The Ministry of Defence has confirmed that Project Astraea, the UK’s new sovereign nuclear warhead, is progressing as part of the Strategic Defence Review 2025 programme.
In a written parliamentary response, Defence Minister Luke Pollard said that “funding for the Astraea programme is included within the £15 billion investment in the sovereign nuclear warhead programme this Parliament,” which also covers sustaining the existing Mk4A warhead and modernising infrastructure at the Atomic Weapons Establishment.
Pollard added that he was withholding the projected cost of Astraea “for the purpose of safeguarding our national security.”
Project Astraea, designated A21/Mk7, s being designed, developed, and manufactured in the UK by the Atomic Weapons Establishment, which was nationalised in 2021. It will replace the current Holbrook warhead used on Trident II D5 missiles carried by the Vanguard-class submarines and their Dreadnought-class successors.
The system is being developed in coordination with the US W93 programme, sharing certain non-nuclear components such as the Mk7 aeroshell under established treaty frameworks to ensure continued compatibility with the Trident system.
The Strategic Defence Review 2025 stated that the sovereign warhead programme will support around 9,000 jobs across the Defence Nuclear Enterprise. Astraea is expected to enter service in the 2030s, when the Holbrook warhead reaches the end of its operational life.
According to official documents, Astraea will incorporate improved safety and performance measures, including insensitive high explosives and technologies developed through the UK–US Joint Technology Demonstrator. It will also be the first British nuclear warhead fielded without live nuclear testing, in line with the UK’s obligations under the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty.
Keir would never agree to it, but Nigel might. Drill a deep hole in South Georgia & do a single full power shot. Huge hoo-ha for a few weeks, but as long as there were no follow up shots, it would soon be forgotten.
Would the US agree to that?
Given how close the two nations warhead designs are, the Americans would want full details of the result.
All the previous UK live nuclear tests other than handful in the early ’50s we’re done in the United States. The US already knows everything that’s involved. And they were all modified us designs.
To achieve what?
Why? They can prove the device will work without an actual nuclear event.
Rumour has it, we did exactly this under Scotland earlier this morning.
That was me on the loo this morning pal, false alarm.
It actually made the USGS site (It still shows up on there).
Take a “Gander” !
not working though : Because of the federal government shutdown, USGS.gov is not being updated and the agency will not be able to respond to inquiries until appropriations are enacted.
USGS Latest Earthquakes site is still working, I look in often.
It’s a pretty Earth Shattering site !
It would set a very bad precedent doing that, and others would follow.
I don’t see the point given the accuracy of super computer modeling now.
The trick is to prepare the site & then wait. Another Country is bound to test at some point & if we can do our test quickly afterwards, we can dodge most of the outcry. If it goes to plan, we would not need to test again for another 30+ years.
Nigel would cave in to Putin, so I doubt he will want nukes.
… whereas Kier is more susceptible to the Chinese version?
‘Nationalised’ in this case refers to switching from being a government owned and managed organisation to a government owned, privately managed organisation (1993) and then back to a government owned and managed organisation again. What the endless reorganising achieves is open to debate. It did of course create contractual headaches regarding the employment status of the staff.
mankind is an evil breed spending its life looking for more ways to destroy itself still it gives us time something to do.
Absolutely. The whole issue of true nuclear “defence” has been covered up for decades and largely spun by the big US arms manufacturers. Those truly in the know have conducted full blown war games with all the armed services and civil defences including the NHS, Fire and Ambulance services and Police, councils and others.
They found that it was the initial decision of which targets to strike and subsequent targets. Probably nothing new in that, except the reviews afterwards discovered that few if not none of the non nuclear countries were attacked with nuclear weapons.
The reasons were clear. If you are a nuclear nation, and the situation arises where an exchange takes place, you cannot waste valuable and limited missiles on countries who do not possess nuclear weapons, it would be madness.
It would be the same in effect of being involved in a street fight with several people, and attacking a person who is on the other side of the road and minding their own business.
The last thing a nuclear nation wants is to run out of nuclear weapons. Unlike WWI & WW2, there will be no factories making more nuclear bombs, and even if there was, the war itself would be over before replacements could be produced.
In previous war games the death tolls on both sides have been truly appalling, and those left alive would find “life” a terrible situation. Very little in the way of health treatment, contaminated water and food and a system of leave you alone to die in pain, sickness and fear.
In short the only people to benefit from this madness is the manufacturers and their shareholders, knowing that the use of such weapons of horror will never be used.
Absolutely. The whole issue of true nuclear “defence” has been covered up for decades and largely spun by the big US arms manufacturers. Those truly in the know have conducted full blown war games with all the armed services and civil defences including the NHS, Fire and Ambulance services and Police, councils and others.
They found that it was the initial decision of which targets to strike and subsequent targets. Probably nothing new in that, except the reviews afterwards discovered that few if not none of the non nuclear countries were attacked with nuclear weapons.
The reasons were clear. If you are a nuclear nation, and the situation arises where an exchange takes place, you cannot waste valuable and limited missiles on countries who do not possess nuclear weapons, it would be madness.
It would be the same in effect of being involved in a street fight with several people, and attacking a person who is on the other side of the road and minding their own business.
The last thing a nuclear nation wants is to run out of nuclear weapons. Unlike WWI & WW2, there will be no factories making more nuclear bombs, and even if there was, the war itself would be over before replacements could be produced.
In previous war games the death tolls on both sides have been truly appalling, and those left alive would find “life” a terrible situation. Very little in the way of health treatment, contaminated water and food and a system of leave you alone to die in pain, sickness and fear.
In short the only people to benefit from this madness is the manufacturers and their shareholders, knowing that the use of such weapons of horror will never be used.
Yet when Poland got its freedom & published the old Warsaw Pact nuclear war plan, the Russians only planned to drop nukes on those Western European nations that lacked their own nukes. The Russian plan avoided dropping any nukes on Britain or France, as they knew they could retaliate.
Not a lot of point giving them up, like Ukraine did. You don’t need dubious stories of secret wargames and greedy manufacturers to see how Russia has treated them. You just read a newspaper.
mankind is an evil breed spending its life looking for more ways to destroy itself still it gives us time something to do. stuff the u. s the less we have to do with the arrogant, gun obsessed, racist,, nation the better.
Andy, did an American nick your flag ? 🏳️🌈🏳️⚧️🏳️🏴🏴☠️🚩 (these are the only ones avaliable on the Emoji list now)
I shit you not !
All Nations Flags have been banned !!!!
I blame all the “Middle aged White English Men” (G Neville.)
We’re all gay pirates now.
Take your meds, Andrew
BAE has just bought the former 96 acre GSK factory in Ulverston on the Ulverston Canal.
If there is going to be no real life exploding of said munition then lets hope the lad’s have got their maths right. It would be a shame to fire one in anger simply for it to fizzle over Moscow
It just wouldn’t matter.
So long as Putin thinks there’s a better than fair chance Moscow is flattened