Thursday, June 02, 2005

GCHQ, Cheltenham, Gloucestershire

Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ) is an intelligence and security organisation which reports to the Foreign Secretary and works closely with the UK's other intelligence agencies (commonly known as MI5 and MI6).

GCHQ moved to Cheltenham in 1952. The local residents referred to it as 'the Foreign Office' for many years and were discreet about the secret organisation in their midst which was still largely unheard of outside Whitehall and the Cotswolds.

GCHQ made a major breakthrough in the field of secure communications in 1973 when it developed what is now known as public-key encryption.
GCHQ aerial photograph
A Conflict of Loyalties: GCHQ 1984-1991
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4 comments:

  1. Anonymous4:35 PM

    Doesn't look like that anymore...

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  2. Anonymous11:02 PM

    I went there last year, it's really really run down. The huts are all broken and leaking.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Christopher2:14 AM

    They want you to think it's all broken and leaking... GCHQ is very much alive and well, I know people who are working in the R&D departments there fresh out of Uni courses, having being headhunted (but you didn't hear that from me, GCHQ doesn't exist and I was never even born alright sunshine?)

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  4. Christopher2:15 AM

    Plus most of the important things are underground, such as the GCHQ command bunker, where the UK's armed nuclear response would be coordinated and launched in the event of war or attack from a foreign nation. Forgot to add that.

    ReplyDelete

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