New hope for Trident?

It seems to me that the transfer of the costs of the Trident nuclear system to the Department of Defence (Future of Trident in doubt as ministers row over budget | Ekklesia) is right and offers new hope.

Unless the Ministry of Defence bears the cost of everything related to defence/military expenditure it cannot be expected to make the decisions based on cost effectiveness. If they do not pay for Trident then it should be no wonder they want it as it will appear to be fantastically cost effective.

By putting the costs into the MOD it will have to be justified as cost effective against the alternatives. Personally I am confident that in any fair comparison the full costs of Trident will not be cost effective and so on those grounds alone it should be abandoned.

My own view is of course that it does not matter at all if Trident is cost effective, it should still be abandoned and all our Nuclear weapons decommissioned immediately. That to be followed as soon as possible by ideally a complete demilitarisation of the UK.

Step one in all this should be immediate progress on banning all arms sales to anyone anywhere by any British company, any British passport holder and anyone on British soil. That will then need to be extended to include all forms of transport for arms and all supporting equipment, good and services.

Comments

[Rachel]

Agree absolutely - and I think there's real hope with Trident. As for the rest of the industry, well dream on (meant literally, not cynically)

[Tony Buglass]

I agree that Trident is a white elephant. I also agree that under any normal circumstances, it cold not be justified, would not be bought, and the money be spent elsewhere in the defence budget. However, it isn't a fair fight: Trident will be forced because of political imperatives, and other more useful equipment (helicopters, etc) which our forces DO need, will be squeezed out.

It's a mess. In a perfect world we could demilitarise. We can't. So we do need the stuff which Trident will squeeze out. Rubbish.

[Dave]

Tony,

a) If Trident is in the same budget as things the armed forces think are more important then they have to decide which they need more.

b) I am not waiting for a perfect world. We should demilitarise now as part of a movement towards a better world - I don't dare say perfect :-)

[Tony Buglass]

My point was that the armed forces will not have a free choice over their priorities. They will be told they have to buy Trident subs, and their own priorities will have to be met from what's left over.

[Dave]

Tony,

I hear you. My hope would be that the armed forces will loudly say to the politicians. We don't want to spend our money on Trident. It is a waste of our money. When it was a gift on top of their budget it was not in their interest to say this.