No, not THAT spectre. Nor that one, either.
No, I’m talking about nuclear war with Russia.
Vulnerability
Trident – weak defence
The Conservative-led government of austerity Britain is facing the sacrifice of its sacred cow of high military spending—to preserve the even more precious elephant in the room: the UK’s ‘independent’ nuclear weapon.
Changing threats and shrinking budgets: something has to give
Defense budgets have hit the headlines again this week, as United States Permanent Representative to the United Nations, Samantha Power, flew to Brussels to urge European nations to rethink their defense spending plans.
Carrington Series: Trident Renewal and Continuous-at-Sea Deterrence
On 4th March 2015, Chatham House hosted an invitation-only event in the Carrington Series on Trident renewal and continuous at sea deterrence.
BASIC response to ‘Retiring Trident’
Today Centre Forum published the report ‘Retiring Trident: An alternative proposal for UK nuclear deterrence’ by Toby Fenwick. This report is an important and timely contribution to the debate on options facing an incoming government. BASIC does not endorse this option specifically, though the paper is well argued and an excellent response to those who assert that like-for-like replacement of Trident is the only credible nuclear weapons option for the United Kingdom.
If we want a nuclear weapons free world then we need to change the rules of the game
Representatives from China, France, Russia, the US and UK (the five official nuclear weapon states under the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty), convened in London last week for a meeting of the so-called ‘P5 process’.
A dangerous game of symbolism we could do without
Nuclear weapons have become symbolic weapons, for display only. They are not weapons of war. They have played no part in the wars of the last few decades. When nations felt threatened, they did not look to their nuclear arsenals for a sense of security.
Complacency is slowly killing the non-proliferation regime
Fatalism over the chances of achieving agreement on nuclear disarmament and non-proliferation is symptomatic of a failure that goes deeper than the inefficiencies of the diplomatic process.