Queen Elizabeth's speech in the event of WWIII

[james_davis_nicoll]

The Queen was expected to urge Britons to pray and remain united and resolute in the event of the "madness" of nuclear war, papers from 1983 show.

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[james-nicoll.livejournal.com]

Via the Daily Mail (http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2382211/Queens-World-War-3-speech-Found-archives-dress-rehearsal-disaster.html)

Text of the 1983 message to the nation written for Her Majesty the Queen... but never delivered

When I spoke to you less than three months ago we were all enjoying the warmth and fellowship of a family Christmas. Our thoughts were concentrated on the strong links that bind each generation to the ones that came before and those that will follow. The horrors of war could not have seemed more remote as my family and I shared our Christmas joy with the growing family of the Commonwealth.

Now this madness of war is once more spreading through the world and our brave country must again prepare itself to survive against great odds.

I have never forgotten the sorrow and pride I felt as my sister and I huddled around the nursery wireless set listening to my father’s inspiring words on that fateful day in 1939. Not for a single moment did I imagine that this solemn and awful duty would one day fall to me.

We all know that the dangers facing us today are greater by far than at any time in our long history. The enemy is not the soldier with his rifle nor even the airman prowling the skies above our cities and towns but the deadly power of abused technology.

But whatever terrors lie in wait for us all the qualities that have helped to keep our freedom intact twice already during this sad century will once more be our strength.

My husband and I share with families up and down the land the fear we feel for sons and daughters, husbands and brothers who have left our side to serve their country. My beloved son Andrew is at this moment in action with his unit and we pray continually for his safety and for the safety of all servicemen and women at home and overseas.

It is this close bond of family life that must be our greatest defence against the unknown. If families remain united and resolute, giving shelter to those living alone and unprotected, our country’s will to survive cannot be broken.

My message to you therefore is simple. Help those who cannot help themselves, give comfort to the lonely and the homeless and let your family become the focus of hope and life to those who need it.

As we strive together to fight off the new evil let us pray for our country and men of goodwill wherever they may be.

God bless you all.

[kla10.livejournal.com]

>When I spoke to you less than three months ago...

They were specifically expecting WWIII to happen in Feb-Mar 1983?

Oh. It was written by one of her speechwriters for an exercise. Possibly, she never even saw it?

[Edited for "oops, wrong world war".]

[timgueguen.livejournal.com]

Ironically 1983 was probably the year we came closest to a NATO-Warsaw Pact nuclear war since the Cuban Missile Crisis. Fortunately a quickly assembled Soviet intelligence operation, Operation RYAN, was enough to convince the fogies in the Kremlin a nuclear attack by NATO wasn't imminent. It was also the year the nuclear war disaster movie The Day After aired on North American TV.

[anton-p-nym.livejournal.com]

Possible context: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Able_Archer_83

-- Steve remembers a lot of east-west tension in the early '80s.

[zibblsnrt.livejournal.com]

If it was going to break out anytime after the Cuban Missile Crisis, 1983 would be the most likely time for it to happen.

A BBC article I stumbled over this morning did say she wouldn't have seen it.

[brett-dunbar.livejournal.com]

It was part of an exercise. According to this story at the BBC website the scenario was this:

In the war-gaming exercise, Orange bloc forces - representing the Soviet Union and its Warsaw Pact allies - launch a chemical weapon attack on the UK. Blue forces - representing Nato - retaliate with a "limited-yield" nuclear strike, forcing Orange to initiate a peace process.

The speech was written as if given at midday on Friday 4 March 1983.

[agent-mimi.livejournal.com]

Probably not that ironic. Surely those developing these exercises did so knowing they may have had practical use in the very near future.

[yorksranter.wordpress.com (from livejournal.com)]

The UK did an annual transition-to-war exercise for the top level of government during the cold war, as a paper simulation. This is one of them.

Having read bits of some of them as they've been declassified, there seems to have been a tradition of incorporating a bit of black humour, and I suspect the rather camp skit on the monarch's public style (our growing family in the Commonwealth? rly?) is just that.

[pauldormer.livejournal.com]

I am reminded of the sixties film The Bed-Sitting Room, set after a nuclear war. As Mrs Ethel Shroake was the queen's charlady, they make her the queen and the film ends with the singing of God Save Mrs Ethel Shroake. (At that time, cinemas used to play the national anthem at the end of the evening.)

[thebluerose.livejournal.com]

We were played this at highschool, I was 13 or 14 and it still haunts me to this day 30 years later because it was so bloody REAL, and having lived thru a smaller scale disaster I now know how really real it was.

Everyone should be shown this at a similar age and should be reminded every decade or so.