`Bombs Away'?

1 Ministry of Defence, Strategic Defence Review, Cm 3999, The Stationery Office, July 1998, p. 5-1. Also available on http://www.mod.uk/policy/sdr/index.htm

2 Ibid., p. 5-9.

3 According to Robin Cook, now Foreign Secretary, `the controversy over unilateral nuclear disarmament at the turn of the fifties... provided a historic conflict which brought many of my generation, myself included, into political activism for the first time.' New Statesman, 12 January 1979. For a comparative analysis of national belief systems, see Beatrice Heuser, Nuclear Mentalities: Strategies and Beliefs in Britain, France and the FRG (Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1998).

4 Paul Anderson & Nyta Mann, Safety First: The Making of New Labour (London: Granta, 1997), pp. 340-351.

5 Both the 1993 and 1994 conferences voted to cancel Trident, while the 1995 and 1996 conferences backed the leadership. See Anderson & Mann (note 4 above), p. 351.

6 Cook, `Bombs Away' (see asterisk note above).

7 For discussion of these claims, see Paul Rogers, Sub-Strategic Trident: A Slow Burning Fuse, London Defence Studies 34, Centre for Defence Studies, 1996.

8 Ministry of Defence, `All WE-177 nuclear bombs dismantled by the end of August 1998', Press Release 200/98, 30 July 1998. `Deterrence, Arms Control and Proliferation', Supporting Essay Five, in Strategic Defence Review, p. 5-2.

9 Peter Almond, `NATO Tactical Nuclear Weapons: Going, Going, Gone?', Disarmament Diplomacy, 12, January 1997, p. 9. The USA is now reported to have `little more than 100' nuclear weapons deployed on land in the whole of NATO Europe, stored in nine storage vaults in seven countries.

10 This was the level planned for Trident C-4, which Britain had originally planned to purchase. Statement on the Defence Estimates 1982, pp. 3-7.

11 For confirmation that each Vanguard boat has a capability of 192 warheads, see Statement on the Defence Estimates 1996, p. 56.

12 Malcolm Rifkind, Defence Secretary, UK Defence Strategy: A Continuing Role for Nuclear Weapons?, speech to Centre for Defence Studies, 16 November 1993.

13 Ministry of Defence, Statement on the Defence Estimates 1995, p. 39.

14 The Labour Party, Because Britain Deserves Better, 1997, p. 39.

15 The Labour Party, A Fresh Start for Britain: Labour's Strategy for Britain in the Modern World, London, 1996, p. 14. Also see Cook, `Bombs Away' (asterisk note above).

16 Strategic Defence Review, p. 5-2. Figures for `operationally available warheads' exclude `missile warheads held as a necessary processing margin or for technical surveillance purposes.' The number of warheads held for these purposes will not increase as a result of the SDR. House of Commons Written Answer, 9 November 1998.

17 The total stockpile includes all British nuclear weapons, excluding only weapons, such as WE-177 and Chevaline, which have been withdrawn from service and are awaiting final dismantlement. Strategic Defence Review, p. 5-3.

18 Strategic Defence Review, p. 5-4.

19 HMS Vanguard first deployed on patrol with slightly fewer than 60 warheads, prior to Trident also assuming a sub-strategic role. The other two Trident submarines currently in service, first deployed in 1996 and 1998 respectively, typically deployed on patrol with 60 warheads. House of Commons Written Answer, 29 July 1998.

20 House of Commons Written Answer, 9 November 1998.

21 House of Commons Written Answer, 30 July 1998. This decision will involve the writing off of surplus expenditure of some £40 million, over half of which is due to advance commitments made by the previous government. The projected saving of £50 million is net of this amount.

22 Six of these missiles have already been test-fired, a further eight are planned for future test-firing, and there is a processing margin of four missiles. House of Commons Written Answer, 30 July 1998. The second Trident boat, HMS Victorious, collected only 12 missiles from the USA in 1995, leaving four of its missile tubes empty. The third boat, HMS Vigilant, collected 14 missiles in 1997. Nicola Butler, `Disarmament Issues in the UK Parliament', Disarmament Diplomacy, October 1998, p. 19.

23 Strategic Defence Review, p. 18.

24 House of Commons Written Answer, 9 November 1998.

25 Strategic Defence Review, p. 6-26. The total operating cost of these `committed' forces is around £125 million a year. House of Commons Written Answer, 2 November 1998.

26 Robert Green, `The SDR and Britain's Nuclear Disarmament Obligations', Disarmament Diplomacy, July 1998, p. 10. In a document approved by its 1996 party conference, Labour stated that `we will ensure that Trident carries no more warheads than Polaris'. (A Fresh Start for Britain [see note 15 above], p. 14.) Since Britain's Polaris submarines carried 48 warheads when they first entered service, however, the government argues that the outcome of the SDR is consistent with this commitment.

27 Eric Grove, `Nuclear Implications Explained', Disarmament Diplomacy, July 1998, p. 9.

28 Strategic Defence Review, p. 5-2. The government still refuses to publish figures on war-head yields.

29 Michael Quinlan, `Thinking about Nuclear Weapons', RUSI Journal, December 1997, p. 3.

30 House of Commons Written Answer, 24 July 1998.

31 House of Commons Written Answer, 9 November 1998.

32 HMS Vanguard has a single augmented crew of 200, while HMS Victorious and HMS Vigilant each have two crews of 140. It is planned that each of the three Trident boats in the operational cycle will eventually have a single augmented crew of 200. House of Commons Written Answers, 28 July 1998. The fourth Trident is normally unarmed and in extended refit.

33 Interview with senior Ministry of Defence official, January 1999.

34 Interview with senior Ministry of Defence official, January 1999.

35 Strategic Defence Review, p. 5-2.

36 Interview with senior Ministry of Defence official, January 1999.

37 Strategic Defence Review, p. 5-2.

38 Interview with senior MoD official, January 1999.

39 Ibid., p. 5-5.

40 Interview with senior Ministry of Defence official, January 1999.

41 Strategic Defence Review, p. 19.

42 The USA has declared its production, current stocks and location of plutonium. US Department of Energy, Plutonium: The First Fifty Years, Washington DC, 1996.

43 Strategic Defence Review, p. 5-10. For a comprehensive analysis of publicly available information on fissile material stocks in nuclear-weapon states, see David Albright, Frans Berkhout & William Walker, Plutonium and Highly Enriched Uranium 1996: World Inventories, Capabilities and Policies (SIPRI/Oxford University Press, 1997).

44 Strategic Defence Review, p. 5-10.

45 Ibid., p. 5-1.

46 Ibid., p. 5-9.

47 The Conservative government initially opposed the Clinton Administration's support for a Test Ban, criticizing US testing restrictions announced in 1993 as `unfortunate and misguided.' Stephen Pullinger, `Britain's Nuclear Weapons Policy and Non-Proliferation', in J. B. Poole & R. Guthrie, eds, Verification 1994 (London: Brassey's, 1994), p. 90.

48 Strategic Defence Review, p. 5-10.

49 Ministry of Defence, Statement on the Defence Estimates 1996, p. 16.

50 Cook, `Bombs Away' (see asterisk note above).

51 House of Commons Written Answer, 30 July 1998.

52 Labour Party, A Fresh Start for Britain (see note 15 above), p. 14.

53 Cook (see asterisk note above). Such a Register was proposed by Germany in 1994, but rejected by the NWS. For further discussion, see Malcolm Chalmers, British Nuclear Weapons Policy: The Next Steps (see asterisk note above), pp. 9-10; Harald Müller & Katya Frank, `A Nuclear Weapons Register: Concepts, Issues and Opportunities', in Malcolm Chalmers, Mitsuro Donawaki & Owen Greene, eds, Developing Arms Transparency (Bradford: University of Bradford/Japan Institute for International Affairs, 1997); Harald Müller, The Nuclear Weapons Register - A Good Idea Whose Time Has Come, PRIF Reports 51, May 1998.

54 Strategic Defence Review, p. 5-11.

55 Measures discussed included `regular bilateral exchange of classified data on aggregate warhead and fissile material stockpiles... linked to intrusive reciprocal monitoring and inspection arrangements'. Shannon Kile, `Nuclear Arms Control', SIPRI Yearbook 1998 (Oxford: Oxford University Press), p. 417.

56 Strategic Defence Review, p. 5-1.

57 William Drozdiak, `START-3 Talks in the New Year?', International Herald Tribune, 10 December 1998.

58 Tactical nuclear weapons, nuclear-armed sea-launched cruise missiles and warheads held in reserve are not included in these proposed ceilings.

59 Dean A. Wilkening, `The Future of Russia's Strategic Nuclear Force', Survival, vol. 40, no. 3, Autumn 1998, p. 89.

60 Bruce Blair, Russia's Nuclear Collapse, paper presented to Pugwash meeting on `A Nuclear Weapon Free World: Steps Along the Way', 6-8 November 1998.

61 As part of this process, parallel arrangements would also have to be devised to cap or wind down the nuclear programmes of India, Pakistan and Israel.

62 An important exception to this consensus is the Scottish National Party, which is strongly anti-nuclear and supports the removal of the Trident submarines from their base at Faslane in Scotland.