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The papers yesterday were full of Prime Ministerial things, including one piece which I found quite sobering - a reminder that the only person in the country with the authority to order a nuclear strike using the British Armed Forces is the Prime Minister. Now, I don't know about you, but overall given a choice between this decision being made by pretty much any Prime Minister I can name and, say , the Queen, I'd rather have her Majesty's finger on the button any day of the week. Whichever way a nuclear decision went, I can't think of any Prime Minister I'd really trust to make the right call.
It's distressingly easy to imagine Tony Blair striking a pose of sanctimonious piety and hang-wringing faux-concern whilst blithely condemning untold millions to sizzling oblivion, and it's similarly easy to imagine John Major Umming and Ahhing in a frenzy of indecision before being carried away in an expanding nuclear fireball because he'd left the decision too late.
All told, the British nuclear arsenal is relatively small. The French, Ukranians, Russians, Belarussians, Chinese and US all have definitely have many more atom bombs than us (although the Ukrainian and Belarussian ones are under the control of Russia), and several emerging powers like India, Israel and Brazil may well have but they're keeping quiet about it. Even more worryingly, there's a suggestion that Japanese Death cult Aum Shrinko (responsible for the Tokyo Sarin-gas attack) detonated the worlds first non-governmental nuclear device in the mid 1990's.
Be that as it may, the thing about atom bombs - their entire point, no less - is that you don't need very many of them to really spoil someone's day. The British stockpile of about 200 warheads has a theoretical ability to devastate an area of some 20,000 square miles and dangerously irradiate an area double that - about a tenth of the land area of, say, France.
I'm just saying.
That article which caught my attention was one which pointed out that one of the first duties of an incoming Prime Minister is to write a letter outlining what the reaction of British nuclear commanders should be in the event of their death in a nuclear attack. The letter is handwritten and then sealed unread by anyone except the PM. Should London and the chain of command be vapourised, the letter is opened and acted on. When a PM leaves office, the letter is destroyed, unopened; the idea being that only the PM knows what is in it and ever will. Apparently when Blair wrote his letter he turned white as a sheet and shook, and when Major wrote his he had to take a day or two off afterwards to recover.
I actually find it rather comforting that people writing what is an effective posthumous death warrant for millions are so affected by doing so.
Of course, the effect of reading about this is to make me wonder what my letter would say. Even if the incoming PM is committed to nuclear disarmament the letter must be written to cover the period before decomissioning, so there's no cop out there. The options which military advisors give the PM are said to include; retaliate, stand down and retreat to Australia (if it's still there), place yourself under the command of the US (if it's still there), use your judgement, and several others.
I mentally started to compose a letter, like you do, but quickly realised that what I was mentally writing was a mealy-mouthed buck-passing pile of crap. I might have a go at thinking about it again later.
So, there's my question to you: If you were PM, what would your letter say?
It's distressingly easy to imagine Tony Blair striking a pose of sanctimonious piety and hang-wringing faux-concern whilst blithely condemning untold millions to sizzling oblivion, and it's similarly easy to imagine John Major Umming and Ahhing in a frenzy of indecision before being carried away in an expanding nuclear fireball because he'd left the decision too late.
All told, the British nuclear arsenal is relatively small. The French, Ukranians, Russians, Belarussians, Chinese and US all have definitely have many more atom bombs than us (although the Ukrainian and Belarussian ones are under the control of Russia), and several emerging powers like India, Israel and Brazil may well have but they're keeping quiet about it. Even more worryingly, there's a suggestion that Japanese Death cult Aum Shrinko (responsible for the Tokyo Sarin-gas attack) detonated the worlds first non-governmental nuclear device in the mid 1990's.
Be that as it may, the thing about atom bombs - their entire point, no less - is that you don't need very many of them to really spoil someone's day. The British stockpile of about 200 warheads has a theoretical ability to devastate an area of some 20,000 square miles and dangerously irradiate an area double that - about a tenth of the land area of, say, France.
I'm just saying.
That article which caught my attention was one which pointed out that one of the first duties of an incoming Prime Minister is to write a letter outlining what the reaction of British nuclear commanders should be in the event of their death in a nuclear attack. The letter is handwritten and then sealed unread by anyone except the PM. Should London and the chain of command be vapourised, the letter is opened and acted on. When a PM leaves office, the letter is destroyed, unopened; the idea being that only the PM knows what is in it and ever will. Apparently when Blair wrote his letter he turned white as a sheet and shook, and when Major wrote his he had to take a day or two off afterwards to recover.
I actually find it rather comforting that people writing what is an effective posthumous death warrant for millions are so affected by doing so.
Of course, the effect of reading about this is to make me wonder what my letter would say. Even if the incoming PM is committed to nuclear disarmament the letter must be written to cover the period before decomissioning, so there's no cop out there. The options which military advisors give the PM are said to include; retaliate, stand down and retreat to Australia (if it's still there), place yourself under the command of the US (if it's still there), use your judgement, and several others.
I mentally started to compose a letter, like you do, but quickly realised that what I was mentally writing was a mealy-mouthed buck-passing pile of crap. I might have a go at thinking about it again later.
So, there's my question to you: If you were PM, what would your letter say?
