Operation Blue Peacock

The British National Archives has released a secret 1957 Ministry of Defense document indicating that scientists considered using chickens to warm the casing of a plutonium land mine. The chickens body heat, about 1,000 BTU (British Thermal Units) per bird per day, would prevent the mine's mechanism from freezing.

Understandably, this information was received with great skepticism. Andy Oppenheimer, co-editor of Jane's World Armies, said, "I have a feeling that it's an April Fool." The Times of London wrote, "Is today the day to reveal the chicken-powered nuke?" However, Tom O'Leary, head of education at the National Archives, said he had no doubt that the document was authentic.

Officials decided in 1957 to acquire 10 "Blue Peacock" land mines, each weighing 16,000 pounds (7,250 kilograms), and to station them with the British Army of the Rhine in Germany. However, in 1958 the Ministry of Defense Weapons Policy Committee decided that work on "Blue Peacock" should stop, after reservations emerged about the fallout hazard.

The nuclear chicken proposal is detailed in the April 2-Oct. 30 exhibition entitled "The Secret State" at the National Archives.

I'm not convinced that this is on the up and up. Simple things are tripping up my thinking. For example, how were the chickens supposed to be fed and who in their right mind would go to a nuclear land mine on a daily basis to do it? I also find it hard to believe that the device, a sophisticated temperature-sensitive plutonium warhead surrounded by high explosives, would not quickly deteriorate in the environment of a chicken house.

Without more information, I'm not buying it. The story is just too implausible. Maybe someone is trying to pull the chain of the animal rights extremists.