Tridant Missle, opperated by one of those infamous private computer companies (bye bye Austrillia)

It seems like Chancellor Gordon Brown (how long before he starts calling himself 'Gord'?) looks set to be yet another Tony Blair clone (which is the last thing Labour needs) with his commitments to the Tridant nuclear subs (I bet you Bin Laden is quaking in his boots....) aswell as the countiued privatisation of the NHS, attacks on civil liberties and general bad mouthing of public sector workers (who do a fine job in my opinion).

The "Iron" Chancellor has, in all his wisdom signalled he would follow Blair's lead (probably the lead which Bush is holding....) and replace Tridant, the question I am wondering is why?

With the end of the Cold War and the threat of the Soviet Union marching across Western Europe what do we need nuclear missles for?

I know that there are several possiblities, North Korea is the most obvious one and the one that holds the most water, yet the government has not (yet, and to my knowledge) mentioned the threat that N.Korea posses as a reason, they have however mentioned Iran (hmmm, a Middle Eastern country that happends to be next on Bush's hit list, how interesting.....) as a reason to arm ourself with nuclear weapons, which again is using the fear of 'Islamic' terrorism and 'Islamic' nations to its own political ends (and probably will add to the reasons to invade Iran, because they have Weapons of Mass Disappearence....)

Another one is that Russia may be a threat again, however with Russia's new found power over its engery and fuel sources (as demostrated when to cut off supplies to Ukraine and effectively held Ukraine to ransom) why would it need to threat the use of nuclear weapons, especally when there is a small chance that Britain will need supplies from Russia and if that is a case, Russia could easily beat Britain into submission without nuclear weapons. Moreover, the state that the Russian economy is in at the moment, and that they would probably need to replace their nuclear weapons, I don't think they would be able to afford it.

Terrorism is another one I have heard the pro-nuclear mob jump and shout about, but why would a terrorist be scared of a nuclear bomb? We can't drop it on the terrorists because after the attack they either be dead if they are a suicide bomber, left the country to hide in another country (Probably without the knowledge of that country) or be lying low in Britain, so where do we target, there is no "Terrorist land" (Like Bush would like us to believe their is) there is no where to target, the nuclear weapons are usless against terrorists, and let me go back to Iran, if I may, if Britain or America was to drop a nuclear bomb on Iran (I seriously doubt that any nation would nuke Iran) but if we did drop a bomb, or America did, then that would create 10 times more terrorists (I know that Bush wants more terrorists, but even he is not that stupid.....) so terrorism is out of the question.

So firstly their is no clear reason from my understand but to stop some "potenional enemy" (either N.Korea or Iran then, should be N.Korea but is probably Iran)

Another probably is the cost, now from what I read it will cost between £10 billion and £25 billion, now since this "Labour" government has come to power the gap between the rich and the poor has gotten bigger, we still have many problems in our poorest communities, the NHS is still in crisis (thanks to New "Labours' " privatisation of parts of the NHS, too many mangers, both a waste of money)
So won't that, £10 billion be better spent on redistribution of some sort, either by investing it into areas where there is high unemployment so there is more training for jobs and actually to attract jobs into the area, spent on improving schools in those areas, spent on the NHS to help it get back onto it's feet, spent on giving young people in areas with high anti-social behaviour something to actually do, there is all kind of things those billions could be spent on, rather then building new nuclear weapons that will just never be used and go to waste.

The NHS is in a deficit of at least £512 million, that £10 billion would wipe out the deficit of £512 million 20 times over at most, there is also a £1.8 billion gap in social care funding, and a £2.2 billion shortfall in funding for local governments, all of which would be far more important to spend money on, especally the NHS and the social care gap.


And although this is a pre-emptive strike by Brown (campaigning to be next Labour leader, or thinking he will be) in a contest is will count against him amoungest traditional Labour MPs and members, and if someone from the old right of the party stands (and I am not on about the loonies from the Socialist Campaign Group, though I would vote for them over Brown, as a protest vote) then I would say I hope they would kick Brown and New Labour out, however thinking about it I would rather New Labour lost the next election and then they will have no-one to blame but themselves, and hopefully allow our lot to retake the party.

On one final note, Blaenau Gwent duel by-election is coming up and a former Labour safe seat, if we do not win this back, this time the New Labour mob cannot blame all women short list for the loss of the seat (though I am sure they will blame something else) but the real blame will rest again ont he policies of New Labour, and it will show the effects that New Labour is having on traditional Labour voters and Labour seats and the threat that it posses to the Labour Party, if we losoe our safe seats and traditional Labour voters, our base, then we can never stand a chance of getting into government ever again, and possibly not even be the offical oppisition.

Random Fact:

Only 36% of the world's newspapers are tabloid.