BBC: The threat of a nuclear attack on the UK in the 1950s caused concern over the supply of tea, top-secret documents which have now been released reveal.
Government officials planning food supplies said the tea situation would be "very serious" after a nuclear war.
"It would be wrong to consider that even 1oz per head per week could be ensured," they stated.
The papers were released under the Freedom of Information Act by the National Archives at Kew.
Heart and health
The documents said a nuclear conflict would result in the loss of three-quarters of tea stocks.
One paper from April 1955 said: "The advent of thermonuclear weapons... has presented us with a new and much more difficult set of food defence problems."
The aim was to be "completely ready to maintain supplies of food to the people of these islands, sufficient in volume to keep them in good heart and health from the onset of a thermonuclear attack on this country". Nuclear Threat Sparked Tea Worry >>>
The Dawning of a New Dark Age (Paperback - UK)
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