Government and Military

31st August 1999

Tony Blair

Prime Minister

Dear Tony Blair,

Thank you for answering our second Open Letter (sent to you on 23rd March) with the reply from Philip Barton of 9th May 1999. We are concerned that you again have been unwilling to answer the substantive arguments put to you and instead continue to rely on little more than simple assurances that you are doing everything you can to encourage the global elimination of nuclear weapons. We believe that British nuclear plans are unlawful and that there is a great deal more you could be doing to help advance the process of disarmament. As British citizens we believe we bear individual responsibility for preventing our government from carrying out policies that conflict with our international legal obligations. In the absence of any constructive discussion with you or an effective response to our questions and concerns, we believe that we have to act nonviolently and responsibly to prevent international laws from being violated in our name through the deployment of the British nuclear weapon system.

As usual, just before our three-monthly "open" disarmament camps, we have enclosed a list of the names of the 143 current TP 2000 pledgers. This is in line with our fully accountable and open guidelines contained in the handbook "Tridenting It" which we sent at the launch of our project last year.

There are in fact a number of practical steps that Britain can take towards compliance with Article V1 of the Non Proliferation Treaty (NPT). While the Strategic Defence review has signalled some progress, such as the commitment towards open information on stockpiles of nuclear weapon materials, these steps are clearly inadequate for addressing the dangers from the proliferation of and dependency upon nuclear weapons.

We believe that Britain is in a very special position and could have a huge impact in pushing the whole nuclear disarmament agenda along by announcing now that it will mothball Trident, pending dismantling. By disarming our own nuclear weapon system we would set an important example and, without taint of hypocrisy, put ourselves in a leadership position for strengthening the non-proliferation regime and restraining states which are tempted to develop nuclear weapons.

Such potential leadership is seriously undermined by the recent revelations about secret collaboration between British and US nuclear weapons scientists. In the short term, Britain should make a legally binding commitment not to increase or modernise its nuclear forces and should work with the other nuclear weapon states to take all nuclear forces off alert. Insisting on retaining the option to use nuclear weapons first sets a bad example. It is time for Britain to take the lead among the NATO nuclear weapon states in pledging not to use nuclear weapons first under any circumstances. Such pledges and commitments would help promote a more constructive atmosphere for banning the production of nuclear bomb materials altogether.

You re-iterate that the UK’s "defensive deterrent posture" is entirely consistent with international law, without explaining your reasoning. The presentation that Sir. Nicholas Lyell made to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) on 15th November 1995 "fully accepted" that the use of nuclear weapons is subject to the principles of customary international law" [CR 95/34 Public Sitting, ICJ, The Hague, Verbatim Report of Sir Nicholas Lyell, 15/11/95 - p 42] and that "there is no doubt that the customary law of war does prohibit some uses of nuclear weapons, just as it prohibits some uses of all types of weapon" [p 45]. He then went on to undermine this acknowledgement and at the same time to lay bare the main problem with the UK’s stance. If, he asks, when states are faced with invasion by overwhelming enemy forces, they are entitled to defend themselves, "if all other means at their disposal are insufficient, then how can it be said that the use of a nuclear weapon must be disproportionate? Unless it is being suggested that there comes a point where victims of aggression are no longer permitted to defend themselves because of the degree of suffering which defensive measures will inflict." [p. 47] This is exactly what we are saying. International humanitarian law is designed to do just that -it is intended to limit the terrible effects of war, to ensure that there is a world and something worth living for after the conflict ends. This means self-restraint even in the midst of justified defence.

As Judge Koroma stated, "The right of self-defence is inherent and fundamental to all states. It also exists within and not outside or above the law. To suggest that it exists outside or above the law is to render it probable that force may be used unilaterally by a state when it by itself considers its survival to be at stake. The right of self-defence is not a licence to use force; it is regulated by law and was never intended to threaten the security of other states." [ICJ Ad. Op General List No 95, 8th July 1996, Dissenting Opinion of Judge Koroma]

In fact, Lyell seems to want to have it both ways. Knowing full well that most conceivable uses of nuclear weapons would be unlawful in anyone’s book, he tries to argue nevertheless that some uses of nuclear weapons would not inevitably cause disproportionate civilian casualties anyway and uses that as an excuse to legitimise British nuclear weapons which were obviously not conceived purely for these unlikely exceptions. Unfortunately, he gives no examples of what these "lawful" uses might be. Most, if not all the targets envisaged by the MoD are in the vicinity of towns and cities. Any targeting of these with current Trident nuclear warheads would lead to massive loss of civilian life and thus be unlawful. If you wish to prove that you have a completely lawful nuclear weapons policy then you should retain only tactical nuclear warheads of below 1 kiloton and make a public statement that no nuclear weapons would ever be used near to civilian populations and residential areas, which would no doubt render them untargetable.

When you speak of legal advice being "available" you do not explain whether it was ever taken up, what quality it was, whether the advisers had a thorough look at all the targeting plans and assessed the likely impact of various levels of explosive power used against various targets in different scenarios. Such detailed analysis would be necessary in order to assess whether in fact any currently planned uses would be possible within the law.

If you look at the enclosed paper by General Lee Butler [Address to the Canadian Network Against Nuclear Weapons 11th March 1999], you will note that as Commander of Strategic Nuclear Forces, with day-to-day responsibility for some tens of thousands of strategic nuclear warheads, he realised that no one person had ever examined in detail every single one of the targets individually, because the war plan was divided up into sections and each section was the responsibility of different people. He examined all 12,500 examples since, even if there had been only one target, he would have had to know why it was selected, what kind of weapon would strike it and what the consequences would be, and therefore he could not feel less responsible because there were a large number of targets. He said that at the conclusion of the exercise he came to understand fully the true meaning of "MAD"- Mutually Assured Destruction.

As British citizens, we are entitled to be informed by the government we elect, which, if any, competent international lawyer has looked at all the UK nuclear targets and war plans, the exercise scenarios, the past and present practice and whether they can openly and honestly assure us that all the details of the British nuclear weapons policy are well within the law. And, if they are, it should be possible to give an example of even one target area upon which a 100 kiloton bomb could be used without breaching international law in an extreme case of self-defence in which the UK is being invaded by overwhelming enemy forces? To avoid provoking international bad feeling by naming a particular "enemy" state, military targets in our own country could be identified in a hypothetical scenario. For the sake of argument, if Iraq or Libya were under overwhelming conventional assault from the UK we can be sure that these states would see this as an extreme circumstance deserving of self-defence. Would an Iraqi or Libyan use of a nuclear weapon on Faslane naval base (close to Glasgow) be justified according to international humanitarian law in any circumstances, some circumstances, or no circumstances?

We are understandably of the opinion that you are unable to answer our questions, either because you do not know yourselves what the exact criteria are for establishing a nuclear attack as lawful, or because you wish to keep the issue in such doubt as would make it easier to ignore international law if it actually came to an extreme circumstance of self defence. Please tell us which of these is the more accurate opinion.

As regards your comment about the security of Britain’s nuclear weapons, we are distressed to have to disagree with you. On June 8th this year three ordinary women, with household tools and a leaking second hand boat, exposed the flaws in security arrangements when they boarded "Maytime" and spent over three hours throwing all the research equipment into Loch Goil. Security was eventually tipped off by a call from the press who had been alerted by us. There are many other sites where you have essential parts of the Trident system. Thankfully we are totally committed to nonviolence and to open and accountable actions and have no intention whatsoever of handling nuclear materials or putting anyone in any danger. Our simple intention is to uphold international law and disarm the nuclear system nonviolently to prevent it from being able to threaten mass destruction. We sincerely hope that you are not really as complacent about security as your letter suggests.

I would like to stress again that we are open to any meeting that you may care to arrange. We are prepared to hear what you have to say and to consider any information that you may have that might persuade us that you are trying your utmost to uphold international law by disarming your nuclear weapons. It would also be useful to discuss our differing views on what amounts to reasonable methods of protest. We remain convinced that our means of protest are both peaceful and legitimate.

Yours sincerely,

On Behalf of Core Group

Angie Zelter, Sylvia Boyes, Brian Quail, David Mackenzie, Ian Thomson, Joy Mitchell, Jane Tallents, Rachel Wenham

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