The truth about Trident

Frank Boulton welcomes a new book on the case against Trident

In December 2006 Tony Blair’s government published The Future of the United Kingdom’s Nuclear Deterrent. It was clear to a bitterly disappointed anti-nuclear movement that a decision to replace Trident had already been taken. The only question was: when? The Conservative-Lib Dem coalition government was coy on the timing; the junior partner’s (Lib Dems) Trident Alternatives Review concluded that some sort of replacement was desirable, though not necessarily on a ‘like-for-like’ basis of four subs, of which at least one was always deployed at sea (‘continuous-at-sea’ deterrence – CASD).

The Tory senior partners derided such concepts and talked of a decisive ‘Main gate’ debate in parliament to endorse CASD with new subs. This was endorsed by the Tory majority elected in 2015. When Theresa May succeeded David Cameron this July she took advantage of disarray among Labour MPs by holding a debate on 18 July. 472 voted for renewal and 117 against, with most Labour MPs voting ‘for’, although the Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn did not. Quakers and Medact were well represented at the concurrent lively protests in Parliament Square.

Outside events

With remarkable foresight, Timmon Wallis, a PhD graduate from the University of Bradford’s Department of Peace Studies and staff member of Quaker Peace & Social Witness (QPSW), had prepared comprehensive and powerful arguments against Trident – not just its replacement (‘renewal’) but against Trident as now – in his book The Truth About Trident: Disarming the Nuclear Argument. Several MPs were presented with copies of the freshly published book at an already planned CND protest in the lobby at Westminster on 13 July. This was a considerable achievement and the author is to be heartily congratulated.

Even though the government majority on 18 July was 355, the case against Trident needs to be re-emphasised, as there is every chance that the replacement programme could be overtaken by outside events – in spite of the decidedly worrying US presidential victory of Donald Trump. Possible ‘outside events’ include Scottish independence and the rise of antisubmarine warfare techniques with cyber-controlled robots and drones which would, at the least, make survival of even the stealthiest Trident replacement submarine ‘difficult’.

Tim Wallis indicates that this book is for the uncommitted general reader as well as for those wanting to refresh their knowledge in order to discuss the issues with more confidence. Trident originated in secrecy and ready access to knowledge is still denied. So, we need to know the ‘truth’.

The book comes in seven sections, during which twenty-one questions are addressed. These cover the basics (what Trident is and the nature and effects of a nuclear detonation); topics such as deterrence, insurance, legality, independence, morality and so on; the UK’s role (or, rather, non-role) in multilateral disarmament; and the impact on public opinion and on politics ‘in the real world’. Each question is, helpfully, stated early in the book and the issues addressed in more detail in specific chapters.

I will quote two linked examples: legality and whether the UK is committed to multilateral nuclear disarmament. First, legality. Can the UK renew Trident without reneging on its international commitments? In the introduction, the author answers this question by explaining that Trident is illegal under international law (and renewal violates its obligations under the Treaty on the Non-proliferation of Nuclear Weapons – ‘NPT’).

In Chapter 12, his fuller exposition of the advisory opinion of the International Court of Justice (ICJ), which came out in July 1996, is more circumspect but comes in the end to much the same thing: but there is enough of a loophole to warrant further attention.

On the issue of whether the threat or use of nuclear weapons would be lawful or unlawful in an extreme circumstance of self defence, in which ‘the very survival of a State would be at stake’, the ICJ was evenly split; so, by the chairman’s casting vote, ‘in view of the current state of international law’, it could not make a definitive conclusion. In other words, if a nuclear-weapons-possessing state felt existentially threatened, it might be legal to use its nuclear weapons but only if civilian lives and neutral countries were not affected. Tim Wallis explains that the current state of international law requires that civilians and neutral territories must not be affected in a war between states.

A loophole could, for example, be that if the UK was threatened with invasion it could use Trident-based weapons on the invading force, so long as civilians were not affected and no radioactive fall-out landed on neutral territory. What the UK could not do would be to bomb Moscow (or wherever). This loophole (also called a ‘legal gap’) is exploited (misunderstood) by UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office officials, who argue that the ICJ opinion allows them to use nuclear weapons even as a first strike if they feel the UK is threatened.

Multilateral disarmament

The second question concerns multilateral disarmament. The UK continues to insist that it upholds the NPT – the ‘sole’ nuclear disarmament instrument of the UN’s ‘Conference on Disarmament’. The NPT is essentially a bargain between the ‘recognised’ Nuclear Weapons States (NWSs – China, France, Russia, the UK and US, who are also the permanent five – P5 – of the veto-competent UN Security Council) who promise to disarm ‘in good faith’ and not to enhance their nuclear-weapons, so long as the non-NWSs promise not to develop their own nuclear weapons, in return for which any non-NWS could be helped to develop a civil nuclear energy programme.

However, there is no timetable and neither the P5 nor the other NWSs outside the NPT (India, Israel, North Korea and Pakistan) show any willingness to disarm. The author describes how most non-NWSs (apart from those under a nuclear umbrella such as NATO, Japan and South Korea) have become impatient with the NPT’s lack of progress since 1995, so have convened an ‘Open Ended Working Group’ (OEWG) within the UN General Assembly to negotiate a ‘Ban Treaty’ which fills the ‘legal gap’ left by the ICJ in 1996. Since the publication of this book, the OEWG has voted, by a considerable majority, to establish a ground breaking new diplomatic conference to negotiate a treaty on the prohibition of nuclear weapons and their total elimination, which will begin in New York in March 2017.

A nuclear ‘winter’

This could not have been achieved without the hard work of the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN) and the International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War (IPPNW), a Nobel Peace Laureate in 1985, of which Medact is the UK affiliate. IPPNW and ICAN have publicised ground-breaking academic studies (to which the author refers) showing that the full discharge from one UK Trident submarine could induce a nuclear ‘winter’, with crop failures for many successive years resulting in widespread massive famine.

Although the prospect of a nuclear famine has galvanised the OEWG and the conference, fierce and aggressive opposition is expected from the P5, especially the US, UK and France, who are likely to threaten noncompliance if such a treaty is ratified. It is remarkable – though sadly not surprising – that this highly significant development has received so little publicity in the UK press.

We should realise, however, that many of our opponents genuinely fear for future security and are greatly concerned, for example, about Russian aggression. Rather than ridicule such fears, we – especially well-informed and sympathetic Friends – should endeavour to dialogue with them in the spirit of conflict resolution inspired by Tim Wallis’ alma mater, the University of Bradford’s Department of Peace Studies and International Development.

This is undoubtedly hard work and testing of our patience; and particularly trying in view of how little time is left.

Frank is a board member of Medact and of IPPNW.

Frank will be speaking at Medact’s Healthy Planet, Better World conference in Friends House on 9 and 10 December: and at a combined Medact IPPNW Congress in York in September 2017. Further information: www.medact.org.

The Truth About Trident: Disarming the Nuclear Argument by Timmon Milne Wallis is published by Luath Press at £12.99. ISBN: 9781910745427.

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