attack increased. This was complemented in 1981 by two booklets regarding the construction of fallout shelters: Domestic Nuclear Shelters, with techniques for building a home shelter, and Domestic Nuclear Shelters - Technical Guidance, for the design and construction of long-term and permanent shelters, some of which involved elaborate designs.

The contents of the booklets would also have been printed in national newspaper

Newspaper

A newspaper is a scheduled publication containing news of current events, informative articles, diverse features and advertising. It usually is printed on relatively inexpensive, low-grade paper such as newsprint. By 2007, there were 6580 daily newspapers in the world selling 395 million copies a...

s if the risk of nuclear attack increased.

In response to extensive criticism of Protect and Survive, Civil Defence: Why We Need It was also printed in November 1981 by the Home Office, which attempted to defend the reasons for civil defence.

Television

Protect and Survive was adapted for television as a series of twenty short Public Information Film

Public information film

Public Information Films are a series of government commissioned short films, shown during television advertising breaks in the UK. The US equivalent is the Public Service Announcement .-Subjects:...

s. These films were produced by Richard Taylor Cartoons, who also produced the Charley Says
Charley Says
Charley Says was a series of very short cut-out animated cartoon Public Information Films for children, shown in the United Kingdom in the 1970s and 1980s for London's Central Office of Information.-Overview:...

child safety films and the Crystal Tipps and Alistair

Crystal Tipps and Alistair

Crystal Tipps and Alistair was a British cartoon produced for the BBC featuring a girl and her dog as well as their friends Birdie and Butterfly....

children's cartoon series, and narrated by Patrick Allen

Patrick Allen

John Keith Patrick Allen was a British film, television and voice actor.-Life and career:Allen was born in Nyasaland , where his father was a tobacco farmer. After his parents returned to Britain, he was evacuated to Canada during World War II where he remained to finish his education at McGill...

. The films were similar in content to the booklets, detailing the same instructions using voice-over narration, sound effects, and simple animation. Each episode concluded with a disturbing yet distinctive electronic musical phrase.

The series was considered classified

Classified

Classified may refer to:*Classified information, sensitive information to which access is restricted by law or regulation to particular classes of people*Classified advertising*Classified , rapper from Halifax, Nova Scotia...

material that was intended for transmission on all television channels only if the government determined that nuclear attack was likely within 72 hours, although recordings were leaked to organisations like CND and press organisations like the BBC

BBC

The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...

, who broadcast it on Panorama

Panorama

A panorama is any wide-angle view or representation of a physical space, whether in painting, drawing, photography, film/video, or a three-dimensional model....

as a discussion of public affairs.

List of episodes

Nuclear Explosions Explained (1:35) Effects of atomic weapons
The Warnings (2:53) Attack, fall-out and all-clear warnings
What To Do When the Warnings Sound (2:28) “Immediate action” drill
Stay at Home (1:40) Techniques for sheltering in place
Choosing a Fall-Out Room (2:06) Choosing a safe room
Refuges (3:54) Building an “inner refuge”
Materials To Use For Your Fall-out Room And Refuge (1:55) Radiation shielding materials
Make Your Fall-out Room and Refuge Now (4:42) Preparing for an attack
What To Put In Your Fall-out Room (3:03) Essential supplies
Action After Warnings (4:13) Detailed “immediate action” drill
Water and Food (2:41) Provisions for 14 days
Sanitation (1:33) Makeshift toilet arrangements
Fire Precautions (2:02) Expedient firefighting techniques
The Importance Of Your Radio (1:20) Portable radio as a vital aid
Life Under Fall-Out Conditions (2:51) Survival during an attack
What To Do After An Attack (2:29) Post-attack actions
Sanitation Care (2:40) Essential hygiene
Water Consumption (1:28) Safeguarding and rationing water
Food Consumption (1:40) Rationing food
Casualties (1:27) Expedient casualty care and mortuary actions

Radio

A collection of recordings for radio transmission were produced as part of the programme. These differed slightly from the films in that the voice was provided not by Patrick Allen but by both male and female voices. In addition, certain portions of the instructional copy were changed slightly. A small portion of these recordings is heard in Threads
Threads
Threads is a British television drama produced by the BBC in 1984. Written by Barry Hines and directed by Mick Jackson, it is a documentary-style account of a nuclear war and its effects on the city of Sheffield in northern England....

during the scene where the character of Bill Kemp is discussing removing internal doors to use for their shelter.

Cultural impact

The programme created a substantial impact upon the popular culture of the UK of the early 1980s, most notably in music. Film series narrator Patrick Allen

Patrick Allen

was featured in certain early remixes of the song "Two Tribes

Two Tribes

"Two Tribes" is the second single by Frankie Goes to Hollywood, released in the UK by ZTT Records in May 1984 . The song was later included on the album Welcome to the Pleasuredome....

" by the UK pop

Pop music

Pop music is usually understood to be commercially recorded music, often oriented toward a youth market, usually consisting of relatively short, simple songs utilizing technological innovations to produce new variations on existing themes.- Definitions :David Hatch and Stephen Millward define pop...

band Frankie Goes to Hollywood

Frankie Goes to Hollywood

Frankie Goes to Hollywood were a British dance-pop band popular in the mid-1980s. The group was fronted by Holly Johnson , with Paul Rutherford , Peter Gill , Mark O'Toole , and Brian Nash .The group's debut single "Relax" was banned by the BBC in 1984 while at number six in the charts and...

, saying "Mine is the last voice you will ever hear. Do not be alarmed." in a tone similar to that used by him in the PIFs.

A promotional tape produced for an early BBC digital radio service, Five Live Sports Plus, used Two Tribes as backing music with Patrick Allen (or a sound-alike, presumably Peter Dickson) explaining the new service using sport as conflict metaphor - in a parody of the parody, the tape ended with the phrase "Mine is the last analogue voice you will ever hear. Don't be alarmed." in a tone similar to that used in Two Tribes and the PIFs.

Rock band Jethro Tull

Jethro Tull (band)

Jethro Tull are a British rock group formed in 1967. Their music is characterised by the vocals, acoustic guitar, and flute playing of Ian Anderson, who has led the band since its founding, and the guitar work of Martin Barre, who has been with the band since 1969.Initially playing blues rock with...

recorded a song called "Protect and Survive" on the 1980 album A, also criticising the initiative. The title of a song by the hardcore punk

Hardcore punk

Hardcore punk is an underground music genre that originated in the late 1970s, following the mainstream success of punk rock. Hardcore is generally faster, thicker, and heavier than earlier punk rock. The origin of the term "hardcore punk" is uncertain. The Vancouver-based band D.O.A...

/D-beat

D-beat

D-beat is a style of hardcore punk developed in the early 1980s by imitators of Discharge, for whom the genre is named. Discharge may have themselves inherited the beat from Motörhead. The first such group was The Varukers.The vocal content of D-beat tends towards shouted slogans...

band Discharge

Discharge (band)

Discharge is a British hardcore punk band formed in 1977 by Terry "Tezz" Roberts and Roy "Rainy" Wainwright. They are often considered among one of the very first bands to play hardcore punk, and to mix punk with metal...

featured a play on words ('"Protest And Survive"), a reference to E. P. Thompson

E. P. Thompson

Edward Palmer Thompson was a British historian, writer, socialist and peace campaigner. He is probably best known today for his historical work on the British radical movements in the late 18th and early 19th centuries, in particular The Making of the English Working Class...

's anti-nuclear manifesto (see below). Heavy metal band Wolfsbane

Wolfsbane (band)

Wolfsbane are an English heavy metal band. Formed in 1984, the band remained active until lead singer Blaze Bayley went on to join Iron Maiden in 1994. After a couple of reunion shows in 2007 and 2009, Wolfsbane officially reunited in June 2010...

's self-titled album contains a song called "Protect And Survive".

The rock band Alien Stash Tin featured a song entitled Paint Your Windows White on their 2011 album On A Pinstripe Planet which features aspects of advice given in the protect and Survive booklet.

The Scottish rock band Runrig

Runrig

Runrig are a Scottish Celtic rock group formed in Skye, in 1973 under the name 'The Run Rig Dance Band'. Since its inception, the band's line-up has included songwriters Rory Macdonald and Calum Macdonald. The current line-up also includes longtime members Malcolm Jones, Iain Bayne, and more...

released a song entitled "Protect and Survive", which has an apocalyptic theme, on their 1987 album, The Cutter and The Clan

The Cutter and the Clan

The Cutter and the Clan is the fifth album by Scottish Celtic rock band Runrig. It was the band's breakthrough album, taking them from cottage industry to the international stage. Originally recorded on the band’s own Ridge label, it was taken on board by Chrysalis Records as part of a 1987 major...

. The same year, Irish folk group The Dubliners

The Dubliners

The Dubliners are an Irish folk band founded in 1962.-Formation and history:The Dubliners, initially known as "The Ronnie Drew Ballad Group", formed in 1962 and made a name for themselves playing regularly in O'Donoghue's Pub in Dublin...

also released a song entitled "Protect And Survive" on their album 25 Years Celebration
25 Years Celebration
25 Years Celebration is a double album by The Dubliners. Recorded in 1987 and released following a special Late Late Show appearance by the group, 25 Years Celebration featured a number of special guests and featured "The Irish Rover", a collaboration with The Pogues, which returned The Dubliners...

. The song is a witty comment on Protect And Survive from an Irish perspective.

In print, Raymond Briggs

Raymond Briggs

Raymond Redvers Briggs is an English illustrator, cartoonist, graphic novelist, and author who has achieved critical and popular success among adults and children...

' graphic novel

Graphic novel

A graphic novel is a narrative work in which the story is conveyed to the reader using sequential art in either an experimental design or in a traditional comics format...

When the Wind Blows (later adapted as an animated film, radio and stage play) obliquely mentions various aspects of the Protect And Survive programme, and the BBC

BBC

play Threads
Threads
Threads is a British television drama produced by the BBC in 1984. Written by Barry Hines and directed by Mick Jackson, it is a documentary-style account of a nuclear war and its effects on the city of Sheffield in northern England....

featured three of the series' films: Stay at Home, Action After Warnings and Casualties. The leaflet series became the subject of detailed and scholarly criticism from anti-nuclear authors (such as E. P. Thompson

E. P. Thompson

), who produced a counterargument entitled Protest And Survive. The children's novel Children of The Dust refers to one of the inner refuge designs mentioned in the leaflets, public information films and radio tapes.

On television, Protect And Survive was thoroughly lampooned in the television series "The Young Ones

The Young Ones (TV series)

The Young Ones is a British sitcom, first broadcast in 1982, which ran for two series on BBC2. Its anarchic, offbeat humour helped bring alternative comedy to television in the 1980s and made household names of its writers and performers...

" episode "Bomb

Bomb (Young Ones episode)

"Bomb" was the fourth episode of British sitcom The Young Ones. It was written by Ben Elton, Rik Mayall and Lise Mayer, and directed by Paul Jackson...

". The Protect And Survive booklet appears on-screen during the episode. Also, in the Spooks
Spooks
Spooks is a British television drama series that originally aired on BBC One from 13 May 2002 – 23 October 2011, consisting of 10 series. The title is a popular colloquialism for spies, as the series follows the work of a group of MI5 officers based at the service's Thames House headquarters, in a...

episode Nuclear Strike
Nuclear Strike (Spooks)
"Nuclear Strike" is the series seven finale and 64th episode of the British espionage television series Spooks. It was originally broadcast on BBC One on 8 December 2008. The episode was written by Neil Cross, and directed by Sam Miller. In the episode, Tiresias, the Russian equivalent of...

the character Malcolm

Malcolm Wynn-Jones

Malcolm Wynn-Jones was the fictional MI5 analyst, featured in the British television series Spooks, also known as MI5 in the United States. Malcolm was played by Hugh Simon from the start of Spooks in 2002 until the character was retired at the start of Series 8 in 2009...

is seen viewing one of the information videos.

In the video game Fallout 2

Fallout 2

Fallout 2 is a computer role-playing game developed by Black Isle Studios and published by Interplay in 1998. The game's story takes place in 2241, 80 years after the events of Fallout...

intro, there was a parody of Protect And Survive information on what to do when leaving the shelters. The manual for Introversion Software

Introversion Software

-History:The company was founded in 2001 by three friends, Chris Delay; Mark Morris; and Thomas Arundel, who met when they were undergraduates at Imperial College London...

's video game Defcon
Defcon (computer game)
DEFCON is a real-time strategy game created by independent British game developer Introversion Software, developers of Darwinia, Multiwinia, and Uplink. The gameplay is reminiscent of the "big boards" that visually represented thermonuclear war in films such as Dr...

parodies Protect And Survive.

In a Channel 4

Channel 4

Channel 4 is a British public-service television broadcaster which began working on 2 November 1982. Although largely commercially self-funded, it is ultimately publicly owned; originally a subsidiary of the Independent Broadcasting Authority , the station is now owned and operated by the Channel...

poll of the 100 scariest moments, Protect and Survive came 89th, just above Tod Browning

Tod Browning

Tod Browning was an American motion picture actor, director and screenwriter.Browning's career spanned the silent and talkie eras...

's 1931 Dracula
Dracula (1931 film)
Dracula is a 1931 vampire-horror film directed by Tod Browning and starring Bela Lugosi as the title character. The film was produced by Universal and is based on the stage play of the same name by Hamilton Deane and John L...

. The explanation for this, as explained by some celebrities on the show, was because of the films' grim instructions, unsettling music and the fact that 'a nuclear war was one of the most disastrous things that could happen'.

An italian play called Protect and Survive. Vivere e amare sotto la minaccia nucleare (Live and love under the fallout menace) written and performed by Melania Fiore and Aldo E. Castellani, was based on the infamous Protect and Survive films. The play went on stage on November 2011 in Rome.

The full version is shown on a loop underground at the Kelvedon Hatch Secret Nuclear Bunker

Kelvedon Hatch Secret Nuclear Bunker

The Secret Nuclear Bunker at Kelvedon Hatch, in the Borough of Brentwood in the English county of Essex, is a large underground bunker maintained during the cold war as a potential regional government headquarters...

in Essex, UK, and also at the Hack Green Secret Nuclear Bunker

Hack Green Secret Nuclear Bunker

The Hack Green Secret Nuclear Bunker is a former government-owned nuclear bunker located at Hack Green, Cheshire, England.- History :The first military use of the area was in World War II, when a Starfish site was established at Hack Green...

in Cheshire. Other copies are shown on loops at the Imperial War Museum

Imperial War Museum

Imperial War Museum is a British national museum organisation with branches at five locations in England, three of which are in London. The museum was founded during the First World War in 1917 and intended as a record of the war effort and sacrifice of Britain and her Empire...

s in London and Manchester

Imperial War Museum North

Imperial War Museum North is a museum in the Metropolitan Borough of Trafford in Greater Manchester, England. One of the five branches of the Imperial War Museum, the museum explores the impact of modern conflicts on people and society. It is the first branch of the Imperial War Museum to be...

External links

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