Perhaps the most striking passage in Barack Obama's Berlin speech was the prominence he gave to his call for the goal of a world without nuclear weapons. That will sound radical to both American and European ears. But there is growing bipartisan and heavyweight support for this in the United States and elsewhere, including Britain, which trascends the controversial history of nuclear disarmament in British (and Labour) politics.

TRIDENT - REPLACE IT OR NOT!

... just imagine ...

The idea of our government spending billions of pounds (estimates seem to vary) on weapons of mass destruction at this point in history would appear to be an error of such enormous proportions it literally takes my breath away.

I'm delighted there'll be a debate and a vote: but that debate has to take place inside and outside parliament, and all aspects of the debate need to be considered.  While an 'independent' nuclear 'deterrent' like Trident is expensive cosmetics, we must not have an expensive cosmetic debate: it has to be a real one.