Although the Thread subject is a “regular” on here and the repetition can get rather tedious, some of the flights of fancy and other assorted bollox expounded do border on the entertaining. Sadly, even if the Polaris Sales Agreement (as amended) and the Kings Bay Missile Processing Agreement were available for public viewing, I doubt it would make any difference to the sundry theories and “hidden facts” some people have fixed in their minds. I would say shame on you other chaps for winding them up but, in all fairness, it is good sport.
Under the rules, if we give up the nuclear deterrent, we will never get it back.
If we did give it up, what concessions would we wring from the other nuclear Powers? Probably none, which seems a criminal waste of a significant bargaining chip.
Like it or not, the nuclear deterrent does buy us a place at the top table. I’m amazed that so many of you would like to give that up. So many souls happy to serve behind the counter and so few with ambitions to run the shop!
Of course it’s useless against a stateless nutter but that’s no argument against its true value. There are some nasty buggers out there who are nation states and, although they seem benign for now, could give us serious cause for concern in the future.
As some of you have already observed, any money saved from giving it up would not find its way to other parts of the Defence Budget. The cost of our ultimate “big stick” is not that great compared to its value. My personal view is that we would be either very brave or very stupid to give it up.