Presentation by Dr Stuart Parkinson, SGR, at Lancaster University

1 December 2014
 

The presentation covers...

• Basic intro to nuclear weapons (NWs) and the UK system
• 4 key arguments against NWs
• Disarmament initiatives – international and UK

1.      Nuclear weapons – the basics

• A basic NW brings together a ‘critical mass’ of nuclear material to ‘fission’ leading to a massive explosion
  • Material is uranium or plutonium
  • 5,000 times more effective than conventional bomb
  • Modern designs use both ‘fission’ and ‘fusion’ to create larger explosions – biggest weapons up to 1,000 larger
• Only type of Weapon of Mass Destruction (WMD) not yet totally banned
• Directly causes death by:
  • Burns (intense heat emitted by rising fireball)
  • Blast (winds stronger than hurricane)
  • Ionising radiation (immediate and delayed via ‘fallout’)
• Other effects:
  • Blinding flash of light
  • Electromagnetic pulse – renders electronics inoperable area over very large areas
  • Destruction of buildings/ infrastructure via blast and fire
    • Injuries to people
    • Vital services unavailable
    • Release of toxic materials from industrial buildings

• Smoke from fires & ‘firestorms’ can have global climatic effects
• Long-term radioactive contamination

2.      Hiroshima atomic bomb – key facts and figures

• Dropped 6 August 1945 on Japanese city
• Explosive power equivalent to roughly 15,000 tonnes of TNT
• Fireball temperature: around 6,000 degrees centigrade
• At least 130,000 died
  • About 80,000 killed immediately; another 50,000 died within 5 months
• Tens of thousands more injured
• Two-thirds of buildings destroyed

3.      UK nuclear weapons – basic facts and figures

• Trident system
• 160 ‘operational’ warheads (around 50 more in stockpile)
• Explosive power of each warhead: 100,000 tonnes TNT
  • About 8 times that of the one dropped on Hiroshima
• Carried on 4 (Vanguard-class) submarines
• Launch vehicle: Intercontinental Ballistic Missile (leased from US)
• At any one time: one submarine on patrol carrying 40 warheads
• Total explosive power carried by one submarine: 4,000,000 tonnes TNT
  • More than the explosive power of all the bombs dropped in World War II

4.      Dangers of keeping nuclear weapons

a. Risk of use is very real – whether by accident or by intention

b. Catastrophic and indiscriminate – if used, large numbers of civilians will die and civilisation would be threatened

c. Deterrence does fail – so is unreliable, especially given the consequences (a) and (b)

d. Doesn’t tackle other more important security threats – indeed, it diverts resources away from dealing with them

a. Risk of use is very real

• ‘Near-nuclear use’ is when a country comes very close to using nuclear weapons
• New report by Chatham House (a top UK think-tank)
• From recently revealed archive material, the report documents 13 cases between 1962 and 2002 – one every 3 years, e.g.
  • Able Archer Crisis, 1983 – NATO war games led to Soviet Union believing an attack was imminent and they nearly launched a pre-emptive strike
  • Black Brant scare, 1995 – Norwegian launch of research rocket led to Russia opening the ‘nuclear suitcase’
• Probably others that have not been publicly revealed

b. Catastrophic and indiscriminate

• Civilian population centres generally targeted by all sides
• If the missiles from one Trident submarine were launched against (e.g.) major Russian cities, main effects:
  • About 10 million dead and millions more injured
  • Firestorms would inject smoke into upper atmosphere causing large temperature drop (known as ‘nuclear winter’) over northern hemisphere – leading to massive crop failures and famine for at least 2 billion people

c. Nuclear deterrence does fail

• Examples
  • Chinese invasion of Korea, 1950 – faced nuclear-armed USA
  • Egypt/ Syria attack on Israel, 1973 – Israel nuclear-armed
  • Argentinean invasion of Falklands, 1982 – faced nuclear-armed UK
• NWs also have no effect on other major security threats, e.g.
  • Terrorism
  • Climate change

d. Doesn’t tackle other more important security threats

• Fails to tackle terrorism
• Fails to tackle roots of conflict, e.g.
  • Social and economic injustice
  • Resource depletion and climate change
  • International arms trade
• Need to divert resources from NWs to tackle these

5.      International non-proliferation/ disarmament initiatives

• Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty (NPT)
  • Over 180 states have committed not to develop/ deploy NWs (in return for access to nuclear power)
  • 5 ‘recognised’ nuclear-armed states (USA, Russia, France, China, UK) - but eventual disarmament intended
  • 4 nuclear-armed states outside the treaty (Israel, India, Pakistan, North Korea)
  • Has been fairly effective in reducing the spread of NWs
• Nuclear weapons-free zones
  • Cover more than half the world
• Nuclear Weapons Convention
  • Proposed total ban
  • Supported by most nations (140+) and civil society
  • Leading campaign group: ICAN

6.   UK political decisions

• Decision on replacing the current system is planned to be taken by parliament in 2016
• Cost would be at least £25 billion to build, with total lifetime costs of about £100 billion
• Spending of at least £2bn already for taken place
• For the reasons listed above, we should disarm and work with other nuclear-armed states to do the same
• In practice, given current political resistance, this could be done in steps:
  • Take Trident off continuous patrols, and then reduce these patrols to zero
  • Put nuclear warheads into storage
  • Cancel Trident replacement
  • Disarm completely

Main sources

• Barnaby F (2003). How to build a nuclear bomb. Granta books.
• Beach H (2011). What price nuclear blackmail? Abolition 2000 UK.
• Lewis P et al (2014). Too close for comfort: cases of near-nuclear use and options for policy. Chatham House.
• Schlosser E (2013). Command and Control. Penguin.
• Webber P (2013). The climatic impacts and humanitarian problems from the use of the UK’s nuclear weapons. SGR.