60 Faces: Hugh Beach -

General Sir William Gerald Hugh Beach, GBE, KCB, MC is a former British Army officer who now researches and advises on defence policy, arms control and disarmament. He has made important contributions to CND’s work, most recently writing a section for our Security not Trident report.

Beach joined the Corps of Royal Engineers in 1941, seeing active service in the Second World War. He went on to senior posts in the Armed Forces and the Ministry of Defence.

In January 2009, The Times newspaper published a letter from military figures, including General Beach, arguing that the UK government should fund more realistic military needs rather than perpetuate its Trident programme, arguing that: ‘Nuclear weapons have shown themselves to be completely useless as a deterrent to the threats and scale of violence we currently, or are likely to, face — particularly international terrorism; and the more you analyse them the more unusable they appear.’

What is 60 faces of CND?
2018 is the 60th anniversary of the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament.

Founded in 1958 at the height of the Cold War, CND has been a powerful collective voice against the dangers of nuclear weapons.

CND’s greatest strength has always been its members.
Incredible people have shaped our history,
our present and will continue to inspire in the future.

Here we take a look at 60 Faces of CND,
60 people who represent all the millions of people
who have campaigned for nuclear disarmament over the decades
and have made our organisation so remarkable.

60 Faces homepage