Cordoba, Argentina, 10th July 2024
Sir Keir Starmer
Prime Minister of United Kingdom
With copy to the people and institutions of UK
SAY NO TO THE RETURN OF US NUCLEAR WEAPONS TO THE UNITED KINGDOM (UK)
The risk of nuclear war increases as more nuclear weapons are generated, and sites with nuclear weapons expand.
The United Kingdom was the only place in the world where, until 2008, nuclear devices from two countries coexisted on the same territory: those of the United States in Lakenheath, and those of the United Kingdom in its submarine-launched Trident missiles’ system.
The US continued to store tactical nuclear weapons in the UK until 2008, when approximately 110 tactical B61s stored at RAF Lakenheath for deployment by USAF F-15E Strike Eagle aircraft were removed.
According to The Guardian newspaper, “the US air force has secured $50m (£39m) funding next year for a project that could pave the way for American nuclear weapons to return to British soil for the first time in more than 15 years. In justifying the expenditure on a 144-bed dormitory at RAF Lakenheath in Suffolk, the USAF told Congress the building was intended to ‘house the increase in personnel enlisted as the result of the potential security mission’, which is jargon typically used by the Pentagon to refer to handling of nuclear weapons, according to experts. Construction of the dormitory is due to begin in June 2024 and last until February 2026, and is the latest in a series of signs that preparations are under way for the possible return of US nuclear weapons to UK territory.” (2023).
The return of nuclear weapons to the United Kingdom, whose defense and attack system is based exclusively on underwater Trident missile launchers, would transform it into a country with a “nuclear dyad” of weapons (land and submarine), bringing it closer to the US strategy of “nuclear triad”, with weapons that can be launched from sea, air and land.
The tactical nuclear weapons of the former US nuclear settlement of Lakenheath were modernized in the United States. According to The Guardian, “The new version, the B61-12 [gravity bomb], is expected to arrive in Europe this year [2023]. The new F-35A Lightning II fighters have been given certification to be armed with the modernized bombs, and the 495th Fighter Squadron, stationed at RAF Lakenheath, is due to become the first unit in Europe to receive the nuclear-capable plans.”
The return of the USA nuclear weapons, and the starting of a “new dyad” of weapons in UK, would mean a risk of unforeseeable consequences for the following reasons:
1) It would transform the East of the United Kingdom into a fixed, stationary target for nuclear attacks from other countries.
2) This risk would be added to the current risk posed by the existence of nuclear power reactors, and two plants dedicated to the reprocessing of local and foreign spent nuclear fuel.
As of August 2022, the UK has 9 operational nuclear reactors at five locations (8 advanced gas-cooled reactors, AGR), and one pressurized water reactor (PWR), which produces 5.9 GWe.
The UK has also the capability to store and reprocess Magnox, AGR and LWR spent fuel. The two reprocessing plants in the UK, Magnox and Thorp, continue to operate in support of UK and overseas recycling commitments. Over 50,000 tones of irradiated fuel has been reprocessed at Sellafield during the past 40 years.
All of them (nuclear power plants, reprocessing plants), are eventual targets of tactical nuclear missiles, which create a synergized combo of radioactive impact: explosion of targeted nuclear devices, and release of radioactive material from the attacked nuclear power plants and reprocessing plants.
3) A new base for parking nuclear weapons on the UK mainland would add the risk of accidents at Lakenheath.
The United States (the operator of Lakenheath) already has a long history of accidents and mismanagement at its own nuclear weapons parking sites. In September 18-19th (1980) an U.S. Air Force LGM-25C Titan II ICBM loaded with a 9-megaton W-53 nuclear warhead experienced a liquid fuel explosion inside its silo. The incident occurred at Missile Complex 374-7 in rural Arkansas (USA).
4) The irresponsible drive of the “nuclear dyad” of weapons in the United Kingdom would contribute to an increase in nuclear tension worldwide.
5) The decision to reinstall the United States nuclear weapons base in the United Kingdom is a slap in the face to its people, because in addition to implying authoritarian and war-mongering government decisions, including risks of all kinds for the population, it generates incalculable costs in a country and a society facing economic crises.
For all of the above, from our organization FUNAM, which has consultative status in the United Nations (ECOSOC); from the Córdoba Campus of the Right Livelihood College, of which I am director, and in my capacity as laureate of the Right Livelihood Award (also called the Alternative Nobel Prize), we emphatically adhere to the campaigns organized by colleague organizations in the United Kingdom that oppose the reinstallation of US nuclear weapons at Lakenheath.
We wish a great success in your new position as Prime Minister, and we ask you to decisively, and frontally, oppose the return of nuclear weapons from the United States to the United Kingdom.
Greets you cordially,
Prof. Dr. Raúl Montenegro, Biologist
Full Professor of Human Evolutionary Biology at the
Faculty of Psychology
National University of Cordoba, Argentina
Right Livelihood Award 2004 (Stockholm, Sweden)
The National University of Cordoba
was founded on 19th June 1613