As we may have a little quiet for a while, could I suggest that if we're thinking about the '40s and '50s, we need to unthink the '60s situation of mutual assured destruction. What actually was the doctrine for the use of the UK's admittedly few and inefficient nukes? Were they intended for war fighting? I imagine one of the nuclear land mines would have disrupted a major tank offensive, and it should have been possible to arrange the delivery of one or two bombs (or devices, if it fits stipulative definitions better) by air.
Clearly the UK did not have the resources to deter the USSR--given the astonishing destruction suffered in WW II, the USSR government (especially under Stalin) would be unlikely to have been deterred by the loss of Kiev, say, or Leningrad. So were the early nukes thought of as a way of slowing down a conventional attack, or were they, as I have seen suggested, a way of upping the ante and ensuring the USA would get involved?
Oh, and could someone please and pretty please tell me how to do paragraph breaks? I've looked through the list of
vB codes more times than I can remember, and I'm beggared if I can see it.