Should the UK renew the Trident system? (1)
Trident, the UK ‘s nuclear weapons system, is a submarine-launched ballistic missile (SLBM) system consisting of four British-built Vanguard class nuclear-powered submarines each carrying up to 16 US Trident II D5 missiles.
There are around three British-built nuclear warheads mounted on every missile making about 48 warheads carried by each submarine. Each warhead can be aimed at a different target and each warhead is estimated to have the explosive power of 100 kilotons. This is around eight times the explosive power of the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima in 1945.
Trident will become obsolete around 2025. The government is soon to make a decision on whether or not to replace or extend its service life.
Following the statement today by the Prime Minister, the pressure group Compass has launched a consultation and presents useful summary of the relevant information here.
I remained unconvinced of the need to renew the Trident system. It may well have been a deterrent during the Cold War, but that conflict is over. I believe that the military and economic case for renewal is deeply flawed. There is perhaps a political case that possessing such weapons gives us some kind of weight at the international table, but set against that is the encouragement retaining such strategic nuclear weapons would give to those states which do not already possess them.
December 4th, 2006 at 11:09 pm
The short answer is ‘NO’ and the long answer is ‘NO’. I was never sure we needed them in the first place and still remain unconvinced. Really have better things to do with the money and I can think of plenty.
December 8th, 2006 at 9:32 pm
OK, let’s say you’re right. The same logic would apply equally well to the other democracies which possess nuclear weapons — the USA, France, India and Israel.
I guess you’d have no objection to them disarming unilaterally as well. (Otherwise, you’re asking the US in particular to pay for defending Britain, for providing it with a nuclear umbrella.)
But when you disarm unilaterally, the problem is that you have no guarantee that the other guys would disarm.
That would require an international agreement.
So, you’d disarm Britain, and have no objection to the US, France, etc., disarming as well, leaving us in a world where perhaps only Iran, Pakistan, North Korea, Russia and China possess nuclear weapons.
I can’t imagine that’s what you’d want.
The solution is not unilateral disarmament by Britain or any of the other democracies, but an agreed mutual disarmament involving all the nuclear powers.
I for one don’t want to live in a world where only rogue states possess nuclear weapons because the rest of us consider the weapons too horrible to use.
December 9th, 2006 at 12:57 am
Eric,
I have no objection to any country disarming unilaterally and never have had. I have asked none of the states we class os friendly to provide me with nuclear cover and would never do so.
However, I have two questions to ask you – 1: Could you press the button for a first strike?
2: Would you press the button and send people to oblivion in retaliation for a strike on us, by either a friendly, an unfriendly or a mistake?
December 9th, 2006 at 10:47 am
First strike? No, of course not. The point of the weapons is to threaten to use them in retaliation — what used to be called “mutually assured destruction”. It’s a horrible idea and a worse acronym, but it did work for several decades of the Cold War.
Anyone threatening a democratic country (including all NATO members) should be aware that they will be hit back by massive force.
As for the second question, would I be willing to cause the deaths of thousands — if I answered no, I’d be a pacifist. But I’m not a pacifist. I believe that a strong defense is the best guarantee that an aggressor will not attack, and this is why I support Nato.
I am a citizen of two countries and reside in a third; all three countries have nuclear weapons. None of them can be easily bullied or blackmailed by aggressors, and this in my view is a good thing.
The history of the last century teaches us that the surest way to provoke war, and to ensure the deaths of many innocents, is to follow the path of appeasement and unilateral disarmament.
December 9th, 2006 at 1:20 pm
I understand the argument, Eric, but the logic of this argument is that, if ‘bad’ states have (or are believed to have) strategic nuclear weapons, so should ‘good’ states. This is an argument for nuclear proliferation. If North Korea has the bomb, why shouldn’t South Korea? If Israel has the bomb, why shouldn’t Iran acquire it?
To convert the argument into everyday terms, if some bad guys have (or might have) guns, it could be argued that all good guys should be free to carry guns – the US model with familiar consequences. Most countries take the view that guns are bad and should only be legitimately possessed by the police.
Reverting to the nuclear weapons issue, whether it likes it or not, the USA is the world’s policeman until the day that the United Nations can effectively take on that role. I would like nuclear weapons to be taken off the face of the earth, but I know that this is totally unrealistic – so, for the moment, let’s minimise their proliferation.
Militarily the UK no more needs an independent strategic nuclear force than Italy or Germany or Japan – all of which are comparable economic powers.
December 11th, 2006 at 12:01 pm
slight correction.
the vanguard class is typically fitted with upto TWELVE warheads and not three as indicated in the question.
having worked in the defence industry all my working life, I have to disagree with you Roger.
I can say that there is a very strong view in my experience that having a nuclear deterrent is essential given our role and committmentsacross the world.
Lets not be simple: Rouge states will support terrorists who plan to destroy democracy and free will. It is quite clear that a full scale retalliation from UK would be unlikely however it remains obvious that the option on the table so long as we HAVE the detterent. Thus rouge states would surely have to consider this before, during and beyond their support for terrorist organisations.
The removal of the deterrent without doubt removes the obligation for consideration by rouge state governements and with it, the restraint that has probably avoided a nuclear incident thus so far.
Let us be clear, nuclear material is here, now. If terrorists seek to acuire it they can. The issue is one of who supplied them and the scope of retalliation from the UK !!!
We MUST retain the deterrent until the world situation refocuses into a more friendly environment. To do anything else is placing a bullseye on the map of the UK.
Sorry Roger, you are wrong.
December 29th, 2006 at 4:47 pm
Roger,
The root of the problem is that you can’t uninvent the Bomb, so the best we can hope for is to contain the risks of it’s ever again being used.
On the basis that no advanced democracy is ever likely to start a nuclear war, the posession of the Bomb by such countries actually makes a nuclear exchange LESS likely because of the MAD / deterrent effect.
Of course there are limits to deterrence. It worked in the Cold War because the other side were also at bottom, certainly following the death of Stalin, led by rational, if still deeply unpleasant, people. The rulers of states such as North Korea do not necessarily fall into such a category.
There is a powerful case for encouraging and enforcing non proliferation. Nations that violate the NPT must bear severe consequences and it is disappointing that the US has undermined it in relation to India (although I am sympatetic to India’s view that it requires the Bomb to counter China’s and Pakistan’s – the pity is that they never felt they could rely on Britain and America to protect them from nuclear blackmail).
I have never seriously believed that a British PM would have pressed the button in any circumstances. The only scenario I can concieve the British Bomb being used would be in the event that our submarines failed to pick up the Today programme three days in a row, or whatever the current indicator that the home country has been annilated may be.
At root Eric is right. Whether Attlee and Bevin were right to make us a nuclear state in the first place is beside the point. We are one and we have obligations, as signatories of the NPT just as non nuclear signatories have. There are very obvious reasons why Germany and Japan never built the Bomb, but they and other democracies such as Australia, Brazil and Turkey, shelter under the nuclear umbrella of those democracies that did. The implied contract of the NPT is that the non nuclear states do not need the Bomb because the existing nuclear powers will protect them from nuclear blackmail. Putting all our eggs in the American basket makes little sense however pro American one is.
The issue under discussion in Parliament now is primarily about renewing the platform which carries our deterrent. We are talking about starting work on new submarines which will not come into service for over a decade. If the international situation changes substantially, then parliament can react, Equally, thanks to the fact that for the first time ever we are having a vote on these issues in parliament, if there ever arises a unilateralist majority in parliament it will count. The Labour manifesto on which the 2005 General Election was won re-iterated the Party’s committment “to retaining the United Kingdom’s independent nuclear deterrent”. The government is fulfilling that committment, but for the first time ever they are involving parliament. That is commendable.