You are now very close to RAF High Wycombe at Naphill. During the Second World War, this site was chosen by the War Ministry as a secret location for Bomber Command. In addition to a range of surface buildings, which were designed to look like a country village from the air, a network of underground tunnels was constructed allowing staff to move between buildings without surfacing. A stairway led 17 metre down to the large concrete box that was the Operations block: the key building in the complex. The roof slabs alone were over 1.5 metres thick overlaid with ballast, another 60 cm of concrete covered with a 1.3m cushion of earth and another 1.5 metre layer of reinforced concrete extending way beyond the walls of the building. This “burster slab” would ensure the detonation of any bomb in the event of a direct hit. Last of all came a considerable depth of earth mounding, on top of which were laid grass turfs. There are very few surface features, other than a series of cylindrical pill boxes built at the corners of the plot. From the first pillbox, if you walk about 20 metres up the track parallel to the fence, to a second pillbox, you may glimpse the green doors, which are the entrance to the wartime bunker. Return to the first (lower) pillbox to continue the walk.
nationaltrust.org.uk/chilterns-countryside/trails/bradenham-beech-woods-and-bunkers-trail
Naphill: Proposed Underground Operations Centre
HL Deb 25 March 1982 vol 428 cc1130-44 1130
§ 8.23 p.m.

§Lord Brockway rose to ask Her Majesty's Government whether they will reconsider their intention to establish a bunker at Naphill, Buckinghamshire, on National Trust land.

§ The noble Lord said: My Lords, I make no apology for initiating this debate. The proposed bunker at Naphill—or "operations centre", as the Ministry prefers—is not an isolated or incidental nuclear project. The Ministry itself says that it is probably the most important construction for many years. It is part of a massive co-ordination at High Wycombe of the headquarters of not only British but American and NATO defence. Indeed, it is not too much to say that this picturesque town in the valley of the Chilterns will be the defence centre for Britain and a large part of Europe if war occurs.....
api.parliament.uk/historic-hansard/lords/1982/mar/25/naphill-proposed-underground-operations

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Location: Bradenham, Wycombe, Buckinghamshire, South East England, England, United Kingdom

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