UK’s Independent Nuclear Deterrent Gives Sunak ‘Kudos’ as He Meets Biden in San Diego, Says Expert

The British prime minister has “kudos” According to a British defense analyst, leaders of countries like New Zealand or the Netherlands don’t have a nuclear deterrent because the UK has one.

UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak is meeting U.S. President Joe Biden and Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese in the port of San Diego in California—home of the U.S. Navy’s Pacific fleet—on Monday to sign the AUKUS security pact between the three countries.

AUKUS is the deal Australia You will receive a “nuclear-powered submarine capability,” Australia, Britain, the United States and Britain “will develop and provide joint advanced military capabilities to promote security and stability in the Indo–Pacific region.”

Tim Ripley, a defense analyst who is also the author of “Little Green Men: The Inside Story of Russia’s New Military Power,” Australia will not receive the tools to create an independent nuclear deterrent unlike the Royal Navy’s agreement which allows them to use U.S. Trident missiles in their submarines.

Ripley claimed that Britain built its first Atom Bomb in 1947. Later, Nye, Britain’s foreign secretary at the time, stated to a Labour Party conference, “Without nuclear weapons, they would not.” “send a foreign secretary, whoever he may be, naked into the conference chamber.”

The UK’s original nuclear deterrent was provided by its own submarine-launched Polaris missile systems. However, in the 1980s, former Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher’s government reached a deal to supply Trident missiles to British Vanguard-class subs. These missiles are very similar to those of the U.S Navy’s Ohio class.

Tony Blair, then Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, gave his approval to the Trident renewal program in 2006. This would have the missiles kept but four new Dreadnought class submarines.

UK PM Has ‘Ability to Blow the World Up’

Ripley spoke to The Epoch Times “It’s seen as a weapon of last resort, a weapon that moves you from being just an average country to a leading player. You have the ability to blow the world up that the prime minister of the Netherlands doesn’t have. So you have kudos and prestige in a way that the prime minister of New Zealand doesn’t have.”

He also said that there was an “industrial argument” That “new nuclear energy power is a key technology, it sets your industry and industrial base above everybody else.”

“Then you’ve got the actual nuclear deterrent argument itself, that you deter anybody else using nuclear weapons against you. That was the classic thing in the Cold War, the four-minute warning, and the only way to stop it was to have mutual assured destruction,” Ripley was added.

The Dreadnought submarines are being built at BAE Systems’s shipyard in Barrow-in-Furness, north England. The first vessel will enter service in early 2030s.

BAE Systems employs 10,000 people at Barrow and in other areas of the submarine-building programme.

Downing Street confirmed that Sunak would make an announcement Monday regarding the integrated defense and security review. This review was updated following Russia’s invasion.

The Times of London reported on Friday that Sunak would announce the injection of another £5 billion into the cost of building four new Dreadnought-class submarines that would eventually replace the current Vanguard-class subs that maintain Britain’s independent nuclear deterrent.

The Royal Navy’s four Dreadnought submarines—only one of which would be at sea at any one time—are in contrast with the U.S. Navy’s 18 Ohio-class submarines and another 60 Virginia-class submarines, all of which will eventually be equipped with nuclear warheads.

Not Just Left-Wing Quering £50 Billion Price Tag

Ripley claimed that arguments against spending so much money on the Trident renew programme were not just for left-wing politicians, such as Jeremy Corbyn. He saw nuclear weapons in the same way. “completely immoral.”

He stated that there are many people who believe the same thing, even within the British Armed Forces. “astronomical” The cost involved is prohibitive, especially when it comes to properly funding the British Army, the RAF and other Royal Navy units.

Ripley spoke of the money being pumped in to the Dreadnought program. “£5 billion would buy you an awful lot of tanks and artillery shells for the army.”

Ripley also stated the independent nuclear deterrent term was not entirely accurate.

He said: “If a submarine is at sea and some crisis unfolds and the British prime minister says fire a missile at Moscow, then it is independent. But if Britain and the United States fell out over something and the United States wanted to take its revenge on Britain for invading Suez or whatever it is, then they can say ‘you can’t get any more missile technology’ from us.”

“So the independent bit is not quite completely as end-to-end independent as the French are. There is American involvement in the long-term sustainment of the British nuclear deterrent, but not at the point of firing,” Ripley was added.

Defense Secretary Ben Wallace has advocated for a multibillion-pound increase in his budget. Defence minister James Heappey stated that there had been. “robust” Clashes between the Treasury and the Ministry of Defence.

Sophia Gaston, Policy Exchange head of foreign policy, UK resilience, tweeted on Friday that she believed the following: “unusual convergence” Sunak’s summit in Paris with France’s President Emmanuel Macron. “coincidence.”

She wrote: “It tells a story that the UK delivers on commitments, is ambitious but practical, prioritises relationships & balances them. Plus, AUKUS central to IP [Indo-Pacific] ’tilt’.”

The so-called Indo–Pacific tilt comes amid growing concern over Chinese military spending and aggression towards Taiwan and other countries in the South China Sea.

Ripley stated that Russia was more of a concern for Britain than China. However, Washington considered China to be a greater threat in the long-term.

He stated that: “The Chinese military build-up is the preeminent issue for the United States, military and political and diplomatic and economic. They are absolutely obsessed by it. It runs through almost everything they do.”

“But the problem with the Chinese thing is how do you have a military confrontation with a country that stocks all your supermarkets?” Ripley was added.