When they are not being accidentally carried over US cities, the movements of the US nuclear arsenal are top secret but the USA have been kind enough to remove its nukes from Britain after the last 110 American nuclear weapons left in the UK were quietly removed from RAF Lakenhealth in Suffolk.
At a time when the United States are applying pressure on Iran over its nuclear ambitions, the US still has nuclear bombs in five European bases, in Belgium, Germany, Holland, Italy and Turkey although the issue is controversial and continually draws protests as has the new idea of placing US interceptor missiles somewhere in Eastern Europe.
A 2006 Greenpeace Survey showed that 70 percent of Europeans want to live in a nuclear weapons free Europe. The polling data also demonstrated that a sizable majority of the citizens in countries which host US nuclear weapons were unaware of their presence.
With the overwhelming response on finding out another country holds such devastating weapons in your country being to tell them to get them the hell off, the governments of several NATO countries have insisted that these weapons be removed from their territory. The US has previously removed their weapons from Canada, Greece, Greenland and Iceland who are all now free of US nuclear bombs.
Britain and France are the only nations in Europe with its own nuclear weapons although Britain is not averse to stashing its devastating armaments in other countries, during the cold war it hid nuclear weapons in Cyprus and Singapore without even telling the respective host Governments.
What this all means is that England is now free of nuclear weapons. All of our own nuclear warheads, missiles and submarines are stationed in Faslane, Scotland which will be well received this side of Hadrian's Wall and suits me as i live on the South Coast of England and as far away from them as is geographically possible, but ensures that our (Scottish) Prime Minister is not going to win any popularity contests up there anytime soon.
14 comments:
Your sense of security is false, Lucy. When the nukes start falling, if the explosions doesn't get you the radio-activity will.
The U.S. is the nigger in the woodpile. Until it is disarmed, the whole world is at risk.
"The U.S. is the nigger in the woodpile"
First Jews, now Blacks. Is there anyone, beside yourself that you don't hate Danny?
Now that I have had my requisite dustup, with the dipshit down under, Lucy, I have a question for you. Do you believe that we (the west)can or should totally disarm? Not the pie in the sky hope, but rather a blunt assessment of the world. Let me know
David,
-"why Americans elected George the first time (let alone twice)"
Well, just once really...
I admit, it is pretty embarrassing.
-"why Americans are so inept in areas like foreign policy"
Bush n' Co do indeed seem pretty inept. But you're talking about three hundred million individuals.
-"why most Americans are so full of themselves"
Americans, as individuals, are generally great achievers and most of us have a lot to be proud of. But we are rarely proud greatly beyond the bounds of moderation.
-"why most Americans are racists (a recent survey showed that 80% of Americans have negative feelings towards coloured people)"
There are racists everywhere on the planet in large numbers almost every country. And I'll say your statistic is meaningless because (according to Wikipedia, God of Wisdom) blacks make up 12.2% of the American population and whites make up 73.9%. It would be just about impossible for you to claim that 80% of Americans are racists (in any meaningful sense). Even if 80% of the whites were racists (which would be absurd) you're statistic is mathematically incorrect.
-"why Americans love violence and killing"
This claim doesn't become a response as it is prima face absurd. It's an empirical claim that is out of touch with reality.
-"why Americans are so easily manipulated by politicians and corporations and the media"
"why Americans, generally speaking, are completely dumb and are a danger to themselves and the world!"
Folks (from the whole world) certainly believe the TV too much. Politicians everywhere are crafty but Americans are not, in fact, disproportionately prone to becoming dumb thralls.
-I believe, David, that you've bitten off a bit more than you can chew.
...okay, now on to the actual comment on the original post.
Lucy,
I certainly dislike nuclear weapons in the abstract, but the concept of a "nuclear deterrent" isn't a bad one in this (very flawed) world. And a "nuclear free Europe" would also be a "massive free rider on the American taxpayer". I hope you're not thinking that the stategic position of Europe would be very sound if there weren't any nuclear weapons (European, American, or otherwise) to back it. Putin, or someone else, would gobble y'all up.
A non-nuclear state simply cannot militarily defeat a nuclear state. Without the (presently nonexistent) technology to defeat a massive (let's say 2000 warhead) nuclear attack.
I'd love for everyone to downsize their respective arsenals and standing armies and navies (who needs 20,000 aircraft carriers?). I don't see why the U.S. needs as many nukes as we have. We'd need maybe 1000 tops to make an effective deterrent in the freak case that the whole world ganged up on us. 1000 may seem big, but you've got to keep in mind that, in the hypothetical case that everyone went MAD (Mutually Assured Destruction), only a fraction of that number will hit their targets with the rest being shot down or destroyed on the ground. Maybe all but 120 will be intercepted.
Whatever the number should be, it should be smaller, but at this point in history, there's just no way at all that the United States could stay on the map without a large (but much smaller) arsenal.
So please think twice about getting my taxes raised so that you can feel all goody about being "nuclear free". I'm only a college student and I will be crushing with all of these big loans.
Someone's nukes will have to defend Europe.
-Nog
Us,
Lucy has an excellent blog here that brings up a lot of interesting stuff.
Let's try keep our commentary civil so that Lucy doesn't have to run in and play referee during our childish digital scuffles, it's the least we can do.
-Nog
Lucy, since my last comment I've been thinking about why the three worthies mentioned above soft-pedal about America most of the time.
Most of the people who visit my blog are Americans and most of the blogs I visit and comment on overseas are in America (see my links). Nowhere do I find the type of comment that is so often on your blog.
Most Americans I find are both very very angry and very ashamed of what is happening to their country and its unbalanced support of Israel and its militaristic hegemony and they are very scared of their government. But not the trio!
I wonder if we don't have a few plants here, ones, paid or unpaid, who represent the conservative, capitalist, imperialist, religious fundamentalist, American base, people who try to soften the strong criticism of things American which you so often offer.
Just a thought!
P.S. 300 million individuals, Nog? I reckon about 5 million individuals and 295 million sheeple.
Cody - I do think that the nuclear genie is out of the bottle and it will be almost impossible to put back in again. It would take an agreement between all the nuclear powers to reduce and then eliminate all nuclear weapons and only then would we have the moral right to stop others building them.
Don't know if this can be acheived, having nukes is a huge international willy waving competition, but we can't threaten others for possessing these weapons while we have our own stockpiles numbering in the thousands.
David - An unfortunate turn of phrase you used but as i said to Cody above, we all need to disarm together. We can't expect Russia, China or the USA to bin the weapons without everyone else doing so at the same time. It is a status thing only and while costing us all billions, they are not practical for todays enemies.
Nog - The concept of MAD probably did keep the peace during the cold war although the thought of 'if they destroy us we will destroy them' is far from satisfactory, the end result is that everything is destroyed. A nuclear free world would not see Russian tanks on the White House lawn or American apaches landing in Beijing because even without the nukes, the military capability is still more than enough to act as a detterent.
Lucy, I would urge your American readers to read the first two comments on my post 'Of Mice And Men'.
They are more typical of what many thinking Americans are thinking.
Cheers.
I don't know if it is just on my computer but your blog isn't loading david, i just get a message saying 'Firefox can't find the server at www.dangerouscreation.com'
David,
I read the first two comments. They, like your post, are op eds not facts.
Statistically, you need a minimum of 1,000 opinions, randomly selected from the entire U.S. population to have a 4% error rate...
Two is a far fetch from 1,000 and they were not randomly selected...
I must have misunderstood your comments...
Q
"I must have misunderstood your comments..." That is entirely understandable, Anony.
You need a brain to understand things.
David,
"300 million individuals, Nog? I reckon about 5 million individuals and 295 million sheeple."
If I might give a very rough statistical critique. The 300 mil number includes children and senile old people. So count them out and we have, oh lets say 225 million relevant Americans. Now these 225 may be very impressionable (as are the children that we've just cut out of the count and other regular folks all over the world) but they're not all total idiots.
-"Most Americans" don't seem think that the Iraq war was a great idea at this point.
-I'd say that if you asked every adult in this Republic about the U.S. Middle East military presence as a factor in the present messes, most of them would concede a lot in a private conversation. Most folks just don't like being labeled with bad things.
-Most Americans don't maintain the delusion that the United States Military won in Vietnam.
-If the United States was the only nation with nukes, as it was from July 16th, 1945 to August 29, 1949, we wouldn't go around nuking folks just because we could get away with it. History has already demonstrated that Americans seemed to prefer to leave powerful enemies standing to murdering off the peoples of Russia and China when we had the chance.
But in the defense of those who might get very annoyed and pissed at what the United States Federal government is doing all over the planet... I tend to get very pissed off at what the United States Federal government does all over the planet. It isn't as if I am completely oblivious that these psychotic adventures are causing a massive human toll. Iraq was always unjust and the Afghanistan venture is losing any legitimacy it ever might have had. And since the Israelis are so wealthy, let them fund their own defense. Etc....
There's very little to like about the present foreign policy approaches in Washington... But most Americans aren't Washington insiders.
Lucy et all,
To clarify, I'm something of an advocate for arms reduction. Think about to guys with lots of guns pointed at each other putting down the most powerful guns, and then the next most powerful, until they both have daisy cock-BB guns that can't usually break the skin.
Some unilateral actions (like unilaterally reducing tariffs on third world exports to the United States) are good but others (throwing down your gun when the other guy is in a tank) might not be the best courses of action. Reduction is good. Zero is a good best to shoot for.
Perhaps we have different assessments of the strengths of non-nuclear first class Western militaries. What good is a fine armored division and a fast air wing if they're nuked along with the bases under them? They'd surely intercept a great number of the warheads but I'd wager more than enough would get through to give the nuclear power certain victory. And keep in mind how nuclear weapons are an incredibly effective defensive weapon that can be tactically target opposing nukes on the ground or in the air.
-Nog
David g,
Nice. Haven't heard anything that clever since I was in 3rd grade...
Lucy, David is being mean to people that don't agree with him...
Q
Don't make me get out the 'I'd Like to teach the World' to sing CD again people.
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