Navaleye,
Of course I'm interested in all of this - it's an interesting subject. But all I wanted to know was how the Nimrod MR 1 differed from the last of the Shacks, capability wise.
I hadn't thought of any nuclear dimension to the question, until someone mentioned it. Any questions I had as to the narrow subject of nukes on RAF maritime patrol aircraft have been answered.
The Shack used Mk 34 'Lulu' from 1965-1971 - probably deploying them in response to the threat posed by the first PRACTICAL Soviet SLBMs.
The Nimrod used a new weapon (the Mk 57) from 1970 until 1991, and were withdrawn as part of the USA's global withdrawal of all its ground and sea-launched tactical nuclear weapons, which included the 350 B-57 depth bombs deployed with land-based naval anti-submarine warfare (ASW) aircraft, which rendered them no longer available for the UK's Nimrods.
That level of detail is all I want or need, and it shouldn't expose me to abuse for asking, nor should those who provide that level of information to hysterical twittering from the terminally confused retirees on the board. In fact, the answers came from elsewhere, but had an ex-Kipper man known the answers, and known that they were in the public domain, and chosen to post them, he would have been doing nothing wrong. Nor can I see any harm in colourful anecdotes about the mass promotion of NCO aircrew and the 'Coffee' and 'coffee - No sugar' buttons on a Nimrod's yoke.
Pointing out the level of detail that has deliberately been put into the public domain is not intended to provoke further disclosures, only to provide a reality check to those wanting threads to be closed down or censored inappropriately.
There's also the issue of a public 'right to know' to be weighed against the 'need to know'. In the example above, it is clear that HMG spent $***m to provide enhanced storage for ** weapons that were known to be going out of service, without replacement, for a period of only * years. There is a clear issue of a staggering, massive waste of public money lying behind these asterisks! If the Cold War was still raging, security concerns would, in my view, completely outweigh pedestrian concerns about spending, but since the weapons concerned and the threat they were designed to counter have evaporated, having the detail in the public domain seems to be a no-brainer.
Thanks to those who've PM'ed messages of support - they were entirely unexpected and much appreciated.