Colossal waste of money, or necessary deterrent in the big bad modern world?

I’m leaning more towards the former; I don’t really know why we have such a national obsession with having global military influence. Germany, for instance, doesn’t, and they seem to be doing okay.

I’m reminded of the great Yes Prime Minister:

Sir Humphrey: With Trident we could obliterate the whole of Eastern Europe.
Hacker: I don’t want to obliterate the whole of Eastern Europe.
Sir Humphrey: But it’s a deterrent.
Hacker: It’s a bluff. I probably wouldn’t use it.
Sir Humphrey: Yes, but they don’t know that you probably wouldn’t.
Hacker: They probably do.
Sir Humphrey: Yes, they probably know that you probably wouldn’t. But they can’t certainly know.
Hacker: They probably certainly know that I probably wouldn’t.
Sir Humphrey: Yes, but even though they probably certainly know that you probably wouldn’t, they don’t certainly know that although you probably wouldn’t, there is no probability that you certainly would!

You’d think they’d let just one off every now and then, so I could feel like I was getting my moneys worth.

Without it Barrow would be a desolate hopeless wasteland filled with economic zombies, drug addiction, petty violent crime and misery. Like now, but a bit worse.

I would rather see the same money spent on conventional weaponry that we could actually use.

Defence spending is a good thing. Defence spending on a weapon that almost no-one imagines would ever be used, even when deterrence has failed, is bizarrely wasteful.

Waste of money. We’ll never fire one.

In my view worth it to occasionally see those subs but I love the comment about letting one off to get money’s worth!

I would rather see the same money spent on conventional weaponry that we could actually use.

Defence spending is a good thing

I’d rather we concentrated on DEFENCE not OFFENCE, and then we wouldn’t need to spend anywhere near what we currently spend.

As b r says- we aren’t under active attack, and aren’t likely to be so most military spending is a waste of money, let alone something as costly and horrific as Trident. Someone needs to break the nuclear arms circle first, why not us? If we drop it hopefully others will too.

I don’t really see the advantage in blowing up other countries at our expense when we have an NHS that needs many more billions of pounds injecting into it.

Here’s an idea: why not get rid of nuclear weapons but pretend that we still have them? It seems that those countries where we are not sure if they have nuclear weapons are the most dangerous.

I don’t really know why we have such a national obsession with having global military influence. Germany, for instance, doesn’t

Well, if you look at the last two times they tried, it’s easy to understand why they’ve given that particular avenue a miss for a while, isn’t it?

wanmankylung – Member
Here’s an idea: why not get rid of nuclear weapons but pretend that we still have them? It seems that those countries where we are not sure if they have nuclear weapons are the most dangerous.

Or maybe they have….. Maybe those are just placebo subs that we see.

Could we not just say we have it… but actually build schools?

Trident has proved so useful in all the wars the UK has been involved in recently.

Look what good it did for Poseidon. Some touchy, feely, life ever lasting God comes along and suddenly your Trident and power of the Deep counts for nought.

Daily Mash on it

Trident has proved so useful in all the wars the UK has been involved in recently.

And even more useful in the ones we haven’t had to fight because of Trident’s deterent?

Who exactly are we supposed to be deterring?

It’s not a waste of money at all, even if we don’t need it. All the money gets spent in the UK on R&D and maintaining the fleet, so it’s all recirculated locally. It’s no different to spending on any infrastructure. We get the actual warheads from the US, but everything else, submarines, propulsion, maintenance is all UK designed and built.

But it also imposes incalculable costs on generations to come as a result of disposing of the spent nuclear reactors, warhead materials, and other wastes associated with the construction and maintenance of the systems.

But it also imposes incalculable costs on generations to come as a result of disposing of the spent nuclear reactors, warhead materials, and other wastes associated with the construction and maintenance of the systems.

Given we have nuclear power plants, the marginal cost of the very small extra spent fuel from subs is in the noise.

IIRC We return the warheads to the US for maintenance / recycling.

unklehomered – Member

Could we not just say we have it… but actually build schools?

sshhh! – keep it quiet, or the Ruskies will figure out that we already did that…

(Trident subs don’t actually exist, they’re just ‘ducks’ with a body kit and grey paint)

Who exactly are we supposed to be deterring?

Given recent events Russia and North Korea would be fairly obvious candidates. With Russia it’s probably less about deterring and more about the influence that the deterent confers.

I read a book a few years ago by one of our former Prime Ministers who explained that our permanent seat on the UN Security Council was entirely based on our possession of a nuclear deterent and that that permanent seat did afford us a lot of geopolitical influence.

Trident = a £130bn prosthetic willy.

Indeed, the issue of the disposal of the waste is equally an argument against nuclear power. Far from being ‘marginal’ the costs will mount over time; what a toxic legacy to leave to our descendants.

If this project goes ahead will the UK continue to lecture Iran and the DPRK about nuclear proliferation?

I really can’t see why anyone would have them… all it does is escalate tensions and introduce the potential for some very nasty consequences that no species should have the right to inflict on a rare planet which has the wonderful ability to sustain life.

Well, if you look at the last two times they tried, it’s easy to understand why they’ve given that particular avenue a miss for a while, isn’t it?

Of course it is, and they’ve put that behind them and got on with being a global industrial and economic force (see also Japan). We however still keep banging on about how well we did in those last two times, and to the time when we had an Empire, and using that as the basis for our need to remain as a global military power.

You could argue that Germany’s learnt the lesson that we need to.

All the money gets spent in the UK on R&D and maintaining the fleet, so it’s all recirculated locally. It’s no different to spending on any infrastructure.

It’s a fair point, but why not spend it on useful infrastructure, rather than white elephants?

It’s no different to spending on any infrastructure.

Except that when you spend on roads, railways, hospitals etc. you end up with something *useful*.

We get the actual warheads from the US, but everything else, submarines, propulsion, maintenance is all UK designed and built.

We get the missiles from the Americans, the warheads are our own (to a largely American design)

Rachel

It’s not a waste of money at all, even if we don’t need it …. so it’s all recirculated locally.

Sounds quite wasteful compared to spending the same money on something useful, assuming the same “local recirculation” of the money.

EDIT: too slow… 😉

Far from being ‘marginal’ the costs will mount over time

It is still marginal compared with running power station reactors 24/7 generating 10s GW.

What I find amusing is that the portrayal of Putin as some kinda meglomanic hell bent on restoring the soviet union!

i’ll willing to bet a large wad of cash that as soon as the trident contracts are signed, Putin and Russia will disappear into obscurity! 😆

and that that permanent seat did afford us a lot of geopolitical influence.

Which gains us what? Many successful, prosperous nations do not have such a seat and, it would seem, don’t need it.

ohnohesback – Member

what a toxic legacy to leave to our descendants.

which will be tiny compared to the toxic legacy our Grandparents have left us from the early days of the Nuclear industry.

Once we agree where to bury all of that, the waste from the Next generation of Trident will look like an after8 mint.

It’s not a waste of money at all, even if we don’t need it. All the money gets spent in the UK on R&D and maintaining the fleet, so it’s all recirculated locally. It’s no different to spending on any infrastructure. We get the actual warheads from the US, but everything else, submarines, propulsion, maintenance is all UK designed and built.

That argument is rolled out every time and still makes no sense. It’s a bit like saying we could employ an extra half million road workers not to actually maintain roads but dig random holes in fields and fill them in again. They are all gainfully employed and the money we pay them is recirculated back into the local economy……… except we don’t need a bunch of holes dug and filled in again and we could spend the same amount of money employing people to do stuff that we actually want and the money we spend would STILL get recirculated back into the economy.

It’s a fair point, but why not spend it on useful infrastructure, rather than white elephants?

I agree that Nuclear Subs might not be as socially useful as say Hospitals, but the money isn’t completely wasted, a huge amount of the spend comes back as revenue in taxes (salaries, VAT, rates) as it’s all spent locally. So you aren’t just throwing it away with nothing to show for it, you get jobs, taxes, regional development (Nuclear Subs aren’t in the well off SE).

Deterrence of Russia is genuinely interesting at the moment.

I doubt anyone thinks they’re poised to invade Germany, or even Poland.

Does anyone think our government would even seriously consider nuking Moscow to protect Latvia from partial Russian annexation?

At a technical level, the Trident missile is a very impressive piece of engineering:-

[Posted only for interest into how the thing works]

BigDummy – Member

I doubt anyone thinks they’re poised to invade Germany, or even Poland.

lots of People in Poland will be reassured by your confidence.

I just do not buy the North Korea threat. Their scientists may help proliferate weapons technology for a price but that couldn’t be stopped by Trident.
Putin, etc. I can see as being a concern but I’d rather have the money spent down a blind alley to go on conventional shiny planes and ships and uniforms. Though how much the Harrier equivalent tech will cost for the carriers would add up quickly.

We have ‘used’ nukes as allegedly Thatcher threatened to nuke Argentina if the French didn’t hand over the info for the Exocet missiles

Guardian linky

Lets face it the Yanks, Russian’s, Israelis, India and Pakistan are all unlikely to give them up, so I don’t see how us giving them up making a jot of difference in terms of global dis-armament.

That argument is rolled out every time and still makes no sense. It’s a bit like saying we could employ an extra half million road workers not to actually maintain roads but dig random holes in fields and fill them in again

Not a bad idea, you could use it as a replacement for benefits – much better than just paying people not to work 😉