LETTERS Nuclear insecurity
Sir: Timothy Garton Ash has done us all a favour by spelling out the reality of the British nuclear dilemma (The trouble with Trident', 12 April). That dilemma is not Trident or submarine Cruise. The accoun- tants and engineers can sort that one out. What we have to decide is how real security is possible for anyone in a world of nuclear weapons and nuclear knowledge. It no longer helps to try to play the game under the old rules. A solution which involves the possibility of a number of nation states each able to trigger off the exchange which could lead to the destruc- tion of our civilisation is not an acceptable one.
We need a great deal of re-reading of Olof Palme's Common Security. He there said that today we have to achieve security `not against the adversary but together with him. International security must rest on a commitment to joint survival rather than on a threat of mutual destruction.' This is the perspective within which any serious discussions about an independent British nuclear deterrent and the functions claimed for it ought to take place.
Bruce Kent
Vice-Chair, Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament, 22-24 Underwood Street, London N1
Previous page
