I thought this might be of a bit of interest to people here who have never really been involved with this type scenario either ex military or civilian…
It concerns the "Special Ammunition Storage sites (nuclear) in BAOR and one in the UK. None of this is official or restricted and can be easily researched or dug into if you’re bothered.
It’s about what I experienced and the routines we had while doing this task 30+ years ago. Altogether I did 4 site guards while in BAOR.
The 2 sites I guarded (my Squadron) were the Sennelager and Hemer sites in BAOR…
These were in the British zone so things and procedures may have been different in the US zone, however, nuclear ammunition remained under direct control and management of US forces and overall SACEUR.
In the UK zone sites, we would control the outer and inner zones with armed guards, a separate QRF and the Americans would have overall control from a central tower overlooking the inner bunkers. They (U.S) were not allowed to arm guard these sites. ( May have been different in the US zone)
The on site guard would consist of tower guards (3 to 5) externally in a fenced area.
Inside the control building you’d have an immediate response team of GPMG gunner, loader and JNCO in charge ( these were sat 3 feet from the inner compound door, fully ready wearing webbing and weapons held and able to deploy in under 30 seconds. Sat in front of these 3 would be a main team of between 6 to 8, webbing off and weapons at hand ready to deploy in 2 minutes max.
Inside the actual inner bunker fence was an actual kill zone for want of a better description… Once deployed, no warnings were required and any intruder faced lethal force immediately.
The site consisted of an outer security fence with high power spot lights facing outwards inside of this a 20 to 30m clear area and then there was the outer bunker fence. Inside this area you’d have your sentry towers with one of the armed sentry inside. Inside the outer bunker fence was a 5 to 10m clear area and then you’d have the inner compound fence… In between the inner and outer compound fence was an immediate lethal force area with no challenges required, as was the compound itself.
Also on site were an equal sized team on rest, so you’d have roughly 16 or so armed ready to go and 16 or so on rest and we’d do 12 hours on, 12 off and we would do that for 3 or 4 days then swap over with the off site Back up Force, (which was the rest of the bumped up Squadron) who acted as a 30 min QRF who were a 20 min drive away (max).
We would be test crashed out anytime the American command team in the tower wanted to and this could happen 2 or 3 times over a day/night shift.
The actual site guards lasted for a 2 week period for each unit and this was an ongoing task which all major UK (tank & infantry) units were rotated through. Ammo stored here was for battlefield tactical missile warheads and artillery shells.
To hopefully explain things a bit better, I will use some images of the old disused Special Ammunition Compound at RAF St Mawgan with explanations…
Only main difference here was the actual guarding here was done by a US Marine detachment and the ammo consisted of nuclear depth charges (possibly undisclosed torpedoes) and small yield bombs. Predominantly to be used by UK and US naval air assets in the event of war.
This is an overview of the site, the red line shows the outer security fence. Bear in mind, this site is already situated in a highly guarded Military RAF station (Nimrods) . Also worth noting, this is an up-to-date image with lots of small trees, bushes and undergrowth visible… In the day, none of this would have been there, these areas were kept totally cut back and it would of been low cut grass only, no vegetation at all.
Next one is same view, but with areas marked which I will explain to give a better idea…
The fence line zones.
Yellow broke lines… This is the area between the outer security fence and the outer compound fence. About 20m in width and cut grass, with high power lights facing outwards. An area where intruders would be challenged.
Blue broken line. Clear area between outer and inner compound fence. This is an area where lethal force is authorised without challenges needed.
Green broken line - this is the inner compound fence line and inside of here is a use of immediate lethal force area, no challenge required.
The blue are armed sentry positions in small bunkers.
I will also add images I took recently so you can see it better for size and scale and as above, these are now all overgrown…back then, all ground work would of been well kept and just cut grassed areas for maximum observation.
Blue ringed area is the main gate which was in the outer security fence, and was 14ft tall with triple row razor wire on top and the fence also had tamper/movement alarms running through it
Just inside the gate was the first visitor entry point for all ID checks to be carried out
and a sterile area ( green circle) to park a vehicle before the next larger security gate .
Next is the red circle, this is the first of 2 remote operated electric gates , which formed another sterile parking area, the main QRF duty guardroom and another secure visitor ID check area.
This also had an armed sentry tower on top of it.
Once through these 2 gates, you were then into the actual ammo bunker area and weapon prep area ( under armed guard at all times)
The building here (white circle) is the Ammo ready to use prep building and looking further into the bunker areas.
More ammo prep building
And views along the bunker access roads shown by the red dots.
The pink circle is the outer security sentry tower which looks down into a valley as well as the site itself along the northern side.
Happy to try and answer further questions if there are any and great if anyone can add further images of old disused Special sites.
Forgot to add some images of the RAF Hardened Aircraft Shelters (HAS) … There were 9 in total, only 2 are now left on the RAF real estate.
These were only used for war deployment or temporary exercise … Aircraft would of been Navy Phantoms or Buccaneers or US aircraft if needed during the time.