Originally Posted by miles offtarget
Back to my original point, does anyone know if still have to have the authority of the US President (and considering the mental stability of the baboon who currently holds that office, is this a wise thing), before we can light the blue touch paper on Trident ?
Anyone who knows for real isn't likely to tell us here!
But it is noticable that politicians asked this in the past have usually dissembled along the lines of "I cannot envisage any circumstance where we'd want to launch and the US wouldn't". Doesn't take a genius to work out that one
But the real issue isn't whether we can fire them ourselves - if we ever find out, Trident will have failed in its primary purpose, deterrance. The issue is that the USA could, if it so wished, stop supporting the UK deterrent, in which case it would be rendered inoperable in months if not weeks. That's how 'independent' it is.