ATTN all Britons RE the debate for Prime Minister

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Just a few impressions I got from watching it:

1)Gordon Brown's campaign sounded alot like the slogan "You don't change horses in midstream"

2)Nick Clegg Seemed to be the most sincere, but not sincere enough. If business cannot find Britons who have the necessary skills, then those enterprises should pay value added taxes to improve the school system until they can find people with the necessary skills. Importing people with the skills in demand merely deterrs natives from learning the skills in question.

3) There is no clearer means of sending a message than a nuclear explosion. There has not been a world war since nuclear weapons were developed.

I'm not sure what to make of Gordon Brown, he comes across like he is made from planks of wood. He seems so cold and emotionless. But on the other hand, I live in a house full of Asperger's and know that what you see on the outside isn't always the reality of what is on the inside. I saw him on the Andrew Maher show this Sunday and for the first time he actually seemed like a real person.

David "call me Dave" Cameron seems like a nice, amiable bloke. I could vote for him if he was standing alone. But I know that this is the very reason he is the leader, because the stuck up tossers who really run the party, know they don't stand a cat in hells chance of getting in themselves.

Nick Clegg also seems a decent enough chap although I did find myself getting a bit annoyed at his repetiveness and ended up shouting at the TV. "Yeah, heard you the first time. NEXT!" Also, I had a sneaky suspicion that his answers were very well rehersed and well acted. So I'm not sure how genuine he was.

I'm sort of hoping for a hung parliament so that they all have to work together and hopefully we'll end up with the best bits of each.

Sorry to intrude, but just wondering if "Britons" is really an existing word? o.O It just sounds odd to me... (Sorry for having nothing constructive to say about your elections ._. )

It's a real word. We just don't have much use for it on this side of the pond.

There has not been a world war since the electric toothbrush was developed. And we've been worryingly close to armageddon a few times, like with Cuba and Stanislav Petrov saving the world.

Anyway, Lib Dem policy is not necessarily to remove the nuclear deterrent, but to remove Trident and switch to another delivery system. Replacing the current submarine based system with a plane based one would be much cheaper - Tornado strike aircraft are nuclear capable, the Eurofighter could be made so; the cost of developing a bomb or missile (or more likely, just buying a design off the US that ends up costing more ) would be much lower than developing the next generation of submarines.

It also occurs to me that a plane based system could be carried both by land based planes and also by the new carriers, and it would make very good sense to do so. It would increase the dispersal of the weapons if there were a couple of airfields and a couple of carriers holding them, instead of sticking the whole active arsenal on one submarine at any time.

Personally, as an amateur of naval stuff I'd love to see new missile submarines, the new carriers, and an expansion instead of reduction of the numbers of Astutes and Type 45s on order, but given the economic climate I doubt it'll happen. I don't want to see the RN lose its place as "second navy" of the world. It's bad enough not being first.

That's not an effective replacement for the submarine system. Once the Vanguard Class submarines leave base and start patrol they to all intents and purposes disappear -- carriers and airbases don't do that. Moreover, the UK has four ballistic missile subs, and so it's certainly not a case of having all your missiles on one ship at a time, although it is true to say that not all four are at sea at the same time; I think at least one is being re-fitted in dock, whilst the others patrol. And remember, these are ballistic missiles that by definition follow a ballistic trajectory and so are extremely difficult to stop once on the way to the target, unlike aircraft systems, or cruise missiles. The Trident missiles can also be configured with multiple warheads with a range of yields, and each sub carries these in various configurations to deal with whatever targets are specified. These are available to launch within minutes.

To suggest we go back to some 1950s type aircraft-delivered system is crazy. You might as well scrap our nuclear capability altogether, because more likely than not if it did come to nuclear war our country would be an irradiated desert before your planes even got off the ground... and of course, anyone thinking of attacking us would know that, thus making the attack more likely.

I'll add with regard to this thread title, that the debate shouldn't be framed as one for PM, as we are really voting for a political party. Even if Labour do win and Brown continues as PM, it won't be long before he'll deposed by the Party elite. However the election goes, we aren't voting for an individual.

Duh, I'm slow. The other option is to stick nuclear Tomahawks in the Astutes. ^^

There is only one Vanguard-class on patrol at any one time, carrying 48 warheads on its 16 missiles (as per the 1998 Strategic Defence Review). Up to 48 warheads, at that. The others are either under refit or swanning round the Gareloch or whatever. We don't have enough missiles to fit all four boats, and we don't even own the missiles we do have.

And aircraft delivered systems aren't 1950s, and moreover can certainly be dial-a-yield. Every other declared nuclear power uses them and so far as I know every other nuclear power except possibly the North Koreans use them; Britain is the only one not to. It's kinda strange to be able to launch nukes from a fantastically complicated submarine but not to be able to drop 'em from a plane. ^^

What dictator would want to risk his own mortality, and leave his nation a sea of radioactive glass?

there is such a thing as triad. Submarines, aircraft and land based nuclear weapons have their advantages and disadvantages. Submarines are hard to find, and hard to contact, so they are good for launching a retaliatory strike. Aircraft carriers are easier to find, but the pilots can be recalled if there was some mistake.

Starting in the great depression, the US military lost a lot of funding, A US citizen devised the suspension system that would later be used by the Russian T-34 tank. Robert H Goddard devised a means of using Gyroscopes to guide rockets, that was also unused by the US military. In exchange for the budget savings the US army got the M-1 tank also called the "Ronson" because it lights up everytime. While that is a good trait for a cigarette lighter it is bad for tanks. Pacifism Kills!

Every other nuclear power can deploy a substantially larger air fleet than we can. A substantially larger everything than we can. We had the V-bombers, and the last time we used one it was for a conventional strike. Planes are easy targets by comparison with subs. If the government is too hard up to fully equip all the subs and still buy boots in for the squaddies then they are certainly not going to start investing in a whole new delivery system which is much more easily compromised. Its a miracle that we haven't already pawned off what we DO have so we can get an extra shithook or two.

There is the capacity to have up to three on patrol, as far as I understand. True, the Labour regime may have made a decision to keep only one on patrol, but at a time when security concerns are raised an enemy couldn't be sure more wouldn't be deployed.


Cruise missiles aren't ballistic missiles. They're a different weapon for a different situation.


Why would we need an aircraft-delivered option if the ballistic missile option is the best for the job? Using aircraft-delivered weapons as a main deterrent is 1950s in the context of the UK. As for other nations, certain other countries don't have our quick access to deep water (eg Israel), and others don't have access to the technology for submarine-launched weapons (India, Pakistan). Others like China, Russia, and the US are in a different league to us and can no doubt envisage a wider spectrum of scenarios in which nuclear weapons would be used. Aircraft launched weapons, whether bombs or cruise missiles, would fit in there somewhere, along with battlefield-type nuclear weapons.