RAF Menwith Hill
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RAF Menwith Hill is a military base in the United Kingdom, located approximately eight miles west of the Yorkshire town of Harrogate. It is understood to be an intelligence-gathering base.
[edit] History
Menwith Hill Station was opened by U.S. Army in 1960 on 545 acres of land acquired by the British War Office in 1954 and leased to the United States. Under the U.S. Army, the station monitored High Frequency radio communications, it is now operated by the United States Air Force and has grown to become the world's largest intelligence-gathering ground station outside the US. Nominally a British Royal Air Force facility, only physical security and UK liaison functions are carried out by MoD personnel, the vast majority of the staff being British GCHQ, American civil service employees, government contractors, as well as U.S. military personnel. The base was also known as Field station F83. Two similar facilities appear to exist at Pine Gap, Australia and Buckley Air Force Base, near Denver, Colorado.
Up until 2003 the base had a Royal Navy equivalent nearby, HMS Forest Moor. This has since been decommissioned as a Naval base and is now run by civilian contractors with MoD assistance.
The base is highly recognisable by its several dozen radomes ('golf balls'), each containing a satellite dish. Many of these are used for signals interception from communications satellites and are commonly thought to be part of the ECHELON system. Other parts of the site are thought to be used by the Space Based Infrared System employed by the US National Missile Defence program. The latter use of the base, alongside the joint US/UK radar station at RAF Fylingdales was particularly controversial.
The base has attracted significant levels of protest from anti-nuclear and pacifist groups.[citation needed] Some groups have, in an effort to disrupt and focus attention on the activities of the base, staged frequent infiltrations and vandalism to the various radomes.
[edit] See also
- List of RAF stations
- United States Air Forces in Europe
- United States Air Force in the United Kingdom
[edit] External links
- Intelligence Resource Program of Federation of American Scientists
- Yorkshire CND's Menwith Hill Site
- PhD Thesis about SIGINT activities at Menwith Hill and other UK sites
- Big Brother Capabilities in an Online World. State Surveillance in the Internet (academic dissertation)
- The Battle of Menwith Hill (Signals Intelligence and the 9/11 Attacks)
- UK Secret Bases
- References in SPECTRE
- RAF Menwith Hill on Google Maps
- RAF Menwith Hill on local.live.com (better resolution than Google Maps)
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| ACTIVE BASES: | RAF Alconbury (USAFE) • RAF Barford St John (USAFE) • RAF Blenheim Crescent (USAFE) • RAF Croughton (USAFE) • RAF Fairford (USAFE) • RAF Feltwell (USAFE) • RAF Lakenheath (SAC/USAFE) • RAF Menwith Hill (USAFE) • RAF Mildenhall (SAC/USAFE/AMC) • RAF Molesworth (SAC/USAFE) • RAF Upwood (USAFE) • RAF Welford (USAFE) |
| INACTIVE BASES: | RAF Bentwaters (USAFE) • RAF Burtonwood (AFMC) • RAF Chelveston (SAC/USAFE) • RAF Chicksands (USAFSS) • RAF Daws Hill (SAC) • RAF Greenham Common (SAC/USAFE) • RAF Manston (USAFE) • RAF Sculthorpe (SAC) • RAF Shepherds Grove (USAFE) • RAF Upper Heyford (SAC/USAFE) • RAF Wethersfield (USAFE) • RAF Woodbridge (USAFE) |
| ACTIVE ORGANIZATIONS: | United States Air Forces in Europe • HQ Air Command Europe • Third Air Force • 48th Fighter Wing (USAFE) • 100th Air Refueling Wing (USAFE) • 501st Combat Support Wing (USAFE) |
| PAST ORGANIZATIONS: | Sixteenth Air Force |
Categories: Articles lacking sources from January 2007 | All articles lacking sources | Articles with unsourced statements since February 2007 | All articles with unsourced statements | Royal Air Force stations | Telecommunications in the United Kingdom | NSA facilities | UKUSA listening stations | Domes
