Controlling Our Own Nuclear Weapons and Their Use

Disagreeing with Field Marshal Lord Bramall, General Lord Ramsbotham, and General Sir Hugh Beach is unwise but essential. Their letter to the Times, stating:

Should this country ever become subject to some sort of nuclear blackmail — from a terrorist group for example — it must be asked in what way, and against whom, our nuclear weapons could be used, or even threatened, to deter or punish. Nuclear weapons have shown themselves to be completely useless as a deterrent to the threats and scale of violence we currently, or are likely to, face — particularly international terrorism; and the more you analyse them the more unusable they appear.
The much cited “seat at the top table” no longer has the resonance it once did. Political clout derives much more from economic strength. Even major-player status in the international military scene is more likely to find expression through effective, strategically mobile conventional forces, capable of taking out pinpoint targets, than through the possession of unusable nuclear weapons. Our independent deterrent has become virtually irrelevant except in the context of domestic politics. Rather than perpetuating Trident, the case is much stronger for funding our Armed Forces with what they need to meet the commitments actually laid upon them. In the present economic climate it may well prove impossible to afford both.

sounds reasonable only under assumptions it is unwise to adopt.

A State armed with nuclear weapons and delivery systems is invariably to be treated differently from one that is not. Look at North Korea and the circumspection with which its real weapons of mass destruction led it to be treated and compare what happened to Iraq with no weapons of mass destruction. Nuclear weapons prevent regime change imposition from outside. That is what they are for. And as we have seen, they work.

If the argument is that the United Kingdom does not have nuclear weapons but is merely a nuclear weapons base which is wholly under United States control then the discussion should not be carried on in terms of the ineffectiveness of nuclear deterrence. We should consider if we wish to obtain control over the weapons sited in the UK, if we wish to pay for weapons sited here that we do not control, and if the money we pay for other states' weapons-siting might be better spent equipping our own forces for the kinds of conflicts they face or are likely to face.

It is not inconceivable that other states or even non-state entities might wish to achieve regime-change in our country. There is nothing like a nuclear armed submarine or ICBM to put them off. So let's be sure we can use them when we want to, without reference to any other state. And let's choose other conflicts in which we become involved to fit our budget and our own interests a great deal more closely than has been done under New Labour.