On a prime minister’s first day in office, they are taken into a top secret meeting and asked to make a plan in case of nuclear attack.
Kate Fall, David Cameron’s ‘gatekeeper’ and deputy chief of staff, remembers that moment because she was firmly ushered out of the PM’s den: “I was told categorically: ‘No. This next meeting – no one else is allowed.'”
A senior military official explains the capabilities of the UK’s trident nuclear missiles. The new PM is then asked to hand-write ‘letters of last resort’ to the commanders of the UK’s four Vanguard submarines, with orders of how to respond if the British government has been incapacitated by an enemy nuclear strike.
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Suddenly, a politician who could always defer upwards has no one more senior to consult.
“You are at the centre of the storm”, says Kate Fall of the incomparable pressure of the job. “It’s the…
