Product Description

In the early 1950s, the historian Professor William Hoskins, in his pioneering work The making of the English Landscape, lamented what he saw as the devastation of the countryside by scientists, the military and politicians. He saw his world as dominated by 'the obscene shape of the atom-bomber, laying a trail like a filthy slug upon Constable's and Gainsborough's sky. England of the Nissen hut, the 'pre-fab', and the 'electric fence, of the high barbed wire around some unmentionable devilment'. A generation later, this book reveals what lay behind the fence and how these sites are now, in dereliction, a new aspect of the complex landscape history of Britain.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #821310 in Books
• Published on: 2003-07-04
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 288 pages

Customer Reviews

Definitive and Amazing
What an amazing book! This book was worth every single penny, not something that can be said of a lot of books on the market today. Absolutely ram-packed with fascinating declassified detail, some of it quite technical for those specifically interested, but all of it nonetheless well laid-out in attractive, presentable and most importantly, very readable format. Packed with lots of photographs, top notch archaeological drawings of bunkers, radar posts etc and ephemera, this book is the definitive study of Britain's Cold War. Well done to the team behind this book, putting into concrete form a period that is now - thankfully - history (Strewth, that makes me feel old!). Go buy today and see for yourself how close we all came to oblivion - and how pointless - and how much money - was spent on one of the more embarrassing and depressing points of human history. I cannot recommend this book enough - it will become a sought after collector's book. You will not be disappointed!

A must for anybody interested in the Cold War.
Firstly I have to get the one reservation I have about this book off my chest.
Possibly because it was produced by English Herritage the coverage of Cold War structures outside England is rather patchy.
For example the book does not acknowledge the existance of the late '80s era bunker built at Cultybraggan near Stirling, while it does include the very similar one at Chilmark in England.

That said, this book is worth every one of the 5 stars I've given it (it was worth getting just to see the Blue Streak silo drawing!).
Much of the information in it is new, or at least not all that well known. Moreover, if the stuctures shown in the book continue to be lost it may be one of the few records of their existance.

Perhaps a book that highlights the archictecture of this very important part of our recent history will help towards preserving as much of it as possible.

Highly recommended.

The Best
This is by far the best book covering the cold war I have seen. The photographs and illustrations are excellant and many of them are previously unpublished. The book covers the origins of the cold war, Briains development and early deployment of the nuclear deterrent, US bases including a fantastic detailed artist cutaway of a Greenham Common cruise missile quick reaction alert bunker, radar development, air defence, civilian government bunkers, UKWMO and ROC bunkers and cold war research stations. Well worth it.