Although the Vulcan was typically armed with nuclear weapons, it could also carry out conventional bombing missions, which it did in Operation Black Buck during the Falklands War between the United Kingdom and Argentina in 1982.

After retirement by the RAF, one example, B.2 XH558, named The Spirit of Great Britain, was restored for use in display flights and air shows, whilst two other B.2s, XL426 and XM655, have been kept in taxiable condition for ground runs and demonstrations.

[5] In January 1947, the Ministry of Supply distributed Specification B.35/46 to UK aviation companies to satisfy Air Staff Operational Requirement OR.229 for "a medium range bomber landplane capable of carrying one 10,000 lb (4,500 kg) bomb to a target 1,500 nautical miles (1,700 mi; 2,800 km) from a base which may be anywhere in the world."

The estimated weight was now only 50% over the requirement; a delta shape resulted from reducing the wingspan and maintaining the wing area by filling in the space between the wingtips, which enabled the specification to be met.

[16] The first 707, VX784, flew in September 1949, but crashed later that month, killing the Aeroplane and Armament Experimental Establishment's chief test pilot Squadron Leader Samuel Eric Esler, DFC, AE.

[19] Due to the delay of the 707 programme, the contribution of the 707B and 707A towards the basic design of the 698 was not considered significant,[20] though it did highlight a need to increase the length of the nosewheel to give a ground incidence of 3.5°, the optimum take-off attitude.

This necessitated a wing redesign incorporating a cranked and drooped leading edge and vortex generators to avoid the onset of compressibility drag, which would have restricted the maximum speed.

Painted gloss white, the 698 prototype VX770, with its pure delta wing, flew for the first time on 30 August 1952 piloted by Roly Falk flying solo.

[27] In January 1953, VX770 was grounded for the installation of wing fuel tanks, Armstrong Siddeley ASSa.6 Sapphire engines of 7,500 lbf (33 kN) thrust and other systems; it flew again in July 1953.

More representative of production aircraft, it was lengthened to accommodate a longer nose undercarriage leg to increase the angle of attack of the wing, shortening the take-off run.

It was repaired, fitted with Olympus 101 engines of 11,000 lbf (49 kN) thrust before resuming trials with Avro and the Aeroplane and Armament Experimental Establishment (A&AEE) at Boscombe Down.

[41] As far back as 1952, Bristol Aero Engines had begun development of the BOl.6 (Olympus 6) rated at 16,000 lbf (71 kN) thrust[42] but if fitted to the B.1, this would have reintroduced the buffet requiring further redesign of the wing.

[45] The increasing sophistication of Soviet air defences required the fitting of electronic countermeasure (ECM) equipment, and vulnerability could be reduced by the introduction of the Avro Blue Steel stand-off missile, then in development.

[62] The Gnats were to have been released in enemy airspace to provide fighter cover, and they were expected to land "in friendly territory" or return to the Vulcan to replenish their tanks by means of a specially installed flight-refuelling drogue.

[65] Political pressure for a Canberra replacement came to a head in 1962, by which time agile, supersonic bombers/strategic strike aircraft, such as the North American A-5 Vigilante, BAC TSR-2, General Dynamics F-111, had become available.

The visual bomb-aimer's compartment could be fitted with a T4 (Blue Devil) bombsight,[76] in many B.2s, this space housed a vertically mounted Vinten F95 Mk.10 camera for assessing simulated low-level bombing runs.

[79] Despite being designed before a low radar cross-section and other stealth factors were ever a consideration,[80] an RAE technical note of 1957 stated that of all the aircraft so far studied, the Vulcan appeared by far the simplest radar-echoing object, due to its shape; only one or two components contributed significantly to the echo at any aspect, compared with three or more on most other types.

[86] With the adoption of low-level attack profiles in the mid-1960s, B.1As and B.2s were given a glossy sea grey medium and dark green disruptive pattern camouflage on the upper surfaces, white undersurfaces, and "type D" roundels.

[96] The bulk of the equipment was carried in a large, extended tail cone, and a flat ECM aerial counterpoise plate was mounted between the starboard tailpipes.

[143] The UK had already embarked on its own hydrogen bomb programme, and to bridge the gap until these were ready the V-bombers were equipped with an Interim Megaton Weapon based on the Blue Danube casing containing Green Grass, a large pure-fission warhead of 400-kiloton-of-TNT (1.7 PJ) yield.

[149] From 1962 onwards, two jets in every RAF bomber base were armed with nuclear weapons and on standby permanently under the principle of Quick Reaction Alert (QRA).

[149] Vulcans on QRA were to be airborne within four minutes of receiving an alert, as this was identified as the amount of time between warning of a USSR nuclear strike being launched and it arriving in Britain.

[150] The closest the Vulcan came to taking part in potential nuclear conflict was during the Cuban Missile Crisis in October 1962, where Bomber Command was moved to Alert Condition 3, an increased state of preparedness from normal operations; however, it stood down in early November.

To supplement it until the Royal Navy took on the deterrent role with Polaris SLBM-equipped submarines, the Vulcan bombers adopted a new mission profile of flying high during clear transit, dropping down low to avoid enemy defences on approach, and deploying a parachute-retarded bomb, the WE.177B.

RAF Air Vice Marshal Ron Dick, a former Vulcan pilot, said "it is [thus] questionable whether it could have been effective flying at low level in a war against ... the Soviet Union.

The missions performed by the Vulcan became known as the Black Buck raids, each aircraft had to fly 3,889 mi (6,259 km) from Ascension Island to reach Stanley on the Falklands.

After a mayday call, the Vulcan, escorted by Brazilian Air Force Northrop F-5 fighters, was permitted an emergency landing at Rio with very little fuel left on board.

[169][N 7] The squadron carried out patrols of the seas around the British Isles, including the strategically important GIUK gap between Iceland and the United Kingdom, flying at high level and using the Vulcan's H2S radar to monitor shipping.

[56] This involved flying through plumes of airborne contamination and using onboard equipment to collect fallout released from both above ground and underground nuclear tests for later analysis at the Atomic Weapons Research Establishment at Aldermaston.

The Vulcan tanker conversion was accomplished by removing the jammers from the ECM bay in the tail of the aircraft and replacing them with a single hose drum unit.