no new trident nuclear submarines

CND Cymru works to rid Britain and the World of all weapons of mass destruction, for peace and human and environmental justice.

Cymraeg

NO NEW NUCLEAR WEAPONS - NO REPLACEMENT FOR TRIDENT

The British Government is already working on a replacement for the ageing

Trident nuclear weapons system - despite the fact that such a replacement:

will cost billions of pounds of public money,
has not been discussed or debated in Parliament,
breaks international law,
undermines international arms control treaties,
will encourage nuclear proliferation.

WHAT IS GOING ON?

The British and US Governments are no longer pretending that nuclear weapons are a ' deterrent'. The US Government has a highly dangerous fantasy that it is desirable, possible and mo-ally 'righf to use military technology to gain and maintain permanent 'global dominance' of trade, investment, communications systems and access to all resources. Such is the size of the US military

budget that the US alone spends over 40% of the world's military expenditure. The British Government is using the same arguments as the US to justify expenditure on new weapons and military hardware.

The British Government is also developing what it calls a 'sub strategic' role for nuclear weapons, where some Trident missiles could carry only a single warhead, but the capability of carrying 48 warheads on each of the 4 submarines would be maintained.

FROM POLARIS TO TRIDENT

The British Trident nuclear weapons system replaced a previous submarine-based nuclear weapon system called Polaris, which consisted of tour British-built submarines armed with 16 US- built Polaris missiles. The missiles were armed

with British-built 'Chevaline' nuclear warheads.

The decision to replace the Polaris/Chevaline system with Trident was made in 1980 without Parliairipnt being properly informed of either its existence or its escalating costs. The first Trident submarine entered service in 1994, with the

other three commissioned into service successively over the following five years.

Trident has a planned lifespan of approximately 30 years, and so could remain operational until around 2025.

DECISION TIME

It took 14 years horn the 1980 decision to replace Polaris with Trident, until the first Trident

submarine entered into service, so any decision about whether or not Trident should be replaced, is now due. On the 4"'- July 2005, the Secretary of State tor Defence, John Reid, confirmed this when he said, "Decisions on any re-placement of the United Kingdom's nuclear deterrent are likely to be necessary in the lifetime of the current parliament."

IMPRUDENT AND OBSCENE

It has been estimated that any replacement for Trident would cost in excess of Ł15 billion (for comparison, the annual British defence budget is approximately Ł6 billion). This does not include the full cost of decommissioning or dealing with resultant nuclear waste and contamination problems for Trident or any replacement. If a decision were made not to replace Trident, this money could be available for other areas of government responsibility such as health, education, environmental protection and promoting international peace and justice.

There are signs that the government has already made a decision in secret on a nuclear replacement for Trident and has begun preparations to build new nuclear weapons.

WHAT COULD COME AFTER TRIDENT?

There are three possible options facing the Government:

1. To extend the life 'of the existing Trident system;

2. To replace the Trident with another nuclear weapons system;

3. Not to replace Trident with any other nuclear weapons system.

1. AN EXTENSION OF TRIDENT'S LIFESPAN?

In the short term the British Government may delay In the short term the British Government may delay making a final decision by deciding instead to fund an extension to the life of Trident. This would then allow Britain to be in step with the USA, which is

already extending the life of its own Trident nuclear submarines via the Trident II D5 Service Life Extension Programme. British nuclear "requirements" could then be considered at the stage when the US Navy designs the replacement of the American Trident system by 2029.

2. A NEW NUCLEAR WEAPONS SYSTEM TO REPLACE TRIDENT?

If the British Government orders a full replacement option either now, or following an

extension of Trident's current lifetime, some detailed decisions will follow:

a. TYPE OF SUBMARINe - It is possible that rather than building new submarines with the sole role of firing nuclear weapons, a 'flexible multi-role submarine', able to fire both nuclear armed long-range missiles and conventionally armed missiles, could be produced. The Ministry of Defence is currently running the 'Maritime Future Underwater Capability', which is researching a future generation of nuclear powered submarines, possibly based on the new Astute Class' nuclear powered submarines already being developed to replace Britain's conventionally armed but nuclear-powered submarines.

b. TYPE OF WARHEAD - Britain could also become involved in US programmes looking at newer, 'more useable', tactical nuclear weapons of up to five kilotons explosive power designed to be used on the 'battlefield'. Do not be deceived, these 'more useable' nuclear weapons have at least one third of the power of the Hiroshima bomb, and the effects of using such weapons would be devastating.

3. SEIZING THE MOMENT -

NO NUCLEAR WEAPONS

CND Cymru believes that complete nuclear disarmament is the only lawful and moral option for Britain; therefore the Trident nuclear weapons system should not be extended or replaced.

Nuclear disarmament would enable Britain to fulfill its 35-year old obligation to nuclear disarmament under Article VI of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) which states:

"Each of the Parties to the Treaty undertakes to pursue negotiations in good faith on effective measures relating to relating to cessation of the nuclear arms race at an early date and to nuclear disarmament, and on a treaty on general and complete disarmament under strict and effective international control".

At the 2000 NPT Conference all nuclear weapon states including Britain, gave an 'unequivocal undertaking 'to accomplish total elimination of their nuclear arsenals leading to nuclear disarmament'.

In 1996, the International Court of Justice ruled that: "the threat or use of nuclear weapons would be generally contrary to the rules of international law applicable in armed conflict, and in particular the principles and rules of humanitarian law".

In other words any nuclear attack would be illegal, unless it could be carried out within the

confines of humanitarian law, a situation which most people find impossible to envisage.

THE BRITISH GOVERNMENT'S POSITION

The Labour Government dropped its 'No First Use' (of nuclear weapons) policy after being elected in 1997. In 2002, Geoff Hoon, then Secretary of State for Defence, clearly indicated that nuclear weapons might be used not only in response to nuclear attacks, but also in response to chemical and biological weapon attacks. Hoon also announced that a pre-emptive strike might be used against a country considered by the Government to be a sufficient threat, whether or not that country even owns nuclear weapons. This goes against previous British commitments never to use nuclear weapons first and declarations that Trident is only a 'minimum nuclear deterrent'. Such willingness to wage preemptive nuclear war is against international law and agreements.

The Government has also made repeated assertions that Britain needs to maintain a nuclear deterrent, and the Labour Party Manifesto 2005 stated, "We are also committed to retaining the independent nuclear deterrent."

British nuclear weapons are always described as being "independent", yet Britain is dependent on the USA for virtually every aspect of building, maintaining, deploying and targeting Trident.

NOT 'IF ...BUT 'WHICH'

Despite the fact that there has been no debate in the House of Commons on this issue, huge sums of public money has already been spent on developments at the Aldermaston Atomic Weapons Establishment (AWE) in Berkshire, England where British nuclear warheads are produced and maintained. This new expenditure includes recruitment of 80 specialist scientists, the acquisition of various new laboratories and equipment, including a high- powered laser plant called 'Orion' which will test components of nuclear warheads under conditions that replicate a nuclear explosion.

This laser alone undermines the aims of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty

All these investments accompanied by an increase in the frequency of meetings between Aldermaston scientists and those from US nuclear weapons laboratories at Los Alamos, Lawrence Livermore and Sandia, coupled with the recent renewal of the US / British Mutual Defence Agreement. These meetings, may well be to prepare the infrastructure tor new nuclear weapons development.

TRIDENT

Trident - the 'British' Nuclear Weapons

System currently consists of:

British-built nuclear powered submarines, at least 1 of which is always on 'patrol'.

Each submarine carries up to 16 Trident II D5 missiles, leased from the USA.

British-built nuclear warheads are mounted on each missile enabling each Trident submarine to carry up to 48 warheads.

Each warhead can be aimed at a different target with guidance from US satellites.

Each warhead is 8 times more powerful than of the bomb that was dropped on

Hiroshima,Japan in 1945 killing over 100,000 people. Each of the 4 submarines has the

equivalent destructive capability of 384 Hiroshima bombs.

For more copies of this briefing

contact:

CND Cymru, Y Drain-Gwynion, Heol yr Eglwys,

Talywaun, Pontypwl NP4 7EF

(01495) 773 180 heddwch@cndcymru.org