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Posted: 2/5/2006 3:23:01 PM EDT
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/3588465.stm


Cold war bomb warmed by chickens
Plans to fill a nuclear landmine with chickens to regulate its temperature were seriously considered during the Cold War.

Civil servants at the National Archives say it is a coincidence the secret plan is being revealed on 1 April.

The Army planned to detonate the seven-tonne device on the German plains in the event of having to retreat.

Operation Blue Peacock forms part of an exhibition for the National Archives, in Kew, London, on Friday.

Professor Peter Hennessy, curator of the Secret State exhibition, told the Times: "It is not an April Fool. These documents come straight from the archives at Aldermaston. Why and how would we forge them?"

The bomb was designed to stop the Red Army advancing across West Germany during the height of the Cold War.

But nuclear physicists at the Aldermaston nuclear research station in Berkshire were worried about how to keep the landmine at the correct temperature when buried underground.

In a 1957 document they proposed live chickens would generate enough heat to ensure the bomb worked when buried for a week.

The birds would be put inside the casing of the bomb, given seed to keep them alive and stopped from pecking at the wiring.

The landmine would be remotely detonated.

Tom O'Leary, head of education and interpretation at the National Archives, told the paper: "It does seem like an April Fool but it most certainly is not. The Civil Service does not do jokes."

Link Posted: 2/5/2006 3:25:40 PM EDT
[#1]
Man, talk about hot wings!
Link Posted: 2/5/2006 3:25:41 PM EDT
[#2]
poor chickens
Link Posted: 2/5/2006 3:29:29 PM EDT
[#3]
I like baked chicken like everyone else, but this is ridiculous!
Link Posted: 2/5/2006 3:30:13 PM EDT
[#4]

Quoted:
I like baked chicken like everyone else, but this is ridiculous!



Not really.

I, for one, like my baked chicken to also glow in the dark.
Link Posted: 2/5/2006 3:30:15 PM EDT
[#5]
maybe i can retroactively sue the .gov for $25 million so i dont have to go to medical school.
Link Posted: 2/5/2006 6:47:39 PM EDT
[#6]
They had "Nuclear" hot wings at the restauraunt I went to tonight!


-K
Link Posted: 2/5/2006 6:49:17 PM EDT
[#7]
Those wacky Brits
Link Posted: 2/5/2006 6:49:18 PM EDT
[#8]


What would be the point?  


A nuke would destroy all the chickens.  Nothing left.
Link Posted: 2/5/2006 6:50:49 PM EDT
[#9]

Quoted:
poor chickens



Nah, they'd never feel a thing.  It's all over in three shakes!
Link Posted: 2/5/2006 6:51:48 PM EDT
[#10]
Hell of a rotisserie!
Link Posted: 2/5/2006 6:53:49 PM EDT
[#11]
Link Posted: 2/5/2006 6:54:45 PM EDT
[#12]
kept warm ???????


I too say
Link Posted: 2/5/2006 6:55:26 PM EDT
[#13]
Who the fuck builds a Nuclear landmine?
Link Posted: 2/5/2006 6:58:18 PM EDT
[#14]

Quoted: Who the fuck builds a Nuclear landmine?
The UK Ministry of Defense
Link Posted: 2/5/2006 6:59:53 PM EDT
[#15]
Not even close to being true.  Nuke security is so tight that I can't believe that a nuclear device that would be left in place un guarded would even be fathomed.  I worked security for SWFPAC for two years, so I know a thing or two.
Link Posted: 2/5/2006 7:00:27 PM EDT
[#16]

Quoted:
Who the fuck builds a Nuclear landmine?



The same people that build nuclear hand grenades.
Link Posted: 2/5/2006 7:05:29 PM EDT
[#17]
Already been done in Chernoble, chicken Kiev.
Link Posted: 2/5/2006 10:51:31 PM EDT
[#18]

Quoted:
Who the fuck builds a Nuclear landmine?



The UK
www.brook.edu/FP/projects/nucwcost/madm.htm

the Israelis at least thought about it,
www.brook.edu/FP/projects/nucwcost/madm.htm

Some book I read years ago by a Soviet officer who defected said that the USSR changed some of their invasion plans because aerial or sattelite images showed that the US seemed to have buried nuclear landmines alond the border.
Link Posted: 2/6/2006 12:29:55 AM EDT
[#19]
Weren't there once plans for a guided missile that used homing pigeons to steer it?
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