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Just prior to retiring, the UK's former Conservative Prime Minister David Cameron arranged for a parliamentary vote on whether the Trident nuclear-armed submarine programme should be renewed.
Labour Leader Jeremy Corbyn is opposed to nuclear weapons, having said "I do not believe the threat of mass murder is a legitimate way to go about international relations." However, some Labour MPs support Trident; Corbyn has made this a free vote.
The submarines operate out of a base at Faslane in Scotland. All the MPs belonging to the Scottish National Party, which advocates Scottish independence, are opposed to Trident. One asked the prime minister: "Is she personally prepared to authorise a nuclear strike that can kill a hundred thousand innocent men, women and children?” and her answer was:
Yes. And I have to say to the honourable gentleman the whole point of a deterrent is that our enemies need to know that we would be prepared to use it, unlike some suggestions that we could have a deterrent but not actually be willing to use it, which seem to come from the Labour party frontbench.
One Conservative MP who is opposed to Trident criticised his own party when he said "This is a political weapon aimed rather effectively at the Labour party."
The Guardian has a page with updates on the vote. It has the text of the motion and lists the number of parliamentary seats held by each party (links added by submitter):
The motion passed by 472 votes to 117. It seems likely that it had the support of nearly all Conservative MPs and a sizable fraction of Labour.
(Score: 2) by GungnirSniper on Monday July 25 2016, @11:35PM
Countries the US has invaded: Afghanistan, Iraq
Countries the US has avoided: North Korea
See any connections beyond big bad Red China?
Tips for better submissions to help our site grow. [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by TheRaven on Tuesday July 26 2016, @10:22AM
Not really. North Korea doesn't have a particularly compelling nuclear deterrent (at least one of their 'tests' was faked - or they managed to find a way of producing a nuclear explosion with no increase in background radioactivity - and their launch vehicles have a habit of exploding on the launchpad). If the US chose to invade, then they could easily shoot down the comparatively primitive missiles that the North Koreans could launch and could probably disable them before then.
The huge amount of conventional artillery in range of Seoul and the fact that North Korea is at least nominally an ally of China (and China would be very unhappy with having US troops right up against their border) are much stronger deterrents. The US doesn't seem to have issues conducting military operations in Pakistan, which has a far more serious nuclear capability.
sudo mod me up
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 26 2016, @02:18PM
The US is going to invade the UK ?