Defence: Continuous At-Sea Deterrent

Lord Arbuthnot of Edrom Excerpts

Wednesday 13th July 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Arbuthnot of Edrom (Con)]

While I reach the same conclusion as the noble Lord, Lord West of Spithead, I am afraid I do so without any of his certainty and with none of his panache, for which I must apologise, because I share the concerns expressed by the noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham. I must begin by paying tribute to the Minister for his stamina—he is clearly a young man—and I should draw the attention of the House to my interests, as set out in the register, particularly in relation to Thales and Babcock.

I agree with the noble Lord, Lord West of Spithead, on one point—on many points, in fact—about the achievement of the Atomic Weapons Establishment and our Armed Forces in maintaining a continuous at-sea deterrent for so many decades. However, outside this House, people are protesting and demanding an absence of nuclear weapons in the world. That is something that we will of course be able to reach only gradually, if we can reach it at all, but a step along that road would be a valuable one to take.

I hope the Minister will say more about the cost of Trident, because £31 billion plus £10 billion in contingency is quite a lot more than it was suggested in 2007 the cost would be. CND’s estimate of the cost as £200 billion is something I discount, but I suspect the cost will go up as the years pass.

There is one expression I would like the House to reconsider, which is describing the nuclear deterrent as an insurance policy. The point of a nuclear deterrent is that if they bomb us, we will bomb them. That is unlike any insurance policy I have ever come across. If someone burns down my house, I do not go and burn down theirs. This nuclear deterrent is rather more like a booby trap: if they bomb us, something very nasty will go off in their back yard. It relies on the principle of retaliation. In law—long ago, I used to practise law—retaliation, as such, is illegal. I suppose that once we get to the point of nuclear exchange, the question of what is and is not legal will become of little interest in people’s minds.

I hope that one point that has not yet been mentioned in this debate will be taken into account, which is that we propose to base the nuclear weapons we have for the foreseeable future—for decades—in Scotland. As I understand it, only one—maybe two—of the Members of Parliament coming from Scotland would support this nuclear deterrent. That will have to be handled with great sensitivity in the years ahead, otherwise we will run the risk of weakening the ties of the union, which have already been damaged severely by the Brexit vote.

Despite all these points against nuclear deterrence, there is one that trumps every other argument—I hope that is the last time I use that word in this House—which is Roosevelt’s comment:

“Speak softly and carry a big stick”.

That is what, at the end of the day, discourages war. Strength discourages war, and I therefore have come down in favour of the Government’s proposal. With considerable reluctance, I have come to the view that we should keep the nuclear deterrent we have. It must be a deterrent that works, which means four boats.

Clearly, it will not work against all the threats that we face—of course it will not. The right reverend Prelate the Bishop of Chester was right to say that it has no consequence in relation to terrorism, but it was not intended to. It is also true that our cyber vulnerabilities pose existential threats to the western way of life. This is a matter of opinion, but in my view our nuclear deterrent has helped—only helped—to keep the peace over many decades. I do not think now, when the world is incredibly unstable, is the time for an experiment in unilateralism.