Scottish CND

Scottish CND's column in The National newspaper last weekend discussed several reasons why the UK's nuclear weapons spending is spiralling out of control.

This includes costs of building new submarines, repairing existing submarines, upgrading dock infrastructure, new nuclear warheads.

While the debacle over defence spending continues, a reminder that military spending generates WOEFUL returns on investment of public money, especially compared to spending on energy and transport infrastructure.

These are precisely the departments that were asked to make cuts to in order to fund former Defence Secretary John Healey's £28bn increased spending demand.

The opportunity costs of a war economy are absolutely enormous - bear this in mind when "defence spending" is erroneously presented as an engine for economic growth.

While military bosses are asking for gargantuan increases to military spending, recent news shows the poor value for money of nuclear-technology weapons...

All five of the Royal Navy's currently commissioned Astute nuclear-powered submarines are berthed awaiting maintenance, meaning none are available for deployment. This follows HMS Anson returning from a visit to Australia earlier this year.

These 5 submarines are a core element of the Royal Navy's nuclear mission in escorting and protecting the nuclear-armed Vanguard submarines. It is unclear which vessels will perform this role now, though there is some evidence that US nuclear submarines have escorted Vanguard submarines in the recent past.

Each Astute submarine has a price tag of over £1.5bn, and maintenance costs are likely to rise given the poor condition of the fleet.

Value for money?

Last week, figures were published showing that the UK is now the third highest spender on nuclear weapons in the world, surpassing Russia (the country which possesses around 45% of the world's nuclear arsenal).

The UK already spends more than China on a per-capita basis, surpassed only by the United States. The UK nuclear weapons bill increased by 17% just last year.

Meanwhile, the UK's nuclear programme is in disarray: billions of pounds have been mis-accounted by the Atomic Weapons Establishment and will have to be written off; all of the Royal Navy's nuclear-powered Astute submarines are berthed; the Vanguard nuclear-armed submarines are years past their shelf-life; the replacement Dreadnought submarines are encountering major technical problems and delays.

Value for money? We think not.

See the full figures for global annual nuclear weapons spending on the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons website.

How about this: Security is about energy and environment, not infinite money for the military industrial complex.

Energy policy is a security issue and not an environmental one, Al Carns has said in a veiled attack on Ed Miliband’s net zero policies.

🖇️ https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2026/06/13/carns-warns-miliband-energy-about-security-not-environment/?WT.mc_id=tmgoff_fb_photo_energy-about-security-not-environment/

The likes of Lisa Nandy doing the media rounds justifying choosing guns over butter do so as public opinion is increasingly hostile to that option.

Ipsos polling last week found 50% oppose increases in arms spending if it means increased taxes and 45% oppose arms increases if it means less spending on public services.

The International Anti-War conference next Saturday is the peace movement's response to the drive to war and austerity

Here's an interesting new chart published by International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN) this week - the latest of their annual figures on nuclear weapons spending.

It shows UK spending on nuclear weapons has increased by 17% in a year. The previous ICAN report showed UK spending had increased by 26% between 2023-2024. These are skyrocketing costs.

It also shows the UK now spends more on nuclear weapons than Russia. It is the third highest spender on nuclear weapons in the world (second in per-capita terms), spending very nearly as much as China in real terms, a country with 20x our population. The UK and France between them spend twice as much as Russia on nuclear weapons.

UK spending on nuclear weapons is so out of control that the Public Accounts Committee has made a call for new transparency mechanisms into this spending, since existing published information is far too vague for them to properly scrutinise and challenge.

And yet the former military bosses (many of whom now work in "defence" industries) want more. They want much much more money for unusable omnicide weapons, at the cost of the public provisions of the UK.

We are being fleeced!

If the UK's "defence" needs are so urgent, why won't any of the former military chiefs who now appear so regularly in the media (many of whom now work in the military industries) discuss the possibility of progressive taxation to pay for it?

Is it perhaps because that may affect their own bottom line, whereas cutting welfare and other state spending wouldn't?