Cold Weather Jackets and Red Buttons...

 

The Christmas season is upon us and as organisations head off on leave, those who are left holding the fort are already forced to dig ever deeper for content beyond “what to do with Turkey leftovers”. There have been a couple of articles in the news which can, at best, be described as scraping the bottom of the journalistic barrel in terms of reporting. The first is the manufactured outrage and anger in the Telegraph at the image of the Leader of the Opposition, Sir Keir Starmer MP sporting a British military combat jacket while visiting British troops in Estonia. Apparently, according to the author of the article, Sir Keir is a “disgrace” who does not know one end of a bazooka from another.

Ignoring the minor problem that the Bazooka was a US Army weapon that first saw action some 80 years ago, so is almost as old as the average Telegraph reader, and which didn’t (to the authors knowledge) see widespread service in the British Army, we have to try to understand what the issue actually is here. In the eyes of the author Sir Keir shouldn’t be impersonating the military while wearing a combat jacket – a valiant point, rather fatally undermined by the fact that politicians of all parties have a long history of wearing military jackets on occasions.

© Crown copyright

Without wishing to stray into the realm of politics (and please remember this is an apolitical blog), a simple google reveals two of the three previous Prime Ministers of the last 18 months wearing Royal Navy ‘foulie’ jackets with ‘Prime Minister’ on their name tag. A certain former Secretary of State for Defence was well known for his toting an MTP jacket regularly, while photos exist of Michael Heseltine wearing DPM jackets while he was occupied the same job. As for Sir Winston Churchill, he never saw a uniform he couldn’t try to wear in some way – indeed he seemed to have spent most of WW2 wearing uniform. The bottom line is that there is a long and honourable history of politicians donning jackets at times, without long term negative impact.

To be honest its easy to have sympathy with politicians at times like this. Visiting troops in extremely cold conditions means wearing a wardrobe fit for keeping you warm. There is little point turning up in a thin fleece, only to come down with frostbite and need emergency medical treatment – that way lies a loss of credibility. Likewise, turn up with a high quality arctic jacket bought commercially and you leave yourself open to attacks about being out of touch with poorly paid squaddies, who are unable to afford similar jackets, and also to the “did you pay for that jacket yourself Sir” question, which implies either you’re overpaid or you’re sticking it on expenses so the public can pay for your nice new skiing outfit. When you do turn up and its cold, the Unit you are visiting is often terribly polite and provides warm clothing for you, just in case, so you’d be causing offence by not wearing the jacket they went to some effort to source for you. Pity the poor press officer trying to navigate the minefield of climate appropriate sartorial wear – to be honest the best thing to do is, if offered, don the warm jacket provided to you by the British Army and use a simple line to take like “Its good to see this jacket does a great job at keeping the magnificent women and men of our armed forces warm at work – we intend to continue giving them all the support they need like this” and hope this calms matters.

There is nothing intrinsically wrong with politicians donning what could be termed “Pirate Rig”– a mix of civilian and military clothing, provided it is for practicality and comfort and not to make a political point or gesture. After all wearing military surplus is very popular for many people, so its not like a great taboo has been committed. As long as the individual doesn’t stray into a nakedly political speech (e.g. standing in front of troops while wearing parts of uniform and making a speech more at home in Parliament or a Conference), then there really is no issue to see here.

The other story that gained traction involved that of buttons, not in a fashion sense, but in whether in extremis Sir Keir would ‘push the button’ and authorise the release of British nuclear weapons. In a now deleted tweet involving interview he essentially gave no answer to the ‘yes / no’ question of use of the nuclear deterrent. To some this decision was seen as an outrage, implying that the UK was not safe under his leadership, yet this equivocation marks a return to an approach undertaken by many former British politicians of all parties who were involved in the nuclear game.

The British system of nuclear release is unique and fascinating. Ignoring the minor constitutional trivia that His Majesty King Charles is the only head of state of a major nuclear power to not have the ability to order a nuclear strike himself, the British PM has a more intimate engagement with the process than their peers in other nations. In the US, the President is aware of the plans that exist to launch a nuclear strike but doesn’t have to make decisions ahead of that point. Presumably similar arrangements exist in France, Russia, and China in different ways, by which political leaders understand the firepower at their disposal and how to authorise its release, but do not have to meaningfully engage with the process in peacetime.

By contrast the British Prime Minister has a far more direct role – during the early Cold War the PM would have needed to authorise the release of the V Force in person, or through authorised nuclear deputies. By later in the Cold War, once the Royal Navy took over the deterrent, they had to think of ways to ensure that the PM’s wishes got through – it was likely that in the event of a nuclear strike, the War Cabinet would be wiped out before the retaliatory strike could be ordered. Similarly, although arrangements were made for the continuity of government through so-called ‘PYTHON’ (or other code word) parties dispersed across the UK and at sea with a nucleus of central government and Ministers embarked and ready to take charge of the nuclear forces if needed, there was again no certainty they would survive or that contact could be made to the SSBN force at sea (or the remaining RAF tactical nuclear air launched force). To ensure that the deterrent remained credible and assured even after a ‘bolt from the blue’ took out London before they had time to react, alternative plans were made.

Arrangements exist as part of the nuclear firing chain to ensure that the Prime Ministers wishes can be met even after their demise. Early in their time at No10 the new Prime Minister will be briefed on the process, the deterrent and the capabilities they now control. They will understand the options open to the SSBN CO at times like this and the potential courses of action that could follow. They will then be left alone to write four letters, each identical, setting out what it is that they want the submarine to do. It could be to order that the submarine fires in response, or it could be to do nothing at all. It is a daunting responsibility for the PM has to confront the reality that with the stroke of a pen, they are writing words that will determine the fate of  tens of millions of people and either let them live (or at least not be killed by the PMs hand) or condemn them to a horrific violent death.  

The contents of these letters have never been leaked or spoken of. Very little is known of the process around these ‘letters of last resort’ beyond the fact that each submarine holds a safe containing a sealed envelope containing a letter setting out what the Prime Minister wants the CO of the submarine to do in the event of all contact being lost with government. One imagines a Cold War scenario where multiple Royal Navy SSBNs are trying to establish contact with a nuclear blasted UK only to find there is no remaining central government to take direction from. In these darkest of hours, the safe would likely be opened.  The specific circumstances though of when this would happen and how it would be verified are doubtless some of the most tightly held secrets in the British Government, for they set out when an SSBN can fire without there being a living chain of command to authorise it.

What this means is that the Prime Minister has a unique connection to the nuclear release decision. They are alone in global leaders of effectively ‘pre-ordering’ a nuclear attack and in having to confront so early on the enormous responsibility they bear as leaders. Nothing can prepare someone for the moment when they are told they must decide whether, in the event of their death in a nuclear conflict, they want tens of millions of people to die, and then to write it down on paper. No other nation publicly uses this method of posthumous nuclear command and control. We do not know what the 13 Women and Men asked to write these letters decided to do. None of the current or former occupants of the role have ever hinted what they would do or why they chose that course of action. There are hints that some would have authorised release but never forgiven themselves, but the contents of the letters will remain the most secret of all parts of the British State.

Historically British PM’s have operated on a form of strategic ambiguity around whether they would use the deterrent or not. While this sounds odd, it makes a lot of sense – if your opponent doesn’t know how you’ll react, they cannot plan with certainty on what the response would be. If you have declared that you will use nuclear weapons, then your opponents know you have, by implication, a red line that is the threshold for release. It then becomes a matter of pushing the boundaries to determine where this line sits and what they can get away with beneath it. By being ambiguous, you make it much harder for opponents to work out what to do or the risks it may involve – by having a binary answer, you paradoxically make your opponents lives a bit easier. The first Prime Minister that the author is aware of saying they would use nuclear weapons is Theresa May MP. Prior to this the author cannot recall any serving PM expressing a view one way or the other precisely to preserve strategic ambiguity. This is why Sir Keir in not answering the question has not acted in a way that calls the deterrent into question. By avoiding a binary answer, an element of ambiguity is restored to the deterrence process that makes hostile nations lives harder. To quote the lyrics of a song “you say it best when you say nothing at all” …

On that note it is time to move away from grim dark thoughts of the huge burdens placed on politicians and the ultimate responsibility they face and instead turn our attention to Christmas. This will be the last PSL blog this side of the Christmas break, so as is tradition, the author would like to say:

"I wonder if I might crave your momentary indulgence in order to discharge a by no means disagreeable obligation which has, over the years, become more or less established practice in government service as we approach the terminal period of the year — calendar, of course, not financial — in fact, not to put too fine a point on it, Week Fifty-One — and submit to you, with all appropriate deference, for your consideration at a convenient juncture, a sincere and sanguine expectation — indeed confidence — indeed one might go so far as to say hope — that the aforementioned period may be, at the end of the day, when all relevant factors have been taken into consideration, susceptible to being deemed to be such as to merit a final verdict of having been by no means unsatisfactory in its overall outcome and, in the final analysis, to give grounds for being judged, on mature reflection, to have been conducive to generating a degree of gratification which will be seen in retrospect to have been significantly higher than the general average

Jim Hacker: Are you trying to say, "Happy Christmas," Humphrey?

Sir Humphrey: Yes, Minister."