Cabinets and the Bomb

Andrew Blick (London, Democratic Audit):I attended last night the launch of a new Peter Hennessy-edited volume, Cabinets and the Bomb. The event took place at the National Archive in Kew and was a gathering of the great and good from the intelligence and defence worlds. One clear theme emerged from the discussion that took place: the successive decisions made by UK cabinets to keep and then retain nuclear capability - sometimes more prime-ministerial than collective in the making - have always been based primarily on political considerations rather than military. There is a gut instinct that we have to, in Ernest Bevin's immortal words, have a "bloody union jack" on a bomb; this sense is then post-rationalised. And perhaps the biggest motivator of all has been the fear of France becoming the only European power with an independent deterrent.