This tribute is the story of what the Royal Navy has done and its many great achievements over the last fifty
years. It is an account of the numerous operations, actions, engagements and deployments over that period.
Time, space and the Official Secrets Act have limited the scope for developing certain aspects of the whole picture
and some subjects have perforce had to remain largely outside the coverage of this tribute. Those matters have
included covert submarine operations and incidents during the Cold War, the evolution and implementation
of tactical doctrine and the deployment of tactical nuclear weapons, the development and integration of certain
sophisticated sensors and weapons systems, information technology and data handling, and command, control
and communications equipments. Other issues such as funding, budgeting, recruiting, changing shipboard
living conditions etc have also not been developed in this tribute.
The views expressed in this book are those of the writer, and many contributors, and do not necessarily represent
the views of the Royal Navy or Her Majesty’s Government.
The White Ensign Association is especially indebted to the Naval Historical Branch, Navy News,
the Royal Naval Museum, the Royal Navy Submarine Museum, the Fleet Air Arm Museum,
the Fleet Photographic Unit and the Director of Public Relations (Navy).
The White Ensign Association is very grateful to Amlin, a marine insurer at Lloyd’s for over
one hundred years, for very kindly sponsoring the production and distribution of this book.
THE WHITE ENSIGN ASSOCIATION LTD
HMS Belfast
Tooley Street, London, SE1 2JH
office@whiteensign.co.uk
Copyright © John Roberts 2009
First published in Great Britain in 2009 by
Seaforth Publishing,
Pen & Sword Books Ltd,
47 Church Street,
Barnsley S70 2AS
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
ISBN 978 1 84832 043 7
PDF ISBN: 978 1 78346 564 4
EPUB ISBN: 978 1 78383 030 5
PRC ISBN: 978 1 78346 797 6
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted
in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying,
recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without prior permission
in writing of both the copyright owner and the above publisher.
The right of John Roberts to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted
by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
Typeset and designed by Roger Daniels
Printed and bound in Thailand