Blair’s nuclear proliferation
Blair and Brown are rushing their plan through
parliament to update Britain’s nuclear weapons. At an initial cost of
£20 billion, the 160 warheads will have the combined destructive force
of 1,280 Hiroshimas. Alternatively, that money could pay for hundreds of
thousands of nurses and teachers, and provide other essential social
services. LYNN WALSH reports.
TONY BLAIR IS determined to commit Britain to a new
Trident missile system before he leaves office later this year. Gordon
Brown supports this programme, which is likely to cost £76 billion over
its lifetime.
There is the charade of a public debate, while in
reality the white paper, The Future of the UK’s Nuclear Deterrent, was
rubber-stamped by the cabinet and will no doubt, with Tory support, be
rubber-stamped by parliament in March.
Blair is proposing a new arsenal of about 160
nuclear warheads, to be launched from US Trident missiles based on four
British-made submarines. Currently, each Trident warhead has around
eight times the explosive power of the Hiroshima bomb, which killed over
80,000 people.
This grotesque arsenal, claims Blair, is required as
an "ultimate insurance policy" in an "uncertain and dangerous" world.
But the case made in the white paper and by Blair is completely
threadbare. Blair himself describes the risk of Britain being threatened
by an existing nuclear power (presumably either Russia or China) or by
an emerging regional power (such as North Korea or Iran) as "not
non-existent". There is no recognition that any such nuclear threat to
Britain could only arise as part of an international crisis – in which
Britain’s relatively small nuclear arsenal would be a completely
marginal factor. Moreover, the risk to Britain of rogue states
sponsoring nuclear terrorism is described by Blair as "not wholly
fanciful". Yet, on the basis of these alleged risks, British taxpayers
will be billed for the most expensive nuclear insurance policy ever.
The government estimates that the new Trident system
will cost between £15 billion and £20 billion (mainly occurring between
2012-27). Other experts calculate that the system will cost at least £25
billion. Adding up the total commissioning and running costs over the
lifetime of the new system, the total bill will be in the region of £76
billion.
Clearly, any public money spent on Trident will not
be spent on the improvement of public services, such as health
provision, education, and the basic state pension. The Campaign for
Nuclear Disarmament (CND) has calculated that £25 billion would pay for:
120,000 nurses every year for the next ten years, scrapping student
top-up fees for the next decade, 60,000 teachers every year for the next
20 years, 100,000 extra fire-fighters every year for a decade,
protecting 360 million hectares of rainforest, 100,000 extra midwives
every year for ten years. The £76 billion overall commissioning and
running costs would pay for a lot more social provision.
Trident should be scrapped now. The so-called
‘independent nuclear deterrent’ has nothing to do with the security and
wellbeing of people in Britain. Possession of a nuclear arsenal is all
about the power and prestige of the ruling class and its political
elite.
A fait accompli
BLAIR CLAIMS HE welcomes a debate on the renewal of
Britain’s ‘nuclear deterrent’. Superficially, it is true, Blair’s
approach has been more open than past Labour or Tory prime ministers. In
1947, the Labour prime minister, Clement Attlee, set up a special
cabinet subcommittee which decided to build a British nuclear bomb. In
the 1970s, Labour premier, James Callaghan, referred the issue of
upgrading British nuclear warheads to an informal ministerial group of
four, which secretly decided to adopt the so-called Chevaline programme,
a decision that only became public under the subsequent Thatcher
government. Margaret Thatcher herself appointed a five-person Trident
group to discuss nuclear weapons’ policy. The decision to launch the
Trident system only came out a year or so later because of a report in
the New York Times. In contrast, Blair, fully supported by Brown, has
come out in the open about his intention to commission a new generation
of Trident submarines and missiles.
In the past, neither Labour nor Tory leaders were
prepared to leave key issues of defence policy, of vital interest for
the ruling class, to be subject to challenge, let alone veto, by
parliament. Blair has been open because he is confident of rushing it
through parliament with the minimum of scrutiny.
In fact, on the replacement of the Trident system,
Blair has presented his cabinet and parliament with a fait accompli.
Public debate will follow a decision to commit the government to
a massively expensive Trident replacement programme. The public
discussion is merely window-dressing.
Even the pro-Tory Daily Telegraph, which supports
replacement of Trident, criticised Blair’s "unseemly haste": "A cabinet
discussion of less than an hour ten days ago was rubber-stamped in
Downing Street yesterday morning. A Commons vote will follow early in
the new year. Why the rush?" (5 December 2006) The cabinet was allowed
to discuss the issue only after a defence white paper arguing for a
single option of a new generation of Trident had already been published.
Blair has been determined to prevent any alternative
options, such as a much cheaper option of upgrading the current Trident
submarines and missiles. This option is favoured by some of the military
tops, who fear that expenditure on a new Trident system will drain cash
from conventional forces, currently overstretched by Blair’s
interventionist policy in Afghanistan, Iraq and elsewhere.
The Trident system consists of US-made missiles
armed with British-made nuclear warheads, and based on four British-made
submarines. The warheads are made and maintained at the Atomic Weapons
Research Establishment (AWRE) at Aldermaston in Berkshire. A massive new
development has already been started at this site, clearly in
preparation for a new generation of nuclear weapons. The AWRE project is
said to be on the scale of the new Terminal Five at Heathrow, costing
£4.2 billion, and described as "one of the biggest construction projects
ever undertaken in Britain".
The commencement of this massive AWRE project
indicates that Blair and Brown already assume that the Trident renewal
will be going ahead. Blair is confident of a majority in parliament, as
the Tories will be supporting New Labour’s nuclear policy. Only about 50
Labour MPs are expected to vote against a new Trident system – an
indication of just how far to the right the Labour Party has swung.
Remember the days when Labour leaders supported CND?
In 1983, Blair said: "We don’t need dangerous and costly Trident and
cruise missiles". In 1984, Brown described nuclear weapons as
"Unacceptable, expensive, economically wasteful and militarily unsound".
Rationale?
WHAT IS BLAIR’S rationale for the modernisation of
Trident? During the ‘cold war’ from the end of the second world war
until the collapse of the Soviet Union after 1989, the argument for
nuclear weapons put forward by capitalist leaders was relatively clear.
Two rival blocs competed for economic, strategic and political
influence: the West, dominated by US imperialism, and the Eastern bloc,
dominated by the Soviet Union, a bureaucratic dictatorship ruling over a
centrally planned economy. There was a race to stockpile ever more
sophisticated and destructive nuclear weaponry, led by the US, followed
by the Soviet bureaucracy. ‘Mutually Assured Destruction’, the capacity
for massive retaliation to any ‘first strike’, ruled out nuclear war as
a rational choice. The certainty of retaliation made a decision to
launch a nuclear strike the equivalent of suicide for the regime
concerned. Even so, it is now clear that the world came dangerously
close to nuclear destruction on several occasions, notably during the
Cuban missile crisis of 1962.
Although, barring an horrendous accident, nuclear
weapons ruled out world war between the superpowers, the nuclear
arsenals of the US, Britain, France, Russia, China and Israel did not
prevent a whole series of ‘small’ wars (including the Korean and Vietnam
wars) which claimed the lives of between 20 and 30 million people during
the so-called cold war. Nevertheless, political leaders in the West,
including Britain, were able to point to the threat of ‘totalitarian
communism’ – that is, the Stalinist systems of the Soviet Union, Eastern
Europe and China – as a justification for maintaining nuclear arsenals
as a ‘deterrent’ against attack.
Even during the cold war period, however, Britain’s
so-called ‘independent British deterrent’ was really an expensive
appendage to the US’s mighty arsenal. British nuclear weaponry was puny
compared to that of the US and the Soviet Union. British weapons were
effectively leased from the US, and their operation depended on US
technical support. Moreover, it was inconceivable that Britain would act
independently of the US on vital strategic issues. The Eden government’s
ill-fated Suez adventure in 1956 was the last time British imperialism
attempted to go it alone without US approval (see Socialism Today No.104
article, The Suez Fiasco).
From the post-war Attlee government onwards,
successive British governments maintained nuclear arsenals, not
primarily for defence, but to retain membership of the nuclear club, to
perpetuate the illusion of Britain as a ‘great power’.
In the post-cold war world, it is much more
difficult for capitalist leaders to make a plausible case for nuclear
weapons. The white paper produced in December argues that "we cannot
rule out the risk either that a major direct nuclear threat to the UK’s
vital interests will re-emerge [from Russia? or China?] or that new
states will emerge that possess a more limited nuclear capability, but
one that could pose a grave threat to our vital interests". The second
threat presumably refers to regional ‘rogue states’, such as North Korea
and Iran, that possess or are in the process of developing nuclear
weapons.
A third threat, it is claimed, "is a risk that some
countries might in future seek to sponsor nuclear terrorism from their
soil. We must not allow such states to threaten our national security…"
These arguments have been answered by Roy Hattersley,
formerly a right-wing member of the ‘Old Labour’ leadership and an
inveterate ‘cold warrior’ (pro-American, anti-Soviet) who supported
Britain’s nuclear weapons. Now, he says, nuclear weapons "are irrelevant
to Britain’s defence". Writing in The Guardian (4 December 2006), he
argues: "Supposing that we are under threat from ‘rogue states’ as well
as ‘international terrorists’, does anyone really imagine that either of
these enemies will be deterred in the way that the Soviet Union once
was? If bin Laden or al Qa’ida are the enemy, on whom are we to threaten
to unleash the holocaust? If it is Iran and North Korea that concerns
us, is it remotely possible that these countries will react to the
balance of terror as the Soviet Union did in the 1950s and 1960s? Our
complaint against them is that they do not behave as rational states
behave. Why should they respond rationally to a nuclear threat?
"The whole idea is clearly a fantasy. So why does
the government propose to squander billions of pounds that could be
useful to fulfil the social purposes that ought to be Labour’s
overwhelming priority?"
Referring to ‘rogue governments’ potentially
‘aiding’ terrorists, Blair himself had to admit "it’s improbable but no
one can say it’s impossible". (Parliamentary debate, 4 December 2006)
Blair’s case lacks all credibility. Britain’s
nuclear arsenal, for instance, did not prevent the occupation of the
Falklands/Malvinas in 1982 by Argentina’s Galtieri regime. Nuclear
weapons did not protect the exiled Litvinenko being murdered last year
by means of highly toxic radioactive polonium – by assassins apparently
sponsored by either a rogue state or a criminal organisation.
A grotesque arsenal of over 10,000 nuclear weapons
has not saved US imperialism from defeat in Iraq at the hands of an
insurgency using small arms and improvised explosive devices. Nor has
the nuclear-armed US been able to prevent the development of nuclear
weapons by states like Pakistan or, more recently, North Korea (which
now has at least a crude nuclear weapon of some kind).
Weapons of prestige
CALLING FOR THE ‘modernisation’ of Trident, New
Labour’s Blair is following in the footsteps of previous Old Labour
premiers – Attlee, Wilson and Callaghan – renewing an expensive
commitment to Britain’s ‘independent nuclear deterrent’. The real
motive, nowhere stated in the white paper or Blair’s speeches, is
prestige. Prestige is the aura of power, which leaders strive to blow up
beyond their real economic and strategic base. ‘Prestige’ comes from the
same Latin root as ‘prestidigitation’, the old-fashioned word for
conjuring and juggling.
Blair is determined that British imperialism, now a
second- or third-rate power, should continue to ‘punch above its
weight’, remaining part of the nuclear, great-power club. This is spelt
out openly by the pro-Tory Daily Telegraph, which favours renewal of
Trident. Nuclear weapons, comments an editorial (5 December 2006),
"serve an additional purpose to deterrence. They also help convert
economic power into political". They ignore the fact, of course, that
massive expenditure on nuclear weapons undermines the economic wellbeing
of the majority of people in Britain.
On the other side, the Financial Times, perhaps the
most authoritative mouthpiece of big business in Britain, takes a
sceptical position about the desirability of a new Trident system.
"What exactly… is it for?" asks an editorial
(Unanswered Questions, 5 December 2006). "Much is made of the
bewildering uncertainty of the post-cold war world. Yet it is hard to
claim it is more dangerous than the mutual assured destruction the world
faced then. What is Britain’s deterrent meant to deter?" Future,
unpredictable, threats from Russia or China, they say, "would surely
only arise as part of a global crisis in which the UK would be playing a
secondary role".
"Put simply: do we need Trident as ‘the ultimate
insurance’ as Mr Blair says? Or are we clinging to the ultimate vestige
of the great power delusions to which this prime minister seems
especially prone? If we did not already have Trident, would we set about
acquiring it from scratch?"
The Financial Times columnist, Philip Stephens, is
even more scathing. "The government cannot argue that a strategic
nuclear capability is vital to Britain’s future security. Had it not
already possessed the bomb it is inconceivable that any government would
now seriously contemplate its acquisition". (The High Price of Nuclear
Prestige, 4 December 2006) Countering the government’s arguments in
favour of Trident, Stephens comments: "The government’s deterrence
theory looks threadbare by the time it reaches rogue states arming
nuclear terrorists. The best Mr Blair could say is that this scenario is
‘not utterly fanciful’."
Are the risks sufficiently plausible to justify the
huge cost of a new Trident system? Stephens implies they are not. "The
costs are political as well as financial… there comes a point when
modernisation of their arsenals robs the existing nuclear powers of all
moral authority".
Delusions of grandeur
WITH GRANDIOSE STRATEGIC pretensions, Blair has
tried to imitate the military policies of Bush. Like Bush, Blair is
determined to update Britain’s nuclear arsenal, including the
development of so-called tactical nuclear weapons. In fact, plans for
the new Trident include the arming of some missiles with tactical
warheads that (according to Blair’s crazy strategic thinking) could be
used in a war-fighting situation. Like Bush, Blair favours a policy of
aggressive intervention into trouble spots around the world. Despite
recent events and a flood of reports from military and strategic
experts, Blair still refuses to admit that the threat of terrorist
attack in the West has been enormously increased by US-British
intervention in Afghanistan, Iraq, Somalia, and elsewhere.
It is still part of Blair’s defence policy (proposed
in New Labour’s 1998 Strategic Defence Review) to develop an enhanced
capacity for global intervention. Plans are still current to build two
new large aircraft carriers, which would be the core of military
taskforces on the US model. The phenomenal costs of building two new
carriers, purchasing new fighter aircraft (mostly from the US), and
building supporting warships would, if this programme goes ahead, be
even greater than the projected costs of the Trident system.
These militaristic plans are based on delusions of
grandeur. Meanwhile, Britain’s military commanders are more and more
complaining about their troops’ lack of basic equipment (armoured Land
Rovers, body armour) and substandard housing for troops and their
families.
Blair has boasted that the current 200 Trident
warheads will be reduced to about 160 in the new system – as if this
will make some contribution to world nuclear disarmament. In fact, moves
by Britain, the US and other powers to modernise their nuclear arsenals
will have the opposite effect, regardless of the precise number of
warheads.
Increased rivalry and tension between the major and
regional powers since the end of the cold war have led to an
acceleration of proliferation. The Non-Proliferation Treaty is, in
reality, a dead letter.
Blair, along with Bush and other Western leaders,
have denounced North Korea for developing at least a primitive nuclear
bomb and Iran for beginning a nuclear programme. But their position is
completely hypocritical. The US, for instance, has encouraged India to
develop nuclear weapons (as a counterweight to China) and recently
turned a blind eye to Pakistan’s nuclear programme. Western leaders have
long upheld the conspiracy of silence about the Israeli state’s nuclear
arsenal, which was first developed in the early 1960s. Without any new
entrants to the nuclear club, there are already around 27,600 nuclear
warheads globally – more than enough to destroy the planet and pollute
surrounding space.
Through their militaristic policies, the major
powers have provoked further proliferation of nuclear weapons, and they
are powerless to stop it. The superpowers may regard nuclear weapons as
an absolute last resort. But can it be totally ruled out that unstable
regimes like North Korea or Pakistan, given internal crisis and regional
conflicts, would not resort to a nuclear strike against their enemies?
The world is becoming a more dangerous place. The
failure of the United Nations and numerous international arms controls
treaties to stop the spread of nuclear weapons shows nuclear disarmament
to be a utopian dream under capitalism. The competitive drive of
national capitalist states for their own spheres of influence, for
markets and resources, makes the accumulation of arms and wars
inevitable.
For as long as they exist, nuclear weapons will pose
a dire threat to humankind. But the elimination of nuclear weapons
requires a world-wide change in the social system: democratic economic
planning instead of the anarchy of the market. Socialist democracy
instead of the predatory rule of capitalists and landlords. Only the
democratic control of society by the working class can provide the basis
for real international cooperation and global planning.
Far from being the ‘ultimate insurance policy’, a
new generation of Trident will help make the world a much more volatile
and dangerous place. The alarming proliferation of nuclear weapons makes
socialist change even more urgent.
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