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?
The majority of his speech focused on the need to support our troops and he announced two new initiatives - replacing 125 service families’ accommodation units and appointing 30 mental health nurses to help those struggling with the after-effects of conflict. Then later - in a move designed to appeal to the party's right wing - he robustly defended plans to replace Trident: "As the Prime Minister has repeatedly said, the first duty of Government is defence of the realm. That is why we will maintain Britain's nuclear deterrent and will go ahead with the Trident replacement programme."
Whoa! So does that mean all these rumours that Trident will be delayed are just that? Or is Foxy just striking a pose to help take the (personal) sting out of a delay announcement later this month?
The more cynical amongst us might also point out the contrast between his commitment to a new £97bn Cold War doomsday machine – and the meagre £47m going on troops' accommodation and mental health nurses.
Foreign Secretary William Hague's speech was far broader – touching on the importance of conflict prevention and championing development and human rights abroad. He also gave a very welcome acknowledgement of the necessity for a global deal on climate change – in order to avert future wars.
On Trident though, he was not only disappointing, but barely coherent. After stressing the importance of international nuclear disarmament and warning Iran about developing nuclear weapons he came out with this bizarrely illogical statement.
“It is because we seek to prevent conflict… (that) we play a full part in working towards multilateral disarmament…it is also why we oppose so strongly the spread of nuclear weapons and must renew, for the next generation, Britain's own independent nuclear deterrent.”
Then with an apparent lack of irony – “If we are to speak of our values to others we must show that we uphold them ourselves”. Er – yes – couldn't agree more…
Last up was David Cameron who, after expressing his shock at the "catastrophic state" of the Ministry of Defence budget and warning of "big changes" to better match UK commitments with the money available to fund them, also backed Trident replacement. "I will take no risks with British security….that's why we will replace the nuclear deterrent based on the Trident missile system."
What does it all mean? Well, we won't have to wait too long to find out. The National Security Council is due to debate the defence review (and what to cut) tomorrow. Then the results of the defence review itself will apparently now be released on 18th October, just ahead of the 20th October spending review.
So watch this space…
