On the eve of the conference, Keir Starmer announced that the UK would switch its order for the US F-35 strike jets for its aircraft carriers to buying a different model of the plane configured to carry tactical nuclear as well as conventional weapons.
The 50-page document is sober and elegant in its address – one of the most coherent, down to earth and realistic policy documents for decades. It follows on the heels of the new Strategic Defence Review – which took a wider perspective of the defence, resilience and security menu for Britain in the age of autonomous weapons, AI and cyber subversion. It stated plainly that an all-out kinetic, i.e. bombs and rockets, nuclear attack on Britain could not be ruled out in the near future.
Sir Keir Starmer being shown a Hawk T2, the RAF’s premier fast jet trainer, at RAF Valley in Anglesey, Wales (Photo: Paul Currie/PA Wire)
We haven’t had much explanation as to why this choice has been made, and announced almost from the side of the UK’s diplomatic mouth. The main reason is Russia’s new nuclear doctrine and the threat to deploy new theatre, or tactical, nuclear weapons across the wider theatre of operations in the Ukraine war. They have used the new Oreshnik and Kinshal hypersonic medium-range ballistic missiles, capable of carrying nuclear warheads.
In the face of this threat, the UK’s role is key. Britain is the unique European nuclear power whose arsenal and capability is dedicated primarily to Nato command. France maintains its own nuclear arsenal, but primarily for France itself.
The Vanguard-class HMS Vigilant, one of the UK’s four nuclear warhead-carrying submarines, with Astute-class HMS Artful behind, at HM Naval Base Clyde (Photo: Danny Lawson/PA Wire)
The defence review noted that there is a gap in the UK’s ability to deploy theatre nuclear weapons, i.e. short-range atomic bombs and rockets, on behalf of European Nato. The RAF phased out the capability of carrying nuclear ordnance with the old MRCA Tornado in the 1990s. The US withdrew nuclear bombs from storage at RAF Lakenheath in 1998. However, the US air force upgraded nuclear bunkers at its main UK air bases ten years ago.
At the Atomic Weapons Establishment (AWE) at Aldermaston, deep in leafy Berkshire, lies the core of UK nuclear defence policy and practice. Here they test and evolve the warheads for the Trident submarines, one on patrol 365 days in the year. Currently they are building and testing the new Astraea A21/Mk7 warhead for the new Dreadnought boats in the 2030s.
Defence Secretary John Healey holds the remains of a domestic drone destroyed by the Dragonfire system, right, during a visit to Warminster Garrison, Wiltshire (Photo: Leon Neal/PA Wire)
The laser test is used in conformity with the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty of 1996 – banning atmospheric and underground tests. The AWE take the NPT very seriously, unlike those not conforming, like Iran, and not joining like India, Pakistan, Israel and North Korea. The parliament of Iran has just proposed suspending all co-operation with the IAEA, the atomic energy authority monitoring the NPT, which Iran actually signed in 1970 and never quit.
They will now be watching to see if anything happens to the 400kg of potentially fissile nuclear material that has now gone missing in Iran, according to the IAEA. Some of it could be refined to 60 per cent purity – very close to the 90 per cent required for a nuclear warhead. It is known that the sites at Natanz and Fordo were emptied in the days before America mounted operation Midnight Hammer.
square DEFENCE UK would drop US tactical nuclear weapons in war with Russia using new stealth jets
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Dictators who actually possess nuclear weapons, like North Korea, will feel immune from attack – and a country like Ukraine must regret giving theirs up in 1994. Furthermore, Hill told The New York Times: “I’d be very careful with the assumption that there is a US nuclear umbrella – countries like Japan and South Korea are wondering whether they can rely on the US.”
One way or another, given its history and expertise, Britain will be at the heart of both Nato and UN diplomacy and policy to manage and mitigate it.
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