Blog: Peace

Does Trident announcement mark a new Lib Dem broken promise?

Posted by louise - 18 May 2011 at 3:32pm - 6 Comments

A while back I got a letter from the Lib Dems telling me "Trident will not be renewed this parliament - not on a Liberal Democrat watch”.

This ran though my mind today as I watched Defence Secretary Liam Fox stand up in parliament to pronounce ‘thunderbirds are go’ on the next phase of building a replacement for Trident.

Article tagged as: costs, liberal democrats, MoD, nuclear, nuclear weapons, peace, submarines, trident, WMDs

FOI documents reveal MoD plans to purchase "long lead" items for Trident

Publication date:  18 May, 2011

A freedom of information request made by Greenpeace reveals that the MoD plans to purchase a whole series of “long lead” items for Trident replacement submarines in the next few years - estimated to cost billions.

Download the report:
Article tagged as: foi, MoD, nuclear, nuclear weapons, submarines, trident, WMDs

Wikileaks reveals Arctic could be the new cold war

Posted by jamess - 12 May 2011 at 2:35pm - 90 Comments
The Arctic resource scramble is sparking military tension
All rights reserved. Credit: Nick Cobbing/Greenpeace
The Arctic resource scramble is sparking military tension

UPDATE: Watch BBC Newsnight's feature on the Wikileaks Arctic files

Submarine explorers planting Russian flags under the North Pole. Military tension between Nato and Russia. US diplomats manoeuvring in the wings. Aircraft carriers lurking and strike fighters changing hands.

Sound like something from a James Bond plot? Unfortunately it’s not.

New Wikileaks releases today have shown the Arctic oil rush is not just a threat to the environment and our climate, but also to peace.

Article tagged as: arctic, climate change, go beyond oil, oil, oil drilling, peace, war, wikileaks

MoD starts purchasing Trident replacement without parliamentary OK - get your MP to act!

Posted by andrelotz - 18 March 2011 at 2:22pm - 15 Comments
While cuts are being made to public services, why is money being spent on weapon
All rights reserved. Credit: Greenpeace
While cuts are being made to public services, why is money being spent on weapons we neither want or need?

At the mention of nuclear today our thoughts turn to the situation in Japan and all of those affected by the earthquakes, tsunami and nuclear emergency. I can only hope that the situation at Fukushima is soon contained and the risks minimised for everyone affected.

Here in the UK, there is another nuclear issue that is silently inching forward without parliamentary approval or public awareness – nuclear weapons replacement.

Article tagged as: disarmament, EDMs, nuclear weapons, peace, strategic defence review, trident

MoD have a Trident-sized hole in their budget

Posted by louise - 21 January 2011 at 10:49am - 8 Comments

Yesterday's headline in the FT shouted "MoD faces fresh crisis over funding". It turns out that the Ministry of Defence have checked over last October's defence review and found out that they actually need an extra £1 billion a year over the next four years to deliver it.

Article tagged as: disarmament, MoD, peace, strategic defence review, trident

Ahoy! A nuclear scandal ahead?

Posted by louise - 14 January 2011 at 5:09pm - 14 Comments
All rights reserved. Credit: John Cobb / Greenpeace

Remember the defence review? The one that left us marvelling at the Alice in Wonderland world we inhabit - where we build two giant aircraft carriers we don’t actually want because building them is actually cheaper than cancelling them? The one that said we can’t actually afford to buy any planes to put on those carriers?

Article tagged as: disarmament, MoD, nuclear weapons, peace, trident

A win on Trident?

Posted by louise - 20 October 2010 at 1:55pm - 1 Comment

Yesterday’s Strategic Defence and Security Review (SDSR) gave us the welcome news that plans to replace Trident have been put on hold and reductions will be made to our existing nuclear weapons. "Five year delay" shouted the papers who widely interpreted the move as a compromise to keep the coalition government together.

The reality is that in the face of military cuts and a National Security Review (which concluded the threats we face are cyber crime, terrorism, a foreign crisis "drawing in Britain", and natural disasters) it’s hard to imagine how David Cameron could have ticked the yes box on spending £97bn replacing Trident. Particularly as there was already a joker in the SDSR pack in the shape of the aircraft carriers.

Article tagged as: aircraft carriers, disarmament, peace, strategic defence review, trident

Leading scientists criticise nuclear weapons research

Posted by jossc - 13 October 2010 at 8:57am - 1 Comment

In a letter in today’s Guardian 36 science professors are calling on the Prime Minister to protect core science funding - by cutting government investment in developing new nuclear weapons. We asked Stuart Parkinson, co-ordinator of the letter, to tell us what it’s all about...

As the announcement of the government’s spending review gets ever closer, the lobbying to defend this or that area of public spending is becoming more and more intense.

Article tagged as: awe aldermaston, nuclear weapons, trident

'Defence Day' at Tory party conference - what will the Lib Dems make of it all?

Posted by louise - 6 October 2010 at 3:26pm - 1 Comment

Dr Fox looks nervous about his Trident budget cc  Steve Punter

Yesterday was, amongst other things, time for the Conservatives to debate defence at their conference.

First up was Dr Liam '13th century' Fox, who declared that we live in a "world more dangerous than any other time in recent memory". Hmmm - what about the Cuban missile crisis, Liam? Or Hitler invading Europe?

Article tagged as: party conferences, trident

Going beyond oil is also about peace

Posted by jamess - 2 October 2010 at 3:11pm - 7 Comments

Everyone’s got their personal reasons for taking action. For me, deciding to jump in front of a moving drill ship was not only about protecting the environment and stopping climate change, it was also about peace. Our addiction to oil fuels conflict, corrupts governments and destroys lives.

Article tagged as: BP, climate change, go beyond oil, oil spill, peace, war
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