MPs URGED the Government yesterday to consider scrapping the policy of having a nuclear ballistic missile submarine on patrol 24 hours a day to maintain a continuous independent deterrent.

The MPs, on the Commons Defence Committee, said that the reduced threat of nuclear attack since the Cold War provided the opportunity for the Government to scale back the deterrent patrols. As a result, fewer submarines would be needed.

The proposal, which followed an investigation into the future of Britain’s strategic nuclear deterrent, would end a policy that began in 1968, when the first of the Resolution class submarines, armed with Polaris missiles, went on patrol. The Polaris deterrent was replaced in the 1990s by four Vanguard class submarines armed with Trident D5 missiles.

Tony Blair has promised a full parliamentary debate on replacing the Trident system. A decision is expected by the end of this year. The Vanguard class boats are due to come out of service from 2024.

The Defence Committee said it was disappointed that the Government had declined to take part in its inquiry, but laid out the options which it believes ministers need to face before coming to a decision.

Previous Governments have judged it was necessary to have four submarines in service to guarantee at least one boat on patrol at any time.

The MPs said: “If the Ministry of Defence believes that the UK should retain the continuous-at-sea deterrent cycle, it must either extend the life of the Vanguard class submarine or procure a new platform to be in service by 2020. In the light of the reduced threat we currently face, an alternative possibility would be to retain a deterrent, but not continuously at sea.”

The MPs noted that the MoD had said that it was possible to extend the life of the Vanguard class boats, although Commodore Tim Hare, a former director of nuclear policy at the MoD, told the committee that the service life of the submarines could be extended by only another five years.

The MPs said it would be vital for the Government to explain why Britain still needed a nuclear deterrent, given that the main threat facing the country was from international terrorism, not a nation armed with strategic weapons.

They questioned whether the retention of a nuclear deterrent was more to do with keeping a place on the international top table than having a military capability.

The MPs said: “Before any decisions on the future of that deterrent are made, it will be important to address the extent to which the possession of nuclear weapons enhances the UK’s international influence and status and whether such a reason adds significantly to the justification for retention of a strategic nuclear capability.”

They welcomed the Prime Minister’s promise of a full debate, adding: “It (the decision) must not be made by the Government in secret.”

The committee’s report pointed out that Britain had fewer nuclear warheads than the other nuclear-armed countries: the US had about 4,216 strategic warheads, Russia 3,980, China 400 and France about 348.

Britain had about 185 strategic nuclear warheads, the MPs said, to challenge potential enemies with “discouragement by fear”, the Oxford English Dictionary’s definition of deterrence.

The MPs said that if the Government did not replace Trident it would leave France as the only European nation with nuclear weapons.

BRITAIN’S NUCLEAR DETERRENT

Britain has a “title” to 58 Tridents, taken from a pool of missiles at the US strategic weapons facility at King’s Bay, Georgia

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