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158-543: The Hawker Siddeley Nimrod is a retired maritime patrol aircraft developed and operated by the United Kingdom. It was an extensive modification of the de Havilland Comet , the world's first operational jet airliner . It was originally designed by de Havilland 's successor firm, Hawker Siddeley ; further development and maintenance work was undertaken by Hawker Siddeley's own successor companies, British Aerospace and, later, BAE Systems . Designed in response to

316-804: A German rebuilding effort set forth by western European countries in 1948, the US, Britain and France spearheaded the establishment of the Federal Republic of Germany from the three Western zones of occupation in April 1949. The Soviet Union proclaimed its zone of occupation in Germany the German Democratic Republic that October. Media in the Eastern Bloc was an organ of the state , completely reliant on and subservient to

474-652: A MPA variant of the Dassault Falcon 900 corporate jet instead. Japan has developed multiple purpose-designed MPAs during this period. The Shin Meiwa PS-1 flying boat was designed to meet a Japanese requirement for a new ASW platform. A modernised derivative of the PS-1, the ShinMaywa US-2 amphibian, was introduced during the early twenty-first century to succeed the PS-1. The land-based Kawasaki P-1

632-577: A Norwegian semi-submersible drilling rig, capsized whilst working in the Ekofisk oil field killing 123 people; six different Nimrods searched for survivors and took turns to provide rescue co-ordination, involving the control of 80 surface ships and 20 British and Norwegian helicopters. In an example of its search capabilities, in September 1977 when an attempted crossing of the North Atlantic in

790-455: A Zodiac inflatable dinghy went wrong, a Nimrod found the collapsed dinghy and directed a ship to it. The Nimrods were often used to enforce Operation Tapestry . Tapestry is a codeword for the activities by ships and aircraft that protect the United Kingdom's Sovereign Sea Areas, including the protection of fishing rights and oil and gas extraction. Following the establishment of a 200 nautical miles (370 km) Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) at

948-533: A central tactical compartment housed in the forward cabin. Various functions such as weapons control and information from sensors such as the large forward doppler radar were displayed and controlled at the tactical station. The flight systems and autopilot could be directly controlled by navigator's stations in the tactical compartment, giving the navigator nearly complete aircraft control. The navigational systems comprised digital , analogue , and electro-mechanical elements. The computers were integrated with most of

1106-563: A flight endurance of ten hours without aerial refuelling. The MR2s were later fitted to receive mid-air refuelling in response to demands of the Falklands War. At the start of a patrol mission all four engines would normally be running; as the aircraft's weight was reduced by fuel consumption, up to two engines could be shut down, allowing the remaining engines to be operated more efficiently. Instead of relying on ram air to restart an inactive engine, compressor air could be crossfed from

1264-646: A general term, in his essay "You and the Atomic Bomb", published 19 October 1945 in the British newspaper Tribune . Contemplating a world living in the shadow of the threat of nuclear warfare , Orwell looked at James Burnham 's predictions of a polarized world, writing: Looking at the world as a whole, the drift for many decades has been not towards anarchy but towards the reimposition of slavery... James Burnham's theory has been much discussed, but few people have yet considered its ideological implications—that is,

1422-425: A large-scale submarine attack is a remote one, and many of the air forces and navies have been downsizing their fleets of patrol planes. Those still in service are still used for search-and-rescue, counter-smuggling, anti piracy , antipoaching of marine life, the enforcement of the exclusive economic zones , and enforcement of the laws of the seas . The earliest patrol aircraft carried bombs and machine guns. Between

1580-637: A live engine to a starter turbine. The crossfeed duct was later discovered to be a potential fire hazard. Similarly, the two hydraulic systems on board were designed to be powered by the two inner engines that would always be running. Electrical generation was designed to far exceed the consumption of existing equipment to accommodate additional systems installed over the Nimrod's service life. The standard Nimrod fleet carried out three basic operational roles during their RAF service: Anti-Submarine Warfare duties typically involved surveillance over an allocated area of

1738-522: A major propaganda effort began in 1949 was Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty , dedicated to bringing about the peaceful demise of the communist system in the Eastern Bloc. Radio Free Europe attempted to achieve these goals by serving as a surrogate home radio station, an alternative to the controlled and party-dominated domestic press in the Soviet Bloc. Radio Free Europe was a product of some of

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1896-484: A mine as a security measure. It sank 37 Axis submarines during the war. The Cold War era saw the introduction of the nuclear depth bomb , a depth charge with a nuclear warhead that raised the probability of a kill against a submarine to a near-certainty as long as detonation occurred. While anti-submarine warfare is the main role of patrol aircraft, their large payload capability has seen them fitted for various weaponry outside their nominal role. The Lockheed P-3 Orion

2054-499: A mission, gathered information could be extracted for review purposes and for further analysis. The Nimrod featured a sizeable bomb bay in which, in addition to armaments such as torpedoes and missiles , could be housed a wide variety of specialist equipment for many purposes, such as up to 150 sonobuoys for ASW purposes or multiple air-deployed dinghies and droppable survival packs such as Lindholme Gear for SAR missions; additional fuel tanks and cargo could also be carried in

2212-642: A neutral Germany to prevent West Germany's incorporation into NATO, but his attempts were cut short after he was executed several months later during a Soviet power struggle. The events led to the establishment of the Bundeswehr , the West German military, in 1955. In 1949, CCP Chairman Mao Zedong 's People's Liberation Army defeated Chiang Kai-shek 's United States-backed Kuomintang (KMT) Nationalist Government in China. The KMT-controlled territory

2370-597: A new larger wing, and fully refurbished fuselage. The project was subject to delays, cost over-runs, and contract re-negotiations. The type had been originally intended to enter service in 2003 but was cancelled in 2010 as a result of the Strategic Defence and Security Review , at which point it was £789 million over-budget; the development airframes were also scrapped. Some functions were allocated to other assets, with Hercules transport aircraft and E-3 Sentry Airborne Early Warning aircraft given some tasks, but

2528-687: A new tail with electronic warfare (ESM) sensors mounted in a bulky fairing, and a MAD ( magnetic anomaly detector ) boom. After the first flight in May 1967, the RAF ordered 46 Nimrod MR1s. The first example ( XV230 ) entered service in October 1969. A total of five squadrons using the type were established; four were permanently based in the UK and a fifth was initially based in Malta . Three Nimrod aircraft were adapted for

2686-675: A new war". On 6 September 1946, James F. Byrnes delivered a speech in Germany repudiating the Morgenthau Plan (a proposal to partition and de-industrialize post-war Germany) and warning the Soviets that the US intended to maintain a military presence in Europe indefinitely. As Byrnes stated a month later, "The nub of our program was to win the German people ... it was a battle between us and Russia over minds ..." In December,

2844-710: A plan envisioning an economically self-sufficient Germany, including a detailed accounting of the industrial plants, goods and infrastructure already taken by the Soviets. In June 1947, in accordance with the Truman Doctrine , the United States enacted the Marshall Plan , a pledge of economic assistance for all European countries willing to participate, including the Soviet Union. Under the plan, which President Harry S. Truman signed on 3 April 1948,

3002-632: A requirement issued by the Royal Air Force (RAF) to replace its fleet of ageing Avro Shackletons , the Nimrod MR1 / MR2 s were primarily fixed-wing aerial platforms for anti-submarine warfare (ASW) operations; secondary roles included maritime surveillance and anti-surface warfare . It served from the early 1970s until March 2010. The intended replacement was to be extensively rebuilt Nimrod MR2s, designated Nimrod MRA4 . Due to considerable delays, repeated cost overruns, and financial cutbacks,

3160-629: A secret 1950 document, the National Security Council proposed reinforcing pro-Western alliance systems and quadrupling spending on defense. Truman, under the influence of advisor Paul Nitze , saw containment as implying complete rollback of Soviet influence in all its forms. United States officials moved to expand this version of containment into Asia , Africa , and Latin America , in order to counter revolutionary nationalist movements, often led by communist parties financed by

3318-480: A source of intelligence. During the late 1970s and 1980s, the KGB perfected its use of espionage to sway and distort diplomacy. Active measures were "clandestine operations designed to further Soviet foreign policy goals," consisting of disinformation, forgeries, leaks to foreign media, and the channeling of aid to militant groups. Retired KGB Major General Oleg Kalugin , former head of Foreign Counter Intelligence for

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3476-511: A submarine, Nimrod aircrews would inform Royal Navy frigates and other NATO-aligned vessels to pursuit in an effort to continuously monitor Soviet submarines. The safeguarding of the Royal Navy's Resolution -class ballistic missile submarines , which were the launch platform for Britain's nuclear deterrent , was viewed as being of the utmost priority. Nimrods were first deployed to Wideawake airfield on Ascension Island on 5 April 1982,

3634-555: A time. In 1979, the toppling of pro-US governments in Iran and Nicaragua and a Soviet invasion of Afghanistan again raised fears of war. In the 1980s, the US provided support for anti-communist forces in Africa, Asia, and Latin America, and the leadership of the USSR changed with the rise of Mikhail Gorbachev , who expanded political freedoms in his country and the Eastern Bloc. This led to

3792-542: A unified and neutral Germany was undesirable, with Walter Bedell Smith telling General Eisenhower "in spite of our announced position, we really do not want nor intend to accept German unification on any terms that the Russians might agree to, even though they seem to meet most of our requirements." Shortly thereafter, Stalin instituted the Berlin Blockade (June 1948 – May 1949), one of the first major crises of

3950-513: The Baltic to Trieste in the Adriatic ". A week later, on 13 March, Stalin responded vigorously to the speech, saying Churchill could be compared to Adolf Hitler insofar as he advocated the racial superiority of English-speaking nations so that they could satisfy their hunger for world domination, and that such a declaration was "a call for war on the USSR." The Soviet leader also dismissed

4108-502: The Bay of Biscay targeting U-boats starting out from their base. As a result of Allied successes with patrol aircraft against U-boats, the Germans introduced U- flak (submarines equipped with more antiaircraft weaponry) to escort U-boats out of base and encouraged commanders to remain on the surface and fire back at attacking craft rather than trying to escape by diving. However, U-flak

4266-859: The Berlin Wall to prevent the citizens of East Berlin from fleeing to West Berlin , at the time part of United States-allied West Germany . Major crises of this phase included the Berlin Blockade of 1948–1949, the Chinese Communist Revolution of 1945–1949, the Korean War of 1950–1953, the Hungarian Revolution of 1956 and the Suez Crisis of that same year, the Berlin Crisis of 1961 ,

4424-626: The Boeing E-3 Sentry . All Nimrod variants had been retired by mid-2011. On 4 June 1964, the British Government issued Air Staff Requirement 381 , which sought a replacement for the aging Avro Shackleton maritime patrol aircraft of the Royal Air Force (RAF). Such a replacement had been necessitated by the rapidly-approaching fatigue life limitations accumulated across the Shackleton fleet. A great deal of interest in

4582-758: The Cuban Missile Crisis began after deployments of U.S. missiles in Europe and Soviet missiles in Cuba; it is widely considered the closest the Cold War came to escalating into full-scale nuclear war . Another major proxy conflict was the Vietnam War of 1955 to 1975; the Soviets solidified their domination of Eastern Europe with operations such as the Warsaw Pact invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968. Both powers used economic aid in an attempt to win

4740-719: The Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962, and the Vietnam War of 1964–1975. Both superpowers competed for influence in Latin America and the Middle East , and the decolonising states of Africa , Asia , and Oceania . Following the Cuban Missile Crisis, this phase of the Cold War saw the Sino-Soviet split . Between China and the Soviet Union's complicated relations within the Communist sphere, leading to

4898-847: The Eastern Bloc . Cominform faced an embarrassing setback the following June, when the Tito–Stalin split obliged its members to expel Yugoslavia, which remained communist but adopted a non-aligned position and began accepting financial aid from the US. Besides Berlin, the status of the city of Trieste was at issue. Until the break between Tito and Stalin, the Western powers and the Eastern bloc faced each other uncompromisingly. In addition to capitalism and communism, Italians and Slovenes, monarchists and republicans as well as war winners and losers often faced each other irreconcilably. The neutral buffer state Free Territory of Trieste , founded in 1947 with

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5056-845: The FBA Type C , as well as large floatplanes such as the Short 184 , or flying boats such as the Felixstowe F.3 . Developments of the Felixstowe served with the Royal Air Force until the mid 20s, and with the US Navy as the Curtiss F5L and Naval Aircraft Factory PN whose developments saw service until 1938. During the war, Dornier did considerable pioneering work in all aluminium aircraft structures while working for Luftschiffbau Zeppelin and built four large patrol flying boats,

5214-488: The Falklands War in order for it to be able to attack any Argentine Air Force patrol planes they might encounter. Maritime patrol aircraft are typically fitted with a wide range of sensors: A modern military maritime patrol aircraft typically carries a dozen or so crew members, including relief flight crews, to effectively operate the equipment for 12 hours or more at a time. Cold War The Cold War

5372-511: The KGB and involved in its intelligence operations, adhered to Moscow's line, although dissent began to appear after 1956. Other critiques of the consensus policy came from anti-Vietnam War activists , the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament , and the anti-nuclear movement . In early 1947, France, Britain and the United States unsuccessfully attempted to reach an agreement with the Soviet Union for

5530-518: The Kingdom of Greece in its civil war against Communist-led insurgents. In the same month, Stalin conducted the rigged 1947 Polish legislative election which constituted an open breach of the Yalta Agreement . The US government responded to this announcement by adopting a policy of containment , with the goal of stopping the spread of communism . Truman delivered a speech calling for

5688-681: The Lockheed Hudson which started out as the Lockheed Model 14 Super Electra , as well as older biplane designs such as the Supermarine Stranraer , which had begun to be replaced by monoplanes just before the outbreak of war. The British in particular used obsolete bombers to supplement purpose-built aircraft for maritime patrol, such as the Vickers Wellington and Armstrong-Whitworth Whitley , while

5846-689: The Lulu nuclear depth charge for ASW, but those were removed from the arsenal and scrapped decades ago. Produced in United States , Japan and Canada , the P-3 has been operated by the air forces and navies of United States, Japan, Canada, Australia, Iran, Brazil, Germany, the Netherlands, New Zealand , Norway , Spain, and Taiwan. The Canadian version is called the CP-140 Aurora . During

6004-760: The Royal Naval Air Service and the French Aéronautique Maritime during the First World War , primarily on anti-submarine patrols. France, Italy and Austria-Hungary used large numbers of smaller patrol aircraft for the Mediterranean , Adriatic and other coastal areas while the Germans and British fought over the North Sea. At first, blimps and zeppelins were the only aircraft capable of staying aloft for

6162-447: The Sino-Soviet border conflict , while France, a Western Bloc state, began to demand greater autonomy of action. The Warsaw Pact invasion of Czechoslovakia occurred to suppress the Prague Spring of 1968, while the United States experienced internal turmoil from the civil rights movement and opposition to United States involvement in the Vietnam War . In the 1960s–1970s, an international peace movement took root among citizens around

6320-491: The Soviet boycott of the Allied Control Council and its incapacitation, an event marking the beginning of the full-blown Cold War and the end of its prelude, as well as ending any hopes at the time for a single German government and leading to formation in 1949 of the Federal Republic of Germany and German Democratic Republic . The twin policies of the Truman Doctrine and the Marshall Plan led to billions in economic and military aid for Western Europe, Greece, and Turkey. With

6478-446: The Space Race . The US and USSR were both part of the Allies of World War II , the military coalition which had defeated Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan in 1945. After the war, the USSR installed satellite governments in the territories of Eastern and Central Europe it had occupied, and promoted the spread of communism to North Korea in 1948 and created an alliance with the People's Republic of China in 1949. The US declared

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6636-443: The Truman Doctrine of " containment " in 1947, launched the Marshall Plan in 1948 to assist Western Europe's economic recovery, and founded the NATO military alliance in 1949 (which was matched by the Soviet-led Warsaw Pact in 1955). Germany's split occupation zones solidified into East and West Germany in 1949. The first major proxy war of the period was the Korean War from 1950 to 1953, which ended in stalemate. In 1962,

6794-438: The Turkish Straits crisis and Black Sea border disputes were also a major factor in increasing tensions. In September, the Soviet side produced the Novikov telegram, sent by the Soviet ambassador to the US but commissioned and "co-authored" by Vyacheslav Molotov ; it portrayed the US as being in the grip of monopoly capitalists who were building up military capability "to prepare the conditions for winning world supremacy in

6952-415: The United Nations Security Council Resolution 82 and 83 backed the defense of South Korea, although the Soviets were then boycotting meetings in protest of the fact that Taiwan (Republic of China), not the People's Republic of China , held a permanent seat on the council. A UN force of sixteen countries faced North Korea, although 40 percent of troops were South Korean, and about 50 percent were from

7110-481: The carrier-based Grumman S-2 Tracker . During the 1970s, the P2V was entirely replaced by the Lockheed P-3 Orion , which remained in service into the early twenty-first century. The P-3, powered by four turboprop engines, is derived from the 1950s era Lockheed Electra airliner. In addition to their ASW and SAR capabilities, most P-3Cs have been modified to carry Harpoon and Maverick missiles for attacking surface ships. American P-3s were formerly armed with

7268-457: The signals intelligence role, replacing the Comet C2s and Canberras of No. 51 Squadron in May 1974. The R1 was visually distinguished from the MR2 by the lack of a MAD boom. It was fitted with an array of rotating dish aerials in the aircraft's bomb bay, with further dish aerials in the tailcone and at the front of the wing-mounted fuel tanks. It had a flight crew of four (two pilots, a flight engineer and one navigator) and up to 25 crew operating

7426-662: The 1960s, 1970s, and the 1980s was Soviet Navy and Warsaw Pact submarines. These were countered by the NATO fleets, the NATO patrol planes mentioned above, and by sophisticated underwater listening systems. These span the so-called "GIUK Gap" of the North Atlantic that extends from Greenland to Iceland, to the Faroe Islands , to Scotland in the United Kingdom . Air bases for NATO patrol planes have also been located in these areas: U.S. Navy and Canadian aircraft based in Greenland, Iceland, and Newfoundland; British aircraft based in Scotland and Northern Ireland ; and Norwegian, Dutch, and German aircraft based in their home countries. During

7584-431: The 1960s, in response to North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) issuing a Request for Proposals (RFP) for a new MPA, the Breguet 1150 Atlantic was developed by a French-led multinational consortium, Société d'Étude et de Construction de Breguet Atlantic (SECBAT). Operators of the type include the French Navy , the German Navy , the Italian Air Force , the Pakistan Navy , and the Royal Netherlands Navy . During

7742-402: The 1980s, an updated version, the Atlantic Nouvelle Génération or Atlantique 2 , with new equipment and avionics was introduced, which included a new radar, sonar processor, forward-looking infrared camera turret, and the ability to carry the Exocet anti-shipping missile. By 2005, French manufacturer Dassault Aviation had decided to terminate marketing efforts for the Atlantic, promoting

7900-478: The Air Rescue Coordination Centre at RAF Kinloss and were a common sight in both military and civil maritime incidents. Throughout the Nimrod's operational life, a minimum of one aircraft was held in a state of readiness to respond to SAR demands at all times. The Nimrod featured a crew of up to 25 personnel, although a typical crew numbered roughly 12, most of whom operated the various onboard sensor suites and specialist detection equipment. A significant proportion of

8058-481: The American-made twin-engine Consolidated PBY Catalina flying boats, and the large, four-engine British Short Sunderland flying boats of the Allies . In the Pacific theatre , the Catalina was gradually superseded by the longer-ranged Martin PBM Mariner flying boat. For the Axis Powers , there were the long-range Japanese Kawanishi H6K and Kawanishi H8K flying boats, and the German Blohm & Voss BV 138 diesel-engined trimotor flying boat, as well as

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8216-417: The Argentine coast to confirm that Argentine surface vessels were not at sea. Another long-range flight was carried out by an MR2 on the night of 20/21 May, covering a total of 8,453 miles (13,604 km), the longest distance flight carried out during the Falklands War. In all, Nimrods flew 111 missions from Ascension in support of British operations during the Falklands War. A detachment of three Nimrod MR2s

8374-414: The Cold War was in its essence a war of ideas. The United States, acting through the CIA, funded a long list of projects to counter the communist appeal among intellectuals in Europe and the developing world. The CIA also covertly sponsored a domestic propaganda campaign called Crusade for Freedom . The rearmament of West Germany was achieved in the early 1950s. Its main promoter was Konrad Adenauer ,

8532-404: The Cold War, preventing Western food, materials and supplies from arriving in the West Germany's exclave of West Berlin . The United States (primarily), Britain, France, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and several other countries began the massive "Berlin airlift", supplying West Berlin with food and other provisions despite Soviet threats. The Soviets mounted a public relations campaign against

8690-408: The Communist governments militarily. The fall of the Iron Curtain after the Pan-European Picnic and the Revolutions of 1989 , which represented a peaceful revolutionary wave with the exception of the Romanian revolution and the Afghan Civil War (1989–1992) , overthrew almost all of the Marxist–Leninist regimes of the Eastern Bloc. The Communist Party of the Soviet Union itself lost control in

8848-536: The HS.801 as a replacement for Shackleton Mk 2. The Nimrod design was based on the Comet 4 civil airliner which had reached the end of its commercial life (the first two prototype Nimrods, XV148 and XV147, were built from two final unfinished Comet 4C airframes). The Comet's turbojet engines were replaced by Rolls-Royce Spey turbofans for better fuel efficiency , particularly at the low altitudes required for maritime patrol. Major fuselage changes were made, including an internal weapons bay, an extended nose for radar,

9006-400: The KGB (1973–1979), described active measures as "the heart and soul of Soviet intelligence ." During the Sino-Soviet split , "spy wars" also occurred between the USSR and PRC. In September 1947, the Soviets created Cominform to impose orthodoxy within the international communist movement and tighten political control over Soviet satellites through coordination of communist parties in

9164-419: The MPA missions were partially taken over by aircraft derived from civilian airliners. These had range and performance factors better than most of the wartime bombers. The latest jet-powered bombers of the 1950s did not have the endurance needed for long, overwater patrolling, and they did not have the low loitering speeds necessary for antisubmarine operations. The main threat to NATO maritime supremacy throughout

9322-445: The MR1 fleet to enhance their detection capabilities, the improved Nimrod MR2 variant entered service in August 1979 following a lengthy development process. The majority of the Nimrod fleet operated from RAF Kinloss in Scotland. Operationally, each active Nimrod would form a single piece of a complex submarine detection and monitoring mission. An emphasis on real-time intelligence sharing was paramount to these operations; upon detecting

9480-428: The Marshall Plan, seeing it as an effort by the US to impose its influence on Europe. In response, the Soviet Union established Comecon (Council for Mutual Economic Assistance) to foster economic cooperation among communist states. The United States and its Western European allies sought to strengthen their bonds and used the policy of containment against Soviet influence; they accomplished this most notably through

9638-466: The MoD recognised that the cost of developing the radar system to achieve the required level of performance was prohibitive and the probability of success very uncertain, and in December 1986 the project was cancelled. The RAF eventually received seven Boeing E-3 Sentry aircraft instead. The Nimrod MRA4 was intended to replace the capability provided by the MR2. It was essentially a new aircraft, with current-generation Rolls-Royce BR710 turbofan engines,

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9796-453: The Nimrod's guidance systems such as the air data computer , astrocompass , inertial guidance and doppler radar. Navigation information could also be manually input by the operators. Upon entry into service, the Nimrod was hailed as possessing advanced electronic equipment such as onboard digital computers . The increased capability of these electronic systems allowed the RAF's fleet of 46 Nimrod aircraft to provide equal coverage to that of

9954-402: The North Atlantic to detect the presence of Soviet submarines in that area and to track their movements. In the event of war, reconnaissance information gathered during these patrols would be shared with other allied aircraft to enable coordinated strikes at both submarines and surface targets. Search and rescue (SAR) missions were another important duty of the RAF's Nimrod fleet, operating under

10112-408: The P-3C, which later became the sole ASW type operated by the service. The Soviet Union developed the Ilyushin Il-38 from a civilian airliner. Similarly, the Royal Canadian Air Force derived the Canadair CP-107 Argus from a British airliner, the Bristol Britannia . The Argus was superseded by the CP-140 Aurora, derived from the Lockheed Electra. Since the end of the Cold War , the threat of

10270-446: The Russian Civil War further complicated relations, and although the Soviet Union later allied with Western powers to defeat Nazi Germany , this cooperation was strained by mutual suspicions. In the immediate aftermath of World War II, disagreements about the future of Europe, particularly Eastern Europe , became central. The Soviet Union's establishment of communist regimes in the countries it had liberated from Nazi control—enforced by

10428-443: The SIGINT equipment. Only since the end of the Cold War has the role of the aircraft been officially acknowledged; they were once described as "radar calibration aircraft". The R1s have not suffered the same rate of fatigue and corrosion as the MR2s. One R1 was lost in a flying accident since the type's introduction; this occurred in May 1995 during a flight test after major servicing, at RAF Kinloss . To replace this aircraft an MR2

10586-421: The Soviet Union and its communist party , which had an influence across the Second World and was also tied to a network of authoritarian states. The Soviet Union had a command economy and installed similarly communist regimes its in satellites. United States involvement in regime change during the Cold War included support for anti-communist and right-wing dictatorships , governments, and uprisings across

10744-408: The Soviet Union was used to monitor dissent from official Soviet politics and morals. Although to an extent disinformation had always existed, the term itself was invented, and the strategy formalized by a black propaganda department of the Soviet KGB. Based on the amount of top-secret Cold War archival information that has been released, historian Raymond L. Garthoff concludes there probably

10902-400: The Soviet Union, which at the time was undergoing the Era of Stagnation . This phase saw the new Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev introducing the liberalizing reforms of glasnost ("openness") and perestroika ("reorganization") and ending Soviet involvement in Afghanistan in 1989. Pressures for national sovereignty grew stronger in Eastern Europe, and Gorbachev refused to further support

11060-499: The Soviet Union. A number of self-proclaimed Marxist–Leninist governments were formed in the second half of the 1970s in developing countries , including Angola , Mozambique , Ethiopia , Cambodia , Afghanistan , and Nicaragua . Détente collapsed at the end of the decade with the beginning of the Soviet–Afghan War in 1979. Beginning in the 1980s, this phase was another period of elevated tension. The Reagan Doctrine led to increased diplomatic, military, and economic pressures on

11218-455: The Soviets accumulated after broken promises by Stalin and Molotov concerning Europe and Iran. Following the World War II Anglo-Soviet invasion of Iran , the country was occupied by the Red Army in the far north and the British in the south. Iran was used by the United States and British to supply the Soviet Union, and the Allies agreed to withdraw from Iran within six months after the cessation of hostilities. However, when this deadline came,

11376-535: The Soviets agreed to withdraw from Iran after persistent US pressure, an early success of containment policy. By 1947, US president Harry S. Truman was outraged by the perceived resistance of the Soviet Union to American demands in Iran, Turkey, and Greece, as well as Soviet rejection of the Baruch Plan on nuclear weapons. In February 1947, the British government announced that it could no longer afford to finance

11534-622: The Soviets had permitted to retain democratic structures. The public brutality of the coup shocked Western powers more than any event up to that point, set in motion a brief scare that war would occur, and swept away the last vestiges of opposition to the Marshall Plan in the United States Congress. In an immediate aftermath of the crisis, the London Six-Power Conference was held, resulting in

11692-545: The Soviets remained in Iran under the guise of the Azerbaijan People's Government and Kurdish Republic of Mahabad . Shortly thereafter, on 5 March, former British prime minister Winston Churchill delivered his famous " Iron Curtain " speech in Fulton, Missouri . The speech called for an Anglo-American alliance against the Soviets, whom he accused of establishing an "iron curtain" dividing Europe from " Stettin in

11850-645: The Tornado fleet. Nimrods were again deployed to the Middle East as part of the British contribution to the US-led invasion of Afghanistan ; missions in this theatre involved the Nimrods performing lengthy overland flights for intelligence-gathering purposes. On 2 September 2006, 14 UK military personnel were killed when a Nimrod MR2 was destroyed in a midair explosion following an onboard fire over Afghanistan. It

12008-520: The Truman Doctrine marked the beginning of a US bipartisan defense and foreign policy consensus between Republicans and Democrats focused on containment and deterrence that weakened during and after the Vietnam War , but ultimately persisted thereafter. Moderate and conservative parties in Europe, as well as social democrats, gave virtually unconditional support to the Western alliance, while European and American Communists , financed by

12166-567: The US assistance, the Greek military won its civil war . Under the leadership of Alcide De Gasperi the Italian Christian Democrats defeated the powerful Communist – Socialist alliance in the elections of 1948 . All major powers engaged in espionage, using a great variety of spies, double agents , moles , and new technologies such as the tapping of telephone cables. The Soviet KGB ("Committee for State Security"),

12324-581: The US government gave to Western European countries over $ 13 billion (equivalent to $ 189 billion in 2016) to rebuild the economy of Europe . Later, the program led to the creation of the OECD . The plan's aim was to rebuild the democratic and economic systems of Europe and to counter perceived threats to the European balance of power , such as communist parties seizing control through revolutions or elections. The plan also stated that European prosperity

12482-758: The US relegated the Douglas B-18 Bolo to the same role until better aircraft became available. Blimps were widely used by the United States Navy , especially in the warmer and calmer latitudes of the Caribbean Sea , the Bahamas , Bermuda , the Gulf of Mexico , Puerto Rico , Trinidad , and later the Azores . A number of special-purpose aircraft were also used in the conflict, including

12640-588: The US was trying to buy a pro-US re-alignment of Europe. Stalin therefore prevented Eastern Bloc nations from receiving Marshall Plan aid. The Soviet Union's alternative to the Marshall Plan, which was purported to involve Soviet subsidies and trade with central and eastern Europe, became known as the Molotov Plan (later institutionalized in January 1949 as the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance ). Stalin

12798-483: The USSR. In this way, this US would exercise " preponderant power ," oppose neutrality, and establish global hegemony . In the early 1950s (a period sometimes known as the " Pactomania "), the US formalized a series of alliances with Japan (a former WWII enemy), South Korea , Taiwan , Australia , New Zealand , Thailand and the Philippines (notably ANZUS in 1951 and SEATO in 1954), thereby guaranteeing

12956-527: The United Nations, was split up and dissolved in 1954 and 1975, also because of the détente between the West and Tito. The US and Britain merged their western German occupation zones into " Bizone " (1 January 1947, later "Trizone" with the addition of France's zone, April 1949). As part of the economic rebuilding of Germany, in early 1948, representatives of a number of Western European governments and

13114-518: The United States a number of long-term military bases. One of the more significant examples of the implementation of containment was the United Nations US-led intervention in the Korean War . In June 1950, after years of mutual hostilities, Kim Il Sung 's North Korean People's Army invaded South Korea at the 38th parallel . Stalin had been reluctant to support the invasion but ultimately sent advisers. To Stalin's surprise,

13272-401: The United States announced an agreement for a merger of western German areas into a federal governmental system. In addition, in accordance with the Marshall Plan , they began to re-industrialize and rebuild the West German economy, including the introduction of a new Deutsche Mark currency to replace the old Reichsmark currency that the Soviets had debased. The US had secretly decided that

13430-510: The Warsaw Pact's primary function was to safeguard Soviet hegemony over its Eastern European satellites, with the pact's only direct military actions having been the invasions of its own member states to keep them from breaking away; in the 1960s, the pact evolved into a multilateral alliance, in which the non-Soviet Warsaw Pact members gained significant scope to pursue their own interests. In 1961, Soviet-allied East Germany constructed

13588-472: The Western agencies paid special attention to debriefing Eastern Bloc defectors . Edward Jay Epstein describes that the CIA understood that the KGB used "provocations", or fake defections, as a trick to embarrass Western intelligence and establish Soviet double agents. As a result, from 1959 to 1973, the CIA required that East Bloc defectors went through a counterintelligence investigation before being recruited as

13746-462: The accusation that the USSR was exerting increasing control over the countries lying in its sphere. He argued that there was nothing surprising in "the fact that the Soviet Union, anxious for its future safety, [was] trying to see to it that governments loyal in their attitude to the Soviet Union should exist in these countries." Soviet territorial demands to Turkey regarding the Dardanelles in

13904-431: The aircraft's electronic suite. Changes included the replacement of the 1950s ASV Mk 21 radar used by the Shackleton and Nimrod MR1 with the new EMI Searchwater radar , a new acoustic processor (GEC-Marconi AQS-901) capable of handling more modern sonobuoys, a new mission data recorder (Hanbush) and a new Electronic Support Measures (Yellow Gate) which included new pods on the wingtips. Provision for in-flight refuelling

14062-561: The allocation of $ 400 million to intervene in the war and unveiled the Truman Doctrine , which framed the conflict as a contest between free peoples and totalitarian regimes. American policymakers accused the Soviet Union of conspiring against the Greek royalists in an effort to expand Soviet influence even though Stalin had told the Communist Party to cooperate with the British-backed government. Enunciation of

14220-662: The beginning of 1977 the Nimrod fleet was given the task of patrolling the 270,000 square miles (700,000 km) area. The aircraft would locate, identify, and photograph vessels operating in the EEZ. The whole area was routinely patrolled. In addition to surveillance, the aircraft would communicate with all oil and gas platforms. During the Icelandic Cod Wars of 1972 and 1975–1976, the Nimrod fleet closely cooperated with Royal Navy surface vessels to protect British civilian fishing ships. Five Nimrods were lost in accidents during

14378-527: The bomb bay during ferrying flights. Other armaments equippable in the bomb bay include mines , bombs , and nuclear depth charges ; later munitions included the Sting Ray torpedo and Harpoon missile for increased capability. The Nimrod could also be fitted with two detachable pylons mounted underneath the wings to be used with missiles such as the Martel ; two specialised pylons were later added to enable

14536-482: The bureau responsible for foreign espionage and internal surveillance, was famous for its effectiveness. The most famous Soviet operation involved its atomic spies that delivered crucial information from the United States' Manhattan Project , leading the USSR to detonate its first nuclear weapon in 1949, four years after the American detonation and much sooner than expected. A massive network of informants throughout

14694-607: The cancellation of the MRA4 resulted in a significant gap in long-range maritime patrol and search-and rescue capability. In July 2016, the Ministry of Defence announced the purchase of nine Boeing P-8A Poseidon aircraft for the RAF. The RAF declared the P-8 had reached initial operating capability (IOC) on 1 April 2020, by which time two of the planes had been delivered. The nine aircraft will be based at RAF Lossiemouth . The Nimrod

14852-716: The chancellor of West Germany, with France the main opponent. Washington had the decisive voice. It was strongly supported by the Pentagon (the US military leadership), and weakly opposed by President Truman; the State Department was ambivalent. The outbreak of the Korean War in June 1950 changed the calculations and Washington now gave full support. That also involved naming Dwight D. Eisenhower in charge of NATO forces and sending more American troops to West Germany. There

15010-515: The communist party. Radio and television organizations were state-owned, while print media was usually owned by political organizations, mostly by the local communist party. Soviet radio broadcasts used Marxist rhetoric to attack capitalism, emphasizing themes of labor exploitation, imperialism and war-mongering. Along with the broadcasts of the BBC and the Voice of America to Central and Eastern Europe,

15168-789: The converted Focke-Wulf Fw 200 Condor airliner landplane. To finally close the Mid-Atlantic gap , or "Black Gap", a space in which Axis submarines could prey on Allied shipping out of reach of MPAs, the British Royal Air Force , the Royal Canadian Air Force , and the US Army Air Forces introduced the American Consolidated B-24 Liberator bomber , which had a very long range for the era. The B-24

15326-497: The country and was banned following the 1991 Soviet coup attempt that August. This in turn led to the formal dissolution of the Soviet Union in December 1991 and the collapse of Communist governments across much of Africa and Asia. The Russian Federation became the Soviet Union's successor state, while many of the other republics emerged from the Soviet Union's collapse as fully independent post-Soviet states . The United States

15484-466: The designation MR2P(GM) (Gulf Mod) . The Nimrod MR2 carried out three main roles: Anti-Submarine Warfare (ASW), Anti-Surface Unit Warfare (ASUW) and Search and Rescue (SAR). Its extended range enabled the crew to monitor maritime areas far to the north of Iceland and up to 2,200 nautical miles (4,000 km) out into the Western Atlantic. With Air-to-Air Refuelling (AAR), range and endurance

15642-567: The development of the MRA4 was abandoned in 2010. The RAF also operated a small number of the Nimrod R1 , an electronic intelligence gathering ( ELINT ) variant. A dedicated airborne early warning platform, the Nimrod AEW3 , was in development from late 1970s to the mid-1980s; however, much like the MRA4, considerable problems were encountered in development and thus the project was cancelled in 1986 in favour of an off-the-shelf solution in

15800-404: The equipping of AIM-9 Sidewinder missiles, used for self-defence purposes against hostile aircraft. A powerful remote-controlled searchlight was installed underneath the starboard wing for SAR operations. For reconnaissance missions, the aircraft was also equipped with a pair of downward-facing cameras suited to low and high-altitude photography. In later years a newer electro-optical camera system

15958-408: The fall of the communist governments of Europe from 1989, which concluded with the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991. The Western Bloc included the US and a number of First World nations that were generally capitalist and liberal democratic but tied to a network of often authoritarian Third World states, most of which were the European powers' former colonies . The Eastern Bloc was led by

16116-588: The first operational use of a towed radar decoy, and a forward looking infrared turret under the starboard wing. The Nimrod first entered squadron service with the RAF at RAF St Mawgan in Cornwall in October 1969. These initial aircraft, designated as Nimrod MR1, were intended as a stop-gap measure, and thus were initially equipped with many of the same sensors and equipment as the Shackletons they were supplementing. While some improvements were implemented on

16274-401: The formation of NATO , which was essentially a defensive agreement in 1949. The Soviet Union countered with the Warsaw Pact in 1955, which had similar results with the Eastern Bloc. As by that time the Soviet Union already had an armed presence and political domination all over its eastern satellite states, the pact has been long considered superfluous. Although nominally a defensive alliance,

16432-449: The ground offensive against Iraqi forces had ended, Britain elected to maintain an RAF presence in the region through assets such as the Nimrod and other aircraft. Nimrod R1s operated from August 1990 to March 1991 from Cyprus, providing almost continuous flying operations from the start of the ground offensive. Each R1 was retrofitted with the same Marconi towed active decoy as well as under wing chaff/flare dispensers, reportedly sourced from

16590-529: The kind of world-view, the kind of beliefs, and the social structure that would probably prevail in a state which was at once unconquerable and in a permanent state of "cold war" with its neighbours. In The Observer of 10 March 1946, Orwell wrote, "...after the Moscow conference last December, Russia began to make a 'cold war' on Britain and the British Empire." The first use of the term to describe

16748-509: The larger fleet of retiring Avro Shackletons. The design philosophy of these computerised systems was that of a 'man-machine partnership'; while onboard computers performed much of the data sift and analysis processes, decisions and actions on the basis of that data remained in the operator's hands. To support the Nimrod's anticipated long lifespan, onboard computers were designed to be capable of integrating with various new components, systems, and sensors that could be added in future upgrades. After

16906-711: The last of which, the Zeppelin-Lindau Rs.IV , influenced development elsewhere resulting in the replacement of wooden hulls with metal ones, such as on the Short Singapore . The success of long range patrol aircraft led to the development of fighters specifically designed to intercept them, such as the Hansa-Brandenburg W.29 . Many of the Second World War patrol airplanes were converted from either bombers or airliners , such as

17064-649: The late 1940s, the RAF introduced the Avro Shackleton  – a specialised MPA derivative of the Avro Lancaster bomber – in anticipation of a rapid expansion of the Soviet Navy 's submarine force. An improved model of the Shackleton, the MR 3 , was introduced, featuring various structural improvements, along with homing torpedoes and Mk 101 Lulu nuclear depth bombs . During

17222-717: The late 1960s, a jet-powered replacement in the form of the Hawker Siddeley Nimrod , a derivation of the De Havilland Comet airliner, begun to be introduced. During the 2000s, an improved model, the BAE Systems Nimrod MRA4 , was in development, but was cancelled and eventually substituted for by the Boeing P-8 Poseidon . The U.S. Navy flew a mixture of MPAs, including the land-based Lockheed P2V Neptune (P2V) and

17380-540: The longer ten hour patrols whilst carrying a useful payload while shorter-range patrols were mounted with landplanes such as the Sopwith 1½ Strutter . A number of specialized patrol balloons were built, particularly by the British, including the SS class airship of which 158 were built including subtypes. As the conflict continued, numerous aircraft were developed specifically for the role, including small flying boats such as

17538-402: The loyalty of non-aligned countries , such as India . By the 1970s, Japan and Western Europe rebuilt their economies, allowing them more diplomatic independence. After the Sino-Soviet split between the USSR and China in 1961, the U.S. initiated contacts with China in 1972 . In the same year, the US and USSR signed a series of treaties limiting their nuclear arsenals, which eased tensions for

17696-669: The mid-1970s a modified Nimrod was proposed for the Airborne Early Warning (AEW) mission – again as a replacement for the Lancaster -derived, piston-engined Shackleton AEW.2. Eleven existing Nimrod airframes were to be converted by British Aerospace to house the GEC Marconi radars in a bulbous nose and tail. The Nimrod AEW3 project was plagued by cost over-runs and problems with the GEC 4080M computer used. Eventually,

17854-414: The most prominent architects of America's early Cold War strategy, especially those who believed that the Cold War would eventually be fought by political rather than military means, such as George F. Kennan. Soviet and Eastern Bloc authorities used various methods to suppress Western broadcasts, including radio jamming . American policymakers, including Kennan and John Foster Dulles , acknowledged that

18012-514: The onboard sensor equipment was housed outside the pressure shell inside the Nimrod's distinctive pannier lower fuselage. Sensor systems included radar , sonar and the MAD; a ' sniffer ' could detect exhaust fumes from diesel submarines as well. The Nimrod and its detection capabilities were an important component of Britain's military defence during the height of the Cold War. The Nimrod's navigational functions were computerised, and were managed from

18170-671: The policy change. Once again, the East Berlin communists attempted to disrupt the Berlin municipal elections , which were held on 5 December 1948 and produced a turnout of 86% and an overwhelming victory for the non-communist parties. The results effectively divided the city into East and West, the latter comprising US, British and French sectors. 300,000 Berliners demonstrated and urged the international airlift to continue, and US Air Force pilot Gail Halvorsen created " Operation Vittles ", which supplied candy to German children. The Airlift

18328-441: The political decision-making level on either side. Similarly, there is no evidence, on either side, of any major political or military decision that was prematurely discovered through espionage and thwarted by the other side. There also is no evidence of any major political or military decision that was crucially influenced (much less generated) by an agent of the other side. According to historian Robert L. Benson, "Washington's forte

18486-479: The presence of the Red Army —alarmed the US and UK. Western leaders saw this as a clear instance of Soviet expansionism, clashing with their vision of a democratic Europe. Economically, the divide was sharpened with the introduction of the Marshall Plan in 1947, a US initiative to provide financial aid to rebuild Europe and prevent the spread of communism by stabilizing capitalist economies. The Soviet Union rejected

18644-663: The requirement was received from both British and foreign manufacturers, who offered aircraft including the Lockheed P-3 Orion , the Breguet Atlantic and derivatives of the Hawker Siddeley Trident , BAC One-Eleven , Vickers VC10 and de Havilland Comet . On 2 February 1965, Prime Minister Harold Wilson announced the intention to order Hawker Siddeley's maritime patrol version of the Comet,

18802-468: The search area. The Nimrod was most often featured in the media in relation to its search-and-rescue role, such as in the reporting of major rescue incidents. In August 1979, several Nimrods were involved in locating yachting competitors during the disaster-stricken 1979 Fastnet race and coordinated with helicopters in searches for survivors from lost vessels. In March 1980, the Alexander L. Kielland ,

18960-450: The small escort carriers of WWII became available to cover the deep oceans, and the land air bases in the Azores became available in mid-1943 from Portugal . As technology progressed the bombs and depth charges were supplemented with Acoustic torpedoes that could detect, follow and then explode against an enemy submarine. The US Navy began fielding the Mark 24 mine in 1943, labelled as

19118-469: The source of the term, Lippmann traced it to a French term from the 1930s, la guerre froide . The roots of the Cold War can be traced back to diplomatic and military tensions preceding World War II. The 1917 Russian Revolution and the subsequent Treaty of Brest-Litovsk , where Soviet Russia ceded vast territories to Germany, deepened distrust among the Western Allies. Allied intervention in

19276-463: The specific post-war geopolitical confrontation between the Soviet Union and the United States came in a speech by Bernard Baruch , an influential advisor to Democratic presidents, on 16 April 1947. The speech, written by journalist Herbert Bayard Swope , proclaimed, "Let us not be deceived: we are today in the midst of a cold war." Newspaper columnist Walter Lippmann gave the term wide currency with his book The Cold War . When asked in 1947 about

19434-682: The threat from Argentine submarines rose, the more capable Nimrod MR2s took on operations initially performed by older Nimrod MR1s. Aviation author Chris Chant has claimed that the Nimrod R1 also conducted electronic intelligence missions operating from Punta Arenas in neutral Chile . The Chilean government allowed an RAF Nimrod R1 to fly signals reconnaissance sorties from the Desventuradas Islands , gathering information on Argentine Air Force movements. The addition of air-to-air refuelling probes allowed operations to be carried out in

19592-405: The two superpowers , though each supported opposing sides in major regional conflicts known as proxy wars . Aside from the nuclear arms race starting in 1949 and conventional military deployment , the struggle for dominance was expressed indirectly via psychological warfare , propaganda campaigns , espionage , far-reaching embargoes , sports diplomacy , and technological competitions such as

19750-674: The type at first being used to fly local patrols around Ascension to guard against potential Argentine attacks, and to escort the British Task Force as it sailed south towards the Falklands, with Nimrods also being used to provide search and rescue as well as communications relay support of the Operation Black Buck bombing raids by Avro Vulcans . As the Task Force neared what would become the combat theatre and

19908-742: The type was on 28 June 2011 from RAF Waddington, in the presence of the Chief of the Air Staff, ACM Sir Stephen Dalton. XV 249, the former MR2, is now on display at the RAF Museum Cosford, West Midlands. The R1 was replaced by three Boeing RC-135W Rivet Joint aircraft, acquired under the Airseeker project; the first aircraft was delivered in late 2013. Starting in 1975, 35 aircraft were upgraded to MR2 standard, being re-delivered from August 1979. The upgrade included extensive modernisation of

20066-654: The type's service with the RAF: Data from Wilson General characteristics Performance Armament Related development Aircraft of comparable role, configuration, and era Maritime patrol aircraft Among other maritime surveillance resources, such as satellites , ships, unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) and helicopters , the MPA is an important asset. To perform ASW operations, MPAs typically carry air-deployable sonar buoys as well as torpedoes and are usually capable of extended flight at low altitudes. The first aircraft that would now be identified as maritime patrol aircraft were flown by

20224-462: The vicinity of the Falklands, while the aircraft's armament was supplemented by the addition of 1,000 pounds (450 kg) general-purpose bombs , BL755 cluster bombs and AIM-9 Sidewinder air-to-air missiles. The use of air-to-air refuelling allowed extremely long reconnaissance missions to be mounted, one example being a 19-hour 5-minute patrol conducted on 15 May 1982 (XV232 Airborne: 0803, Landing: 0308), which passed within 60 miles (97 km) of

20382-437: The wars the British experimented with equipping their patrol aircraft with the COW 37 mm gun . During World War II, depth charges that could be set to detonate at specific depths, and later when in proximity with large metal objects replaced anti-submarine bombs that detonated on contact. Patrol aircraft also carried defensive armament which was necessary when patrolling areas close to enemy territory such as Allied operations in

20540-444: The weapons bay. Usually one other Nimrod airborne on a training mission would also carry a set of Lindholme Gear. As well as using the aircraft sensors to find aircraft or ships in distress, it was used to find survivors in the water, with a capability to search areas of up to 20,000 square miles (52,000 km). The main role would normally be to act as on-scene rescue coordinator to control ships, fixed-wing aircraft, and helicopters in

20698-411: The world, while Soviet involvement in regime change included the funding of left-wing parties , wars of independence , revolutions and dictatorships. As nearly all the colonial states underwent decolonization and achieved independence in the period from 1945 to 1960, many became Third World battlefields in the Cold War. At the end of World War II, English writer George Orwell used cold war , as

20856-400: The world. Movements against nuclear weapons testing and for nuclear disarmament took place, with large anti-war protests . By the 1970s, both sides had started making allowances for peace and security, ushering in a period of détente that saw the Strategic Arms Limitation Talks and the 1972 visit by Richard Nixon to China that opened relations with China as a strategic counterweight to

21014-400: Was 'signals' intelligence - the procurement and analysis of coded foreign messages." leading to the Venona project or Venona intercepts, which monitored the communications of Soviet intelligence agents. Moynihan wrote that the Venona project contained "overwhelming proof of the activities of Soviet spy networks in America, complete with names, dates, places, and deeds." The Venona project

21172-424: Was a period of global geopolitical tension and struggle for ideological and economic influence between the United States and the Soviet Union (USSR) and their respective allies, the Western Bloc and the Eastern Bloc , that started in 1947, two years after the end of World War II , and lasted until the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991. The term cold war is used because there was no direct fighting between

21330-412: Was a strong promise that West Germany would not develop nuclear weapons. Widespread fears of another rise of German militarism necessitated the new military to operate within an alliance framework under NATO command. In 1955, Washington secured full German membership of NATO. In May 1953, Lavrentiy Beria , by then in a government post, had made an unsuccessful proposal to allow the reunification of

21488-418: Was also fearful of a reconstituted Germany; his vision of a post-war Germany did not include the ability to rearm or pose any kind of threat to the Soviet Union. In early 1948, following reports of strengthening "reactionary elements", Czech Communists executed a coup d'état in Czechoslovakia (resulting in the formation of the Czechoslovak Socialist Republic (9 May 1948)), the only Eastern Bloc state that

21646-420: Was also used at the basis for the PB4Y-2 Privateer , a dedicated MPA variant adopted in large numbers by the US Navy, which saw service late on in the Pacific theatre. During the conflict, there were several developments in air-to-surface-vessel radar and sonobuoys , which enhanced the ability of aircraft to find and destroy submarines, especially at night and in poor weather. Another area of advancement

21804-433: Was as much a logistical as a political and psychological success for the West; it firmly linked West Berlin to the United States. In May 1949, Stalin backed down and lifted the blockade. In 1952, Stalin repeatedly proposed a plan to unify East and West Germany under a single government chosen in elections supervised by the United Nations, if the new Germany were to stay out of Western military alliances, but this proposal

21962-449: Was contingent upon German economic recovery. One month later, Truman signed the National Security Act of 1947 , creating a unified Department of Defense , the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), and the National Security Council (NSC). These would become the main bureaucracies for US defense policy in the Cold War. Stalin believed economic integration with the West would allow Eastern Bloc countries to escape Soviet control, and that

22120-688: Was deployed to Seeb in Oman in August 1990 as a result of the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait , carrying out patrols over the Gulf of Oman and Persian Gulf . Due to the level of threats present in the Gulf theatre, operational Nimrods were quickly retrofitted with a Marconi towed active decoy . Once hostilities commenced, the Nimrod detachment, by now increased to five aircraft, concentrated on night patrols, with daylight patrols carried out by US Navy Lockheed P-3 Orions. Nimrods were used to guide Westland Lynx helicopters and Grumman A-6 Intruder attack aircraft against Iraqi patrol vessels, being credited with assisting in sinking or damaging 16 Iraqi vessels. After

22278-416: Was disbanded and its number reassigned to 38(R) Squadron. The Nimrod MR2 aircraft was withdrawn on 31 March 2010, a year earlier than planned, for financial reasons. The last official flight of a Nimrod MR2 took place on 26 May 2010, with XV229 flying from RAF Kinloss to Kent International Airport to be used as an evacuation training airframe at the nearby MOD Defence Fire Training and Development Centre. In

22436-410: Was fitted with underwing pylons that could carry a variety of common American weapons, including the AGM-84 Harpoon anti-ship missile, the air-to-ground AGM-65 Maverick , as many as ten of the CBU-100 Cluster Bomb , rocket pods, sea mines, and the standard issue Mark 80 general purpose bombs. The Royal Air Force 's Hawker Siddeley Nimrod was fitted with AIM-9 Sidewinder missiles in 1982 during

22594-552: Was greatly extended. The crew consisted of two pilots and one flight engineer, two navigators (one tactical navigator and a routine navigator), one Air Electronics Officer (AEO), the sonobuoy sensor team of two Weapon System Operators (WSOp ACO) and four Weapon System Operators (WSOp EW) to manage passive and active electronic warfare systems. Until 2010, the Nimrod MR2 was based at RAF Kinloss in Scotland ( 120 , 201 and 206 Squadrons), and RAF St Mawgan in Cornwall ( 42 and 38(R) Squadrons). Following Options for Change , 42 Squadron

22752-481: Was installed for greater imaging quality. Various new ECMs and electronic support systems were retrofitted onto the Nimrod fleet in response to new challenges and to increase the type's defensive capabilities; additional equipment also provided more effective means of identification and communication. A number of modifications were introduced during the 1991 Gulf War; a small number of MR2s were fitted with improved Link 11 datalinks, new defensive ECM equipment including

22910-417: Was introduced during the Falklands War (as the MR2P ), as well as hardpoints to allow the Nimrod to carry the AIM-9 Sidewinder missile to counter enemy Argentine Air Force maritime surveillance aircraft. In preparation for operations in the Gulf War theatre, several MR2s were fitted with new communications and ECM equipment to deal with anticipated threats; at the time these modified aircraft were given

23068-410: Was introduced during the 2010s by the Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force (JMSDF) as a replacement for the aging P-3C Orion . Both the Royal Australian Air Force and the Royal Australian Navy met their early postwar MPA needs via a stretched-fuselage modification of the Avro Lincoln bomber. However, the type was soon supplemented and eventually replaced by new aircraft, such as the P2V and later

23226-402: Was kept highly secret even from policymakers until the Moynihan Commission in 1995. Despite this, the decryption project had already been betrayed and dispatched to the USSR by Kim Philby and Bill Weisband in 1946, as was discovered by the US by 1950. Nonetheless, the Soviets had to keep their discovery of the program secret, too, and continued leaking their own information, some of which

23384-454: Was left as the world's sole superpower. In February 1946, George F. Kennan 's " Long Telegram " from Moscow to Washington helped to articulate the US government's increasingly hard line against the Soviets, which would become the basis for US strategy toward the Soviet Union for the duration of the Cold War. The telegram galvanized a policy debate that would eventually shape the Truman administration 's Soviet policy. Washington's opposition to

23542-488: Was now restricted to the island of Taiwan , the nationalist government of which exists to this day. The Kremlin promptly created an alliance with the newly formed People's Republic of China. According to Norwegian historian Odd Arne Westad , the communists won the Civil War because they made fewer military mistakes than Chiang Kai-Shek made, and because in his search for a powerful centralized government, Chiang antagonized too many interest groups in China. Moreover, his party

23700-403: Was parity in the quantity and quality of secret information obtained by each side. However, the Soviets probably had an advantage in terms of HUMINT (human intelligence or interpersonal espionage) and "sometimes in its reach into high policy circles." In terms of decisive impact, however, he concludes: We also can now have high confidence in the judgment that there were no successful "moles" at

23858-459: Was selected for conversion to R1 standard, and entered service in December 1996. The Nimrod R1 was based initially at RAF Wyton , Cambridgeshire, and later at RAF Waddington , Lincolnshire, and flown by 51 Sqn . The two remaining Nimrod R1s were originally planned to be retired at the end of March 2011, but operational requirements forced the RAF to deploy one to RAF Akrotiri , Cyprus on 16 March in support of Operation Ellamy . The last flight of

24016-412: Was short-lived, as opposing pilots adapted their tactics. Equipping submarines with radar warning receivers and the snorkel made them harder to find. To counter the German long-range patrol aircraft that targeted merchant convoys, the Royal Navy introduced the " CAM ship ", which was a merchant vessel equipped with a lone fighter plane which could be launched once to engage the enemy planes. Later,

24174-427: Was still useful to the American program. According to Moynihan, even President Truman may not have been fully informed of Venona, which may have left him unaware of the extent of Soviet espionage. Clandestine atomic spies from the Soviet Union, who infiltrated the Manhattan Project at various points during WWII, played a major role in increasing tensions that led to the Cold War. In addition to usual espionage,

24332-416: Was the adoption of increasingly effective camouflage schemes, which led to the widespread adoption of white paint schemes in the Atlantic to reduce the warning available to surfaced U-boats , while US Navy aircraft transitioned from an upper light blue-gray and lower white to an all-over dark blue due to the increasing threat of Japanese forces at night-time. In the decades following the Second World War,

24490-527: Was the first jet-powered MPA to enter service, being powered by the Rolls-Royce Spey turbofan engine. Aircraft in this role had been commonly propelled by piston or turboprop powerplants instead to maximise fuel economy and enable maximum patrol time on station. Advantages of the Nimrod's turbofan engines included greater speed and altitude capabilities, and it was more capable of evading detection by submarines, as propeller-driven aircraft are more detectable underwater by standard acoustic sensors. The Nimrods had

24648-513: Was the single greatest loss of British military lives since the Falklands War. The outbreak of the Iraq War in March 2003 saw the RAF's Nimrods being used for operations over Iraq, using the aircraft's sensors to detect hostile forces and to direct attacks by friendly coalition forces. While the Nimrod MR1/MR2 was in service, one aircraft from each of the squadrons on rotation was available for search and rescue operations at one-hour standby. The standby aircraft carried two sets of Lindholme Gear in

24806-431: Was turned down by the Western powers. Some sources dispute the sincerity of the proposal. Britain, France, the United States, Canada and eight other western European countries signed the North Atlantic Treaty of April 1949, establishing the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). That August, the first Soviet atomic device was detonated in Semipalatinsk , Kazakh SSR . Following Soviet refusals to participate in

24964-434: Was weakened during the war against Japan . Meanwhile, the communists told different groups, such as the peasants, exactly what they wanted to hear, and they cloaked themselves under the cover of Chinese nationalism . Confronted with the communist revolution in China and the end of the American atomic monopoly in 1949, the Truman administration quickly moved to escalate and expand its containment doctrine. In NSC 68 ,

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