Does Britain Need Nuclear Weapons? A report from the British Pugwash Group

Tom Milne, C. R. Hill, R. S. Pease, R. E. Peierls, J. Rotblat, Does Britain Need Nuclear Weapons? A report from the British Pugwash Group

Contents

Chapter 1: Introduction

Chapter 2: UK Nuclear Weapons

2.1 Historical Background

2.2 The UK’s Nuclear Arsenal

2.2.1 Strategic Weapon Systems

2.2.2 Sub-strategic Systems

2.2.3 Warhead Safety

2.2.4 Dismantlement of Warheads

2.3 Infrastructure Supporting the Nuclear Weapons Programme

2.3.1 The Atomic Weapons Establishment

2.3.2 Provision of Special Nuclear Materials

2.3.3 Cost of Nuclear Programme

2.4 UK Nuclear Weapons Policy

2.4.1 Government Policy

2.4.2 Labour and Liberal Democrat Policy

2.4.3 UK Public Opinion on Nuclear Weapons

2.4.4 Secrecy

2.5 Future Developments

2.5.1 Comprehensive Test Ban

2.5.2 Fissile Material Cut-off

2.5.3 Non-proliferation

2.5.4 Ballistic Missile Defences

Chapter 3: Nuclear Policies of Other Countries

3.1 Nuclear Weapon States Party to the NPT

3.1.1 The United States

3.1.2 USSR/Russia

3.1.3 France

3.1.4 People’s Republic of China

3.2 Nuclear Weapon States Outside the NPT

3.2.1 Israel

3.2.2 India and Pakistan

3.3 Non-nuclear Weapon States

3.3.1 Sweden

3.3.2 South Africa

3.3.3 Other Countries

3.4 Summary

Chapter 4: Future UK Policies

4.1 Appraisal of British Government Policy

4.1.1 Nuclear weapons `keep the peace’ (the Russian ‘threat’)

4.1.2 Sub-strategic nuclear weapons

4.1.3 Nuclear weapons cannot be disinvented

4.2 Nuclear Weapons in the post-Cold War World

4.2.1 Remaining nuclear dangers

4.2.2 The meaning of deterrence

4.2.3 Non-proliferation

4.2.4 What Are British nuclear weapons for?

4.2.5 Politics and public opinion

4.3 The Shape of Future Policy

4.3.1 Independent nuclear disarmament by Britain

4.3.2 Nuclear disarmament in conjunction with other nations

4.4 Towards a Nuclear-Weapon-Free World

Chapter 5: Conclusions

Appendices

1 British Nuclear Policy: Statement on the Defence Estimates 1994

2 Labour Party policy

3 Liberal Democrat policy

4 Extracts from European Parliament Report on the NPT

5 Public opinion poll