Expansion decision ‘undermines democracy’ and will mobilise new generation of protesters, groups warn
The biggest expansion of the UK’s nuclear deterrent in a generation will put the nation on the “nuclear frontline” and mobilise a new generation of anti-nuclear weapons protesters, campaign groups have warned.
Anti-nuclear and anti-arms campaign groups are planning mass protests against nuclear weapons – of a kind not seen since the days of the Greenham Common peace camp in the 80s – in response to government plans to significantly expand its nuclear deterrent by buying a squadron of American fighter jets capable of carrying nuclear weapons.
The Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (CND) is planning a protest on Saturday at RAF Lakenheath, which is used by the US air force. The base is undergoing a multimillion-pound upgrade and contains old storage vaults for nuclear weapons, and is seen as a potential site for the storage of US nuclear weapons.
Campaign groups said the decision to buy 12 F-35A jets, which are capable of carrying conventional arms, and also the US B61-12 gravity bomb, a variant of which has more than three times the explosive power of the weapon dropped on Hiroshima, had been taken without parliamentary debate and undermined democracy.
