HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.ORG.UK --------------------------- It's the ultimate in
retro-chic - nuclear weapons
Simon Hoggart Tuesday April 30, 2002 The Guardian http://politics.guardian.co.uk/columnist/story/0,9321,707346,00.html Yesterday a Labour defence secretary promised to use nuclear weapons if needs be. He got away with it, as you'd expect now that Labour is the war party. As someone pointed out, Tony Blair talks about the "first" Gulf war, implying that we're right on course for the second. But how it took me back, to a time in the past which some younger readers may not even recall! Cliff Richard was top of the pops, income tax was four and sixpence in the pound, we all gathered round the TV to watch great natural history shows starring David Attenborough, Arsenal were top of the league, and Margaret Thatcher was a little known figure on the very fringe of politics. So not much has changed in 40 years or so. Still, in those days we had CND, Aldermaston marches, Michael Foot in his duffel coat waving his stick round Trafalgar Square, and The War Game, a television drama which pointed out that when a nuclear bomb exploded over your city, there wouldn't be much point in protecting yourself in the manner suggested by the authorities, to wit, hiding under a table. Then we forgot about nukes and got on with buying DVDs and holidays in Florida. Until now, when they might return as a form of retro-chic, like hippie clothes. Malcolm Savidge, a Labour MP, asked whether the words of Geoff Hoon, the defence secretary, signalled a change in government policy. Were we going back on an undertaking we had given to the non-nuclear states, under the nuclear non-proliferation treaty, not to use nukes against them? And in any case, hadn't it always been the policy of successive British govern ments that nuclear weapons were "the deterrent of last resort"? At this point, as always with any discussion of nukes, things turned metaphysical. "It is still a deterrent of last resort," said Mr Hoon. "But in order for it to be a deterrent it must be possible for a British government to express its view that ultimately, in conditions of extreme self-defence, those nuclear weapons would be used." Which of course begged the question which Mr Savidge had really been asking, which was "what would the government of Iraq have to do before we rained death on millions of Iraqi civilians?" (I was reminded of a deeply cynical joke I heard in the States. Defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld and his top aides go to the Oval Office to see President Bush. They tell him that their estimates show a nuclear strike would kill 10 million Iraqi civilians and one bicycle repair man. "What's with the bicycle repair man? asks Bush. "See," says Rumsfeld, turning to his aides, "I told you no-one would care about the 10 million Iraqis.") Diane Abbott was incredulous. What, she asked, was extreme self-defence? "You're either defending yourself or you're not." Geoff Hoon certainly wasn't going to answer that. "I accept that there are those, and some of them are on my side of the house, who do not believe in the use of nuclear weapons in any circumstances. That is not the position of the government. "So it is important that I set out that, er, the government has the availability of nuclear weapons and in certain specified conditions that I have already indicated, we would be prepared to use them." But he hasn't indicated those conditions, and I suspect he never will. He's hardly going to say: "My pledge to Saddam: do what you please and we won't nuke you." On the other hand, you could almost see Labour MPs scrambling for their duffel coats and packing their fish paste sandwiches for the long walk to Aldermaston. --------------------------- ANTI-NATO INFORMATION LIST ==^================================================================ This email was sent to: archive@jab.org EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?a84x2u.a9617B Or send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^================================================================ |
