Letter From America: Ian Williams

Written By: Ian Williams

Published: November 22, 2015 Last modified: November 22, 2015
Marshall Islanders shine light on nuclear hypocrisy
Clement Attlee and Ernest Bevin were among the real parents of the British Independent Nuclear
Deterrent. Churchill was the Tory PM who gave all the technology to Roosevelt, whom he
naively trusted even as Washington drained the UK Treasury dry, but it was the 1945 Labour
government of saintly memory, confronted with US refusal to reciprocate Britains wartime
handover of nuclear secrets, that decided to implement an independent nuclear programme,
despite the empty coffers and Labours ambitious social and economic agenda.
Seeing the fate of Socialist comrades across Eastern Europe, they knew they could not trust the
Soviets, and recent history, including the nuclear deal and the catastrophically abrupt end of
lend-lease arrangements, taught them they could not rely on the Americans. NATO was Bevins
baby, famously intended to keep the Germans down, the Americans in and the Russians out. But
the other part was a British bomb.
As an active member of CND, with loads of frequent blister miles from Aldermaston, I was
always bemused by the active Communist Party members who campaigned with seemingly total
sincerity against the British nuclear weapons, but regarded the workers bomb as a benign and
defensive thing. But there was a genuine dilemma: Britain had been an offshore island bereft of
support before in recent memory. There was in some way a case for an independent nuclear
deterrent, even if it was only a tripwire to ensure back up in case of major threats.
But while we had the bomb, the means of effective delivery were missing. Once the Blue
Streak missile programme was abandoned under Treasury pressure the Tories turned to
Washington, which was happy to have the British pay for a fistful of Polaris submarines. But like
the successor, Trident, there has always been considerable doubt about just how independent that
deterrent is. Could we actually independently target and fire missiles without US acquiescence?
So the current debate is more complicated than a mere issue of upgrading Trident. There is the
issue of whether Britain needs an independent nuclear capability, as Bevin and Attlee wanted.
Trident, new or upgraded is not necessarily the answer to that question. The other issue is, of
course, whether we can afford it, which also feeds back into that question. There are few
Keynesian benefits to buying off-the-shelf US technology, with strings attached or not. At a time
when austerity is pushed as the answer to everything, why does it not also figure in the nuclear
equation?
Do we want an independent nuclear deterrent, or do we simply want to contribute to the
American arsenal like the loyal sepoys we seem to have become? Can we afford an independent
deterrent, especially one as expensive as Trident?
Then there is the question of our international standing. The Republic of the Marshal Islands,
dubious beneficiary of much of the USs fusion bomb testing, has a case before the International
Court of Justice against Britain specifically for its failure to honour its signature on the Nuclear
Non-Proliferation Treaty.
The case argues that although the NPT allowed the Soviets, the US, China, Britain and France, to
keep their nuclear weapons while prohibiting other signatories from acquiring them, those
nuclear powers on their part agreed to good faith negotiations to disarm, and committed

themselves not stop the arms race.

At the UN the British government consistently votes against resolutions on effective
disarmament and refuses even to countenance multilateral negotiations on disarmament, while it
is clear that replacing Trident would breach the treaty obligation to stop the arms race. Indeed the
Trident system as an upgrade for Polaris was probably in breach of the treaty.
Britains behaviour has consequences. India, for example, consistently used the bad faith of the
nuclear powers on disarmament as an excuse for developing its own nuclear arsenal. Labour has
traditionally had an internationalist and multilateralist approach, and even Tony Blair thought it
was important to try to get the UN to back the invasion of Iraq. The case unfolding at the The
Hague and the deliberations at the UN should at least inform the Labour Partys debate on
Trident. Nye Bevan did not want to go into the conference chamber naked. Successive British
governments have refused to go in at all!