Deciding where to run the game was key.
We wanted to simulate the government’s emergency Cobra meeting, chaired by our fictional prime minister and held in a bunker.
We also needed a second room to be a pretend Permanent Joint Headquarters (PJHQ) for the military.
Finally, we had to create a Kremlin, where our Russian president would assemble with this team.
Tortoise Media agreed to turn the basement of their building into the set of The Wargame.
Concern from Home Secretary Amber Rudd
Concern from Home Secretary Amber Rudd
It has a web of corridors that connect to multiple rooms, making the site an ideal venue.
The largest underground room was used for the Cobra (Cabinet Office Briefing Room) crisis meetings, with ministers and top officials positioned around a long table.
A bank of screens lines the wall at one end of the room. Maps can be displayed on the screens.
The foreign secretary and national security advisor in The Wargame
The foreign secretary and national security advisor in The Wargame
Crucially, they also provide a video link for the Cobra team to request a call with an imagined US secretary of state as well as the head of the NATO alliance whenever they choose.
James Shield, a producer at Tortoise, asked Professor Phillips O’Brien, the head of international studies at the University of St Andrews, to be our top American diplomat.
Elisabeth Braw, a leading expert on security and defence, plays the NATO chief.
The Wargame’s NATO Secretary-General, Elisabeth Braw
The Wargame’s NATO Secretary-General, Elisabeth Braw
Across a narrow corridor from the Cobra meeting area is a smaller room, which we pretend is the military headquarters.
This is where our chief of joint operations and a team of six advisers, with expertise in defence, security and national resilience, assemble.
At the other end of the basement, along a corridor and through two doors, in another fairly large room, we establish the Russia side.