Submariner says he set out to expose nuke threat

A submariner who claimed to have footage of top secret files about Britain’s nuclear weapons on his phone appeared to have been learning Russian before he went on the run.

Able Seaman William McNeilly, 25, who published 30 alleged security and safety flaws with the Trident submarine fleet, said yesterday that he planned to hand himself in to the authorities but had yet to make good on his word yesterday.

In Facebook posts from an undisclosed location abroad, McNeilly said he had spent more than a year as a de facto spy, training to become a nuclear weapons engineer to gather as much information as possible on Trident missiles and submarines.

He said he had put in extra hours of study and skipped a dental operation to secure a place on a nuclear patrol in January as part of his plan to expose information about the deterrent, which he called ‘‘the biggest threat to the UK’’.

However, senior military sources dismissed the junior submariner as a ‘‘delusional self-publicist’’. There was nothing substantive to his claims, a senior military source said.

The police and Royal Navy are working to find McNeilly, although he is not thought to have committed any criminal act.

He has simply broken military law by going absent without leave.

The junior engineer, from Newtownabbey, near Belfast, flew out of Belfast City airport on May 7, two days after he put a report entitled The Secret Nuclear Threat on the internet, where it went unnoticed until it was picked up by a Scottish newspaper on Sunday. It is thought that he might have flown to Spain and then moved to Germany.

A search through his YouTube page revealed that he had shown an interest in Russian language lesson videos. A Royal Navy source said there was no reason for someone in his position to have needed Russian for his job.

One of the most potentially alarming revelations in his 18-page dossier, which was also published on the WikiLeaks website, was a claim that he had been able to record on his mobile phone what he described as the ‘‘instructions for the safety and security of the Trident II D5 strategic weapon system’’.

He said that he was able to slip unnoticed into the navigation centre while on the nuclear patrol with HMS Victorious between January and April.

‘‘I’m sure all the Strategic Weapon System (SWS) personnel are scratching their heads and wondering how I’m writing this on my personnel [sic] laptop and referencing a book, which is contained within a safe in the Missile Control Centre (MCC),’’ he wrote.

‘‘The MCC is the compartment used to control the launch of the nuclear missiles.

‘‘It can only be accessed by people on the access list, and no personnel [sic] electronics are allowed.

‘‘I was on the access list but how could I have gotten a copy of every single chapter on to my phone? A hidden camera? No. Smuggled the book out then filmed it? No. What I did was walk into a room where no recording devices are allowed. I sat down; took my Samsung Galaxy SII (white) out of my pocket, and recorded the entire book word for word.’’

The subsequent Facebook posts, written after he broke cover with his report, reveal a sense of paranoia and a belief that the leak would result in life imprisonment or assassination. The Ministry of Defence denies that anything he has revealed is a threat to national security.

In one, he released a picture of himself bare-chested from a secret location, saying: ‘‘Sorry for the Topless pic, but I can’t reveal my clothes. I’m just letting you know I’m alive and well.’’

The submariner said he could have sold the information, but decided to release it to raise awareness to prevent a nuclear catastrophe.

The ministry is investigating the claims and reviewing security measures.