EXPERTS are questioning Britain’s ability to maintain its nuclear arsenal and operate fighter jets in light of shifting US foreign policy.
Doubt has been cast on the UK’s ability to keep up the Trident programme without American aid and fears have been raised that the US could effectively halt use of F-35 bomber planes.
Defence specialists have said that Britain must plan for the possibility that Donald Trump could pull America out of Nato – which could mean it would no longer supply the UK with nuclear weapons.
Former foreign secretary Malcolm Rifkind told The Guardian: “It really is necessary for Britain and France to work more closely together because if American reliability ever came into question, then Europe could be defenceless in the face of Russian aggression.
“The contribution by America must now be to some degree in doubt, not today or tomorrow, but over the next few years and certainly as long as Trump and people like him are in control in Washington.”
The UK Government has insisted that Britain’s nuclear arsenal is “completely operationally independent” – an assertion rubbished by experts.
Hans Kristensen, a nuclear weapons monitor at the think tank the Federation of American Scientists, said: “Britain likes to call its nuclear posture independent, but it, of course, is absolutely not.
“It may be that Britain can fire weapons independently of the US, but below that, the entire infrastructure covering missile compartments on submarines, the missiles themselves, all are supplied by the Americans.”
Britain’s nuclear weapons are designed, manufactured and maintained in the US and, as of 2008, the country had 50 missiles left after purchases from an American stockpile, according to research by Bradford University.
Dr Marion Messmer, a senior research fellow at Chatham House and an expert on nuclear weapons policy, argued that Britain may have to plan to launch nuclear weapons by air rather than at sea.
She told The Guardian: “You wouldn’t necessarily be able to take the warheads which the UK uses for submarine launches and fit them for air launch. You would very likely need to develop a whole second warhead.”
Dr Messmer added: “You could hope that France – the most obvious contender for Britain to work with – has a delivery vehicle similar to Trident that could easily be adapted, but it would require the French government and the French nuclear enterprise being willing to share those designs with the UK.”
Elsewhere, concerns are growing in Canada – which Trump has repeatedly said he wants to annex – that its American-made fighter jets could be switched off by its southern neighbour.
Canada ordered 88 F-35As in 2023 for $14.5 billion while Britain’s Royal Air Force operates F-35B jets.
Writing in The Globe and Mail, Michael Byers, co-director of the Vancouver Outer Space Institute, said that America could compromise F-35 jets.
He said: “Lockheed Martin, the giant U.S. defence contractor that manufactures the F-35, has always refused to share the full ‘source code’ with foreign customers, including close allies of the United States. The source code, comprised of 8 million or more lines of code, is the foundational programming that enables all of the aircraft’s functionality.
“Since the source code is a tightly held secret, every training or combat mission flown by a Canadian F-35 will require a ‘mission data load’ processed through specialized computing facilities in the United States. The load details the mission objectives and threat profiles and enables full use of the F-35’s advanced situational awareness capabilities.
“Now, imagine that the US president wishes to strong arm Canada into making concessions on critical minerals or perhaps transboundary diversions of fresh water. He could easily order that Canada be denied access to the U.S.-based computing facilities. Our F-35s would still be able to fly but their capabilities would be compromised.”
Byres added: “If the United States wished to invade Canada, it could achieve air superiority – perhaps with just a few keyboard strokes.”
