The British independent nuclear deterrent, ‘Trident’, will apparently have to be decommissioned in twenty years time. A decision will have to be taken shortly regarding its replacement with modern American missile technology. At a cost of £20 billion, this is a decision with serious financial implications.
Britain likes being a nuclear power. It enables our politicians to ensure Britain’s continuing presence on the UN Security council, and gives an impression of military power which belies the extent of Britain’s actual martial strength. Of course, it’s all an exercise in smoke and mirrors. The nuclear deterrent is in no way independent; it is wholly reliant on American military and logistical support. Anyone who imagines that Britain could ever launch a nuclear strike without express American approval is living in cloud cuckoo land.
We are proposing to spend £20 billion on a technology which we can’t use without someone else’s permission. This strikes me as rather silly. It’s like buying a car when you know you won’t be allowed to drive it unless Uncle Nigel gives you the nod.
The politicians know this, but they’d much rather we didn’t. In the post cold war world there is no credible nuclear threat, and any proliferation to rogue Middle Eastern states is likely to be dealt with by the American and the Israelis. No one poses us a nuclear threat, so why do we need nuclear weapons? Should the need for a nuclear capacity exist at some indeterminate point in the future, I’m sure the capability could be acquired at short notice.
The truth is that politicians like nukes because they act as a fig leaf covering conventional military weakness. Let’s face it, the entire British army is less than half the size of the American Marine Corps alone, and our naval capacity has withered to the point where a repeat of the Falklands Campaign would be inconceivable.
Politicians don’t like to appear powerless; they like to look like big swinging dicks. That’s the real reason why £20 billion will be spent on something which we don’t need, are unlikely ever to need, and will be unable to use should we judge that the circumstances demand it. Ever get the feeling you’re being cheated?
32 comments:
You could see the merits of the UK having a nuclear deterrent back in the days of Cold War, but I can certainly think of better ways to spend £20bn.
The money would be much better deployed by investing in armed forces personnel - not technologies, real people who know how to act in war zones and on peace-keeping missions.
I suppose they could spend it on the NHS to no discernable effect.
It would be much more sensible to establish a Pepsi Max/Midget Gem fund from which all right thinking people would benefit.
Yes, or my pension fund.
I think it's about time the government started a "National Treat Fund" for people who have worked and contributed to apply to. You can apply for cash up to £50,000 for any purpose so long as you fit strict elligibility criteria, one of which is maintaining a certain level of NI contributions. Dolescum don't need to apply because they get given huge sums of cash for doing fuck all anyway.
Perhaps we should infect all the dolescum with Anthrax and put them on a ship bound for Iran. That would learn them.
Yeah, give people a real excuse to be off on the long term sick. Fuckers.
Disabilty cars. I've got a bit of a sore leg, and your knee hurts a bit. Why don't we get disability cars?
All you need is a bad back for a couple of weeks and they'll give you an extended council house (rent free) and a brand new people carrier.
Dolescum in people carriers. That's it, I'm buying a bazooka.
Why can't there be a revolution - a bit like the French had only with the working people wiping out the parasitic, greedy, lazy, scumbag wastes of space that are bleeding the rest of us dry?
I would so love that.
They have come down hard on the DLA folk here,most were Taxi drivers with their bloody big people carriers.
Believe it or not, there is one district in Glasgow where 3 out of 5 people are on disability benefit. I'll say that again, 3 out of 5.
That's like where I live. Every time a house comes free on this avenue, social services get hold of it and put a massive extension on it for "people with disabilities". There's nothing wrong with any of these fuckers and they all get free housing and free cars plus LOADS in benefits. It makes me fucking sick when I leave the house for work at 6.30 each day, and come home late to find them partying in the garden (in summertime). I'm essentially paying for them to have a 50 year free holiday. Fucking cunts, the lot of them and they want killing, the fucking parasitic fuckers!
Why can't there be a revolution - a bit like the French had only with the working people wiping out the parasitic, greedy, lazy, scumbag wastes of space that are bleeding the rest of us dry?
I would so love that.
I wonder if that would even been conceivable in this day and age. Hmm, point to ponder...
The problem with revolutions is that the very people they are intended to benefit end up getting screwed.
I don't want a guillotine, I'll settle for a tazer instead.
ah, the tazer.
on the surface i'm a woolly-minded liberal. underneath beats the heart of a true-blue right wing fundamentalist. i used to work for the sickness benefit dept and the claimants were, to a man, worthless spongeing lying lazy parasitic fucking bastards. i used to take great delight in bouncing the fuckers off the books and back into the market. amazing the amount of people whose "unemployment" runs out and then immediately develop a fabulously unquantifiable "bad back" or "depression".
makes me fucking sick. after all, they're diverting the money i'm spongeing for being a working single mother in receipt of tax credits....
Yes, tasers are the way forward. Or failing that, a cattle prod.
Somebody must answer my prayer!
Too true, Garf. Too true. :-(
The daft thing about benefits generally is that they provide a positive disincentive for people to find work. Above a certain point every extra pound earned results in one less pound in benefits. Mad.
I thought this post was supposed to be about nukes. How did we get into spongers and tazers?
Use of public money. If it doesn't go on defence, it'll probably end up going on worthless benefits scroungers.
Oh and most people have a mental taser; they kill with the power of the scowl. Or at leat they wish they could.
Perhaps defence development agencies should invent an intercontinental taser instead of nuclear missiles?
The old saying, "if looks could kill..."
The thing I want to know is what they'll be doing with all the old Trident's that they don't want any more.
Will we suddenly see loads of them on offer at the car boot sales? Or maybe as buy-1-get-1-free offers.
I'd like one.
If they appear on eBay, I'll definitely bid.
You can buy suitcase nukes in Tashkent. Perhaps you should get one and take out Blackpool. (ensuring that the winds not blowing in the direction of Barnsley)
I have it, on good authority, that the sea-breeze will carry the fall-out northwards.
Via Lancashire, if we time it right.
And he can't help having a dig at me. You are a P.I.G. PIG, piggy.
Oh,
Errm.
Hey ho.
What is it about saying the word 'nukes' that makes you feel stupid?
Of course, you can really yank it up a notch and pronounce them 'N'kes'.
Anyway, nukes are soooo last century, we need a new ultimate weapon, like one can be exploded over a country and give everyone instant ennui.
No exciting reason behind the deletion - simple double comment error.
And here's me thinking you were being controversial and calling Garfer a cock.
When's Blogger coming back?
Fuck's sake.
You have a point there, I couldn't say it out loud in public, but I don't mind it written down.
An 'ennui' weapon would be excellent. The enemy would lie about on sofas looking listless. We could be as obstreperous as we liked and the rape and pillage would be much easier.
Garfer - at the present time, you're right. But in 2040, with an agressively nuclear-armed modern Chinese fleet patrolling the Atlantic and their countless millions of expendable troops walking into India, then I'd want the option kept open. Anyway, Gordon spends more than £20 billion a year on fucking incapacity benefit alone. So be nice, taxpaying bloggers and give the Royal Navy some decent new toys, will you? God knows they're needed...
Fair pont Merkin. It just annoys me that the politicians witter on about our 'independent nuclear deterrent'. It's not, it's dependent om American technology and goodwill.
The french 'force de frappe' is independent. De Gaulle basically told the Yanks to go fuck temselves.
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