Liberal Democrats leader Sir Ed Davey is calling on the government to start building a “fully independent British nuclear deterrent” to end the UK’s reliance on the US.

The UK has operational control of its nuclear arsenal, including British-built warheads, but it depends on the US to supply and maintain the Trident missiles that would deliver them.

In a speech to his party’s spring conference in York on Sunday, Sir Ed will argue the UK’s continued reliance on US support is an unacceptable risk to national security.

    • bearboiblake [he/him]@pawb.social
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      4 months ago

      Nuclear proliferation would probably lead to a safer world. Look at North Korea, they are left alone by imperialists because they have the big red button. We could distribute nukes to everyone so there is universal MAD.

      May also end the world, but we’re already on the way there.

      • gnutrino@programming.dev
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        4 months ago

        North Korea is a terrible example of this, they were only able to get nuclear weapons because they never actually needed them. North Korea is left alone because they have hundreds of artillery pieces sat in range of Seoul and the backing of China to ride out the sanctions.

        Without that their nuclear program would have gotten the crap bombed out of them (again) long before it resulted in a bomb.

        • bearboiblake [he/him]@pawb.social
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          4 months ago

          Sure, but times have changed a lot, these days, IMO, imperialists would happily sacrifice Seoul to distract from Epstein files, as we’ve seen recently by the US relocating missile interceptors from Korea to defend Israel.

      • ohulancutash@feddit.uk
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        4 months ago

        Britain and Poland would have to withdraw from the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons. The only state to do so to date is North Korea and it would be a highly troubling precedent.