Trident

As ever the Trident replacement programme demands our constant vigilance and continued protest. Only this week it emerged that the Government is taking yet more costly preparatory steps towards replacement prior to the parliamentary decision point on the nuclear weapon system scheduled for 2016. While letting its LibDem partners in the Coalition optimistically  search for ‘alternatives’ to Trident, the Government is busy spending a further £3 billion on major parts of the first replacement submarines. Commenting on this news,  Kate Hudson for National CND said that the ‘billions that will now be squandered on the next phase of Trident are funds that will be unavailable for combating ever deeper cuts to public services by other departments’.  Also, and in addition, it has now been revealed (the Observer, 15 May) that the New Trident missile subs will have more costly reactors, which are considered safer (!), but which will  add another £20 billion to the estimated £75-80 billion that the programme is going to cost over its lifetime. Question: how many budget deficits can be plugged by a total of £100 billion?

Missile Defence

The US has agreed with Romania to place its ‘star wars’ missile interceptors in Romania, by 2015, in accordance with its Phased Adaptive Approach for Missile Defence in Europe. (NY Times, May 12) Russia has complained that the decision conflicts with Obama’s pledges to offer Moscow a voice in the system’s planning. So here too, we are facing a situation of dashed hopes and promises.

Nuclear Pakistan  At this point in time, however, the greatest nuclear worry is the build-up in Pakistan and India. Only last week (and soon after Bin Laden’s assassination),  Pakistan successfully test-fired a new short range surface -to -surface ballistic missile that a military press release announced  ‘carried nuclear weapons’.  Pakistan started its nuclear programme in 1972 but has been on a building binge in recent years, growing its arsenal from around 70 weapons in 2008 to over 100 today. While China supports Pakistan in its acquisition of nuclear material, the U.S. – since 2008 – has a nuclear agreement with India allowing trade in nuclear materials, technologies and equipment between them. So much for the Nuclear non-proliferation treaty (to which Pakistan and India are not signatories but the US and  China are). The most terrifying aspect of this build up is that the ‘mutual deterrence’ principle which has worked so far in this region may not apply to Pakistan’s radical jihadists.