The “button” question has come up again. The nuclear button. Actually, I’m given to understand, the button is not a button at all, but more resembles a starting pistol. Would Sir Keir Starmer, widely expected to be the UK’s next Prime Minister, be prepared to fire it? Yes, unequivocally, said Sir Keir. The deterrent “only works if there is a preparedness to use it.”
That’s a very strange utterance. How can you use a deterrent? If you deploy a hydrogen bomb in anger, it will be either as a pre-emptive strike, or as a retaliation. In the first instance, you will not have been deterred by the nuclear capability of the opposition; in the second instance, you will have been subject to a nuclear attack. This would show that the deterrent did not work, and had never worked.
Prime Ministers, and prospective Prime Ministers, are routinely asked the “button” question. I remember Mrs May answered in the affirmative, looked very uncomfortable, and was not inclined to expand upon a monosyllabic reply. I had the sense she was saying something along the lines of, “The nuclear deterrent functions as a deterrent every day. For its deterrent value to have credence, my answer has to be ‘yes’.” I suppose she could have been bluffing. But then, had she responded with a monosyllabic “no”, that, too, could have been a bluff. Who knows what she wrote in her letters of last resort, residing in the four safes of the continuous at sea deterrent (CASD).
Jeremy Corbyn when he was campaigning for the premiership said “no”. I had the distinct sense that was not a bluff. Some people say that reply, among other things, made him unelectable.
Nicola Sturgeon said “no”, but then that was rather academic, defence being a reserved and not a devolved issue. I recall that during PMQs in Westminster Michael Gove asked the PM – I forget which one, there have been so many recently – the question, clearly a plant, whether he agreed that the SNP’s quibbling about the prospective cost of the Trident upgrade was akin to a eunuch moaning about the cost of Viagra.
(Other erectile dysfunction treatments are available.)
The PM’s reply was once more monosyllabic. Yes.
I thought of the Viagra allusion when I heard about the recent test-firing of a Trident missile off the coast of Florida earlier this year. Defence Secretary Grant Shapps was in attendance. The missile was intended to fly several thousand miles, but in fact only managed a few hundred yards before falling into the sea. Apparently an “anomaly” had occurred. I was reminded of Elon Musk’s description of a failed launch of one of his space rockets: “rapid unscheduled disassembly”. Grant Shapps stated the test had “reaffirmed the effectiveness” of the deterrent. Thus do our political masters inhabit a universe parallel to our real one.
The redoubtable Brian Quail, famous in the greater Glasgow area (the prime target in the UK) for his implacable opposition to nuclear arms, has written a characteristically subtle letter to today’s National, praising Sir Keir for his candour. His point is that “yes” means “yes”. That truth lies at the kernel of the doctrine of nuclear deterrence. Deterrence is guaranteed – supposed to be guaranteed – by the fact that the systems are “locked and loaded”. A nuclear attack will be so swift that there is no time during the event to make executive decisions. They have to be prearranged. We are effectively saying to our enemy, “If you attack us, we will immediately attack you.” In the event, there’s nothing to be done about it. We have effectively concluded with our putative adversaries a suicide pact. The world is awash with nuclear weapons – about 12,000 of them. It’s an “accident” waiting to happen.
I have a modest proposal. Why doesn’t my Alma Mater, the University of Glasgow, since it is directly in the firing line, create a Faculty of Peace, and offer a Master’s degree inviting our best young minds, not to get swallowed up in the financial sector, but to consider the question, how can we best get along with one another, without destroying ourselves, and the planet?
jamescalumcampbell 