My first reaction is - why should the UK be launching US-made nuclear weapons?
It's been widely reported that these aircraft will only be able to use US nuclear munitions, and that will require US permission.
God forbid they ever be used, of course, but it seems like a weird choice, especially when the UK is apparently able to build warheads for trident, and is allegedly able to operate that system without US oversight (though of course with US ballistic missiles as the carrier...)
That's probably one of very few options available quickly.
UK could launch it's nuclear program, it has the scientific background and infrastructure, but surely they wouldn't have a certified, tested weapon within 5 years.
Maybe UK could buy them from France - but I don't think France ever exported their nukes, and if they would even consider it. How would it be launched? They have air-launched missiles, presumably only working with French jets, and cruise missiles, which IIRC are not very long range.
Who else is there? India? Pakistan? Israel? North Korea? Hard to imagine a sale from either of these countries.
> UK could launch it's nuclear program, it has the scientific background and infrastructure, but surely they wouldn't have a certified, tested weapon within 5 years.
As in the other thread (that I see you've now seen) the UK does have an active nuclear weapons program, with an in-progress updated design. It's true that it would need a smaller 'tactical' warhead design for the use-case we're talking about so it would take some time.
> How would it be launched?
I have no idea, we have certainly reached beyond my competence to hold an opinion here :)
It just feels like an odd choice at the current time, to crow about a new capability, but reveal another country is going to hold the keys. especially when the UK does have an active nuclear program. :shrug:
It's hard to take this "looming war" with Russia seriously when WWIII didn't happen during the USSR times when Russia was much stronger. It's hard to believe that Russia would want to start WWIII now when they didn't then and when they have shown that they were highly struggling in Ukraine (and they struggled in Chechnya, too).
Along the same line, during the Cold War Sweden was literally facing the Warsaw Pact and yet stayed out of NATO. Now it is surrounded with friends and needs to join NATO.
I am just old enough to remember the end of the Cold War and the fall of it all. To me it is very difficult to consider that the situation now is riskier than then.
A reasonable conclusion is that we are being led up the garden path...
Russia has a stockpile of nukes for defense because they are worried of invasion (history has shown this is warranted). But they know that the military might of the US and NATO would obliterate their conventional forces.
My theory is that there has always been push-back against an EU power-grab to full "statehood" and involvement in military matters, and that this is a pretext to "manufacture consent" in European public opinion.
Now, specifically for the UK, again I think this is largely pandering to the US to attract favours (tariffs, etc)
I think, sure, while Russia is fighting in Ukraine, they would really struggle to attack elsewhere.
But were they to win, which is not that hard to imagine, they would suddenly have a war-time economy and suddenly able to move troops to another border. Russia is always making threats, most recently Putin said at a Russian Economic Forum that "wherever a Russian soldier's boot stood, belongs to Russia".
As for fearing NATO... Russia was always good at salami tactics: take a slice and back off before backlash mounts. If they helped themselves to Estonia, say, over 48 hours, would the US, UK and France send nukes? Send much at all? Possibly not, and Putin knows it.
None of it pertains to the "when" question, but I can easily imagine circumstances where it happens.
> If they helped themselves to Estonia, say, over 48 hours, would the US, UK and France send nukes? Send much at all? Possibly not, and Putin knows it.
They clearly wouldn't send nukes but Russian forces would still be destroyed by conventional means. Ukraine has shown that the Russian air force is weak and poorly supplied (see how the US or Israel operate from the air while Russia sends in ground troops almost immediately) so would lose air control very quickly and then be carpet bombed.
Russia is good at making threats but reality is different. In general, the really powerful don't need to make big threats all the time because they are both confident of their strengths and they know the opposition is fully aware of them, too. Putin threatens nuclear armageddon all the time because, really, that's all he has to appear strong.
I don't think Finland and Sweden would have joined NATO if this were just a pan-European power grab. They want to be separate countries. They joined because they genuinely believe that Putin has his eye on them.
That would be insane, but Putin is taking his playbook from the Cold War "madman" theory. He wants you to be guessing, which scatters your attention and misdirects your forces.
The Soviet Union engaged in plenty of proxy wars with the West, but they always avoided engaging directly with Western Europe. Putin has upped the ante by attacking Ukraine, which the West considers an ally and was moving towards a formal alliance.
That puts the madman theory in play. He makes rhetorical feints at Scandinavia. He knows the West won't ignore them, because they don't know if he's kidding.
I concur that the UK is just sucking up to the US here. The US has become a very unreliable partner and Europe needs to find a way to mollify it while they figure out how they can deal with Putin's continuous needling by themselves.
"Putin has an eye on Sweden" does not pass the most basic smell test, now even less than during the Cold War...
My take is that Sweden wanted to abandon its historical neutrality formally to fully join the rest of the "group" but needed something to make the public agree.
> which the West considers an ally and was moving towards a formal alliance.
No, Ukraine was not an ally and was not going to join NATO.
No-one even wanted Ukraine in the EU because it is so sht (dubbed the most corrupt country in Europe) before the Russian (re-)invasion and now, somehow, it should be fastracked...
This is all the usual murky, dodgy dealings in geopolitics but Europeans have lost their "nose" for propaganda in the media, especially in the West where there is no such thing, right?
> because they don't know if he's kidding*
We know exactly what their strengths and our strengths are, and they know them, too. Russia is not going to invade the EU/NATO anymore than during the USSR times. Basic common sense, again.
> "Putin has an eye on Sweden" does not pass the most basic smell test, now even less than during the Cold War...
It does pass. Invading the Swedish island of Gotland would cut off air and sea routes to the Baltics, while a ground move against the Suwalki gap between Poland and Lithuania would sever land routes. Map: https://warsawinstitute.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/Balti... Keep in mind that Belarus should also be marked in red, because it hosts Russian forces and allows them free passage.
It is one of the most obvious hostile moves against the EU and NATO, and Europe clearly doesn't have the means nor the will to launch a major war to liberate the countries. Everything hinges on the US, and we all know the state of things there.
Not only is this realistic, but the affected countries are taking remarkable steps to counter it. Sweden withdrew its military presence from Gotland in 2005 and disbanded the Gotland Regiment. After Russia invaded Ukraine, Sweden re-established the regiment, returned tanks and IFVs and radars and air defense systems to Gotland, and is building up a brigade-strength task force to defend the island by 2027.
Are the UK or the US prepositioning forces in Gibraltar and Alaska to repel an invasion, renovating bunkers and shelters, and making preparations to evacuate the civilian population?
Interestingly you are not replying to my points. You are only repeating what the media tell the public.
Now, it is perfectly norm0al for Sweden to secure its territory. But the narrative and policies go way beyond this and, again, my take is that Russia is just a pretext to implement those by overblowing the threat.
If anything, the media is downplaying the preparations to calm the population.
Russia is not a pretext, but the reason for the preparations. Russian actions, from invading Georgia in 2008 to annexing Crimea in 2014 and launching a full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, to the current wave of sabotage, have fundamentally changed security assessments. These aren't hypothetical threats being "overblown". They're real, documented acts of aggression that have forced countries to reassess their defenses. The policies are a direct response to that reality, not an excuse manufactured to justify them.
Dismissing that as mere PR is incredibly shallow. If the Swedish government wanted a publicity stunt, they would stage a photo op, not expand conscription and form new brigades.
Not PR or publicity stunt, more like "conspiracy". I have already written that my theory is that this is to manufacture consent of the public for a push of the EU into military matters and a further power-grab of the EU over European nation states. It is not very subtle but it seems to be working nevertheless.
It's been widely reported that these aircraft will only be able to use US nuclear munitions, and that will require US permission.
God forbid they ever be used, of course, but it seems like a weird choice, especially when the UK is apparently able to build warheads for trident, and is allegedly able to operate that system without US oversight (though of course with US ballistic missiles as the carrier...)