Misconceptions can often take root and spread quickly, one claim I’ve encountered a lot recently is that the UK stores all of its nukes in Scotland because they’re too dangerous to keep in England.
We’ve all read a variation of this claim “There are 220 nukes in Scotland, none in England as it’s too dangerous to have them there but Scotland is stuck with them!”.
The lifecycle of the UK’s Trident nuclear weapons system unfolds across various locations throughout the country, far beyond the confines of Scotland. This intricate network of facilities each serves distinct, crucial roles in the creation, maintenance, and storage of these weapons.
Aldermaston: The Birthplace of Warheads
Located in proximity to London, Aldermaston, home to the Atomic Weapons Establishment (AWE), plays a pivotal role in Trident’s operations. This is where Trident’s warheads are designed, produced, and maintained. The warheads often split their time between here and Coulport.
Burghfield: The Assembly and Maintenance Facility
Just seven miles from Aldermaston, and similarly close to London, is the Atomic Weapons Establishment at Burghfield. This facility is responsible for the assembly of the UK’s nuclear warheads, their in-service maintenance, and eventually, their decommissioning. Nuclear components are transported from Aldermaston to Burghfield for assembly and are then transported by road to Coulport, Scotland for deployment on Trident submarines.
Faslane: Submarine Base
Scotland does indeed play a significant role in the UK’s nuclear operations, specifically at the Faslane naval base at HMNB Clyde, near Glasgow. Faslane is home to the Vanguard-class submarines, which are armed with the UK’s nuclear weapons.
Coulport: Warhead Storage and Deployment
The Royal Naval Arms Depot Coulport, located in Scotland, is where Trident warheads are stored prior to deployment. The warheads are housed in reinforced concrete bunkers built into the hillside, and are loaded onto the Vanguard-class submarines at a dock beneath the bunker.
It’s important to note that these warheads frequently traverse the route between Burghfield and Coulport, as they return to Burghfield for refurbishment. This cyclical pattern illustrates the interconnectedness of the UK’s nuclear operations and the critical role played by facilities outside of Scotland.
In conclusion, while Scotland is home to key sites in the UK’s Trident nuclear system, it’s incorrect to claim that the UK exclusively stores its nuclear weapons in Scotland. The development, storage, and maintenance of these weapons involve a wide-reaching, nationwide network, extending far beyond Scotland’s borders.
Not quite as simple as explained in the article. The weapons at Coulport are the ones immediately(sort of) deployable. Those elsewhere in the system apart from the patrolling submarine are really not a lot of use, and if the fleet is neutralised it doesn’t matter how many warheads we have as they are in effect unusable.
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If the EHJ at Coulport and Kings Bay, Georgia are neutralized, then yes, they are. Not aware of where else Trident D5 could realistically be loaded aboard RN Vanguard Submarines.
Though realistically once they have launched their retaliation strikes there isn’t a lot of point worrying any more! The infrastructure for loading missiles into a submarine is relatively simple to replicate. It is the warheads themselves that are the main issue.
Yes, that’s true. Aldermaston, Burghfield, Coulport and Faslane will all be primary targets, so all warheads in maintenance and storage are gone.
Naval Base Kitsap, Kitsap Peninsula, Washington State. Although, if King’s Bay is history, probability is high that Kitsap is as well. Almost guaranteed. 🤔😱
Going all the way to the Pacific…a non starter mate.
The Trident wharf at Canaveral in Florida, that’s where we loaded once.
That is because there are no other facilities – yet. And the time it would take for the subs to travel to an alternative backup location, load, and return to some hidden place really preclude immediate further retaliation. In essence these devices (the system not just the warhead and missile) become single use.
Quite probably, which is why our dependence on a few expensive capital ships is dubious.
Angus I believe is ex RN.
Seconds out….Round 1…Ding Ding!
So a Tiger Class Light Cruiser, a County Class Guided Missile Destroyer, a Amazon Class Frigate and Leander Class Frigate
It has often been said the Tiger Class Light Cruisers were past it cause they were designed for a war that had gone
Frankly the Tiger Class Light Cruisers could have been better if instead of wasting money converting them into helicopter cruisers and just upgrade the electronic systems
The RN or the people employed? It may be different now than your day mate but in my (agreed none RN) opinion it seems to be doing very well with the platforms it has. The RN head sheds have planned much better then the Army for example, in regard to future planning, deployments and careers.
Did u have a bad camping experience as a child in Scotland? Most people who visit Scotland say it’s wonderful. It’s mostly the same with other parts of the U.K.
One big happy country made of 4 nations.
Agreed.
Depends if you wild camp. Scottish midges are the worst! Been to pretty much every shite hole around the World. Surviving most wee flying bitey things. Mosquitos in the jungle weren’t a problem. The Sandflies of the Sahara don’t even come close. Though the Black fly in Canada do come a close second. But those bloody midges, definitely a gift from the devil……
DaveyB, Our Midges ware pit boots,camo paint and have a bite you will have nightmares about ( they are Scots after all and they love the free food)🤣
Davey, I agree with you 100% mate. Whether it’s the flying nasties in the jungles of Sierra Leone and their black flies, Brunei, Belize and other flying things of all sorts in Africa (both West and East coast), those bloody black flies in Canada are all tolerable. The Midges and Nats on the West coast of Scotland are something else. I have heard tales of lambs, even young children being descended on in bit Midgies in their million, sucking every mill of blood out of the victims. I once camped on a weekend beside a lovely secluded wee lake only to wake up to the tent struggling to remain up under the weight of the greater Scottish Midge. When I was first told of the Midge problem they suffer at certain times of the year, I thought it was a 1980s pop artist who got a bit lairy, I was mistaken, I also thought it was often dark and grim in the summer up there, but no! The Midges up in Scotland are in such numbers, that they can make a summer’s day appear dull enough for streetlights to come on.
If we ever have to go to war, we shouldn’t send the British Army, no! Just capture a good number of Scottish summer Midges and get the RAF to release them over the enemy’s capital city. They’ll soon surrender!
🤣🤣🤣Call em the Scots Mig’s (no bombs required)
They would take too long to procure and go over budget.
Because Finland is the land of 20,000 lakes there are no shortage of insects able to breed in those lakes or surrounding puddles. Thus the T-Shirts of The Finnish Airforce showing a selection of that airborne menace. Of course they can tell the rare delicacy of foreign people so are very combat effective.
I’m not suggesting that they are superior but definitely a notable foe..
Since Finland decided for Lockheed Martin F-35 JSF, the local defence cadre can be assigned to the Volunteer Reserve…
Tends to be people that quote this kind of stuff say it out of ignorance/lack of knowledge.
They don’t understand how a nuclear weapon works, the parts of it, how these need to be maintained and so on and so on.
Knowledge is power and if u don’t know, keep quiet and fake it until you find out.
Not sure they are bothered. All they want is to make a political point, not deal with facts. One SNP supporter thought I’d made up the term ‘sea room’…
The Tritium has a half life of about 12 years , yield ,batteries and components degrade due radiation so need regular overhauls to be reliable. Expensive compared to cost of nasty virus delivered by missile !
What has labelling an ‘SNP supporter’ got to do with the debate?
I’m not sure what your problem with this is. It wasn’t a ‘label’, it was a fact. Another fact is that removal of nuclear weapons is SNP policy. They tend to ignore anything inconvenient on this, dispute clear facts, or come out with ideas like the myth that the entire column is about. So an SNP supporter told me, when I pointed the geographical reasons for the current base, that he’d never heard of the concept of ‘sea room’ and that I’d made it up. It illustrates the ignorance about the whole subject that they seem to have.
I’m not sure of the relevance of your comment! Removal of nuclear weapons is a policy of many many people cross party. It may be a policy for one or more but the practicality of implementing such a policy means that it may not actually be achieved or even achievable. Instead of your rant and diversion it would have helped if you contributed to the debate. Defence is important and party politicising it does not help. Cherished policies end up subject to pragmatism and practicality. The point of the debate is the actual value of the deterrent and where parts of it are sited, along with the consequences of using them. I am sure that if a major target was sited in your backyard you would be less than happy with it! So in that context the people living and working in the 50 or 60 mile radius of Glasgow, Faslane and Coulport have a rather different view, which has to be respected.
How very patronising of you. It would have been much better to say ‘oh, I see why you mentioned he was SNP’ than come out with all this waffle to justify yourself. There was no ‘rant’ or ‘diversion’. I explained clearly why I made the comment. You just don’t to admit you misunderstood it.
Funnily enough all political parties are composed of individuals, most of whom have varying opinions of whatever policy has been dreamed up, usually based on their own circumstances. Mentioning any political party in the context of the thread is a diversion and red herring. You didn’t explain your point at all. And the point of having a nuclear weapon facility in your backyard will tend to create an opinion which will be different to anybody else. Ask everyone at Devonport if they would like the weapons/boats stored there, or Portsmouth? And the point really remains that if a nuclear exchange occurred our current facilities would be destroyed and the boats would have no base to return to still less more weapons to reload. So they are a one shot wonder,especially as we have no ABM defences.
And had it been the Green party campaigner who brought it up in the context of a political discussion, I’m sure they would have said “One green campaigner…” (I presume he knew they were an SNP supporter because this issue came up in a political discussion.) I have heard similar things from several vocal SNP supporters when discussing Scottish Independence with them.
In case you didn’t read it properly, the statement being challenged was about how ‘nuclear weapons are kept in Scotland because they’re too dangerous to be kept in England’… That’s specifically an SNP campaign issue (the UK/England is keeping all their dangerous stuff away from themselves because they don’t care about Scottish people).
You might not like it and want to talk about the locations or equipment involved, but the whole point of the article is to challenge and correct this piece of misinformation. These sorts of false narratives are being used as political tools, they are being spread for political purposes and there is a not insignificant chance it originated with the express intent of using it to manipulate people’s feelings for political means.
It is very relevant to the article to discuss where these pieces of misinformation come from or why they might be circulating.
Also, you accuse HF of diverting the discussion, however, instead of just moving on, without paying heed to it, you’ve created a whole threat discussing the relevance of politics… One could even call that a tangent/diversion (which you created by complaining), ironic.
The reality is that there was nowhere in England that was as good (or convenient) as Faslane and Coulport. So while it may not actually have been the case of as far away from big English centres of population as possible it does then create a convenient bone of contention, which has considerable credibility! Regardless of any debateable reasons, the fact remains that they are both sited within fallout reach of Scotland’s largest cities. And any deep penetration of Coulport could have an enhanced fallour consequene beyond that of the immediate weapon. While yes tangential issues do not always help, fact and reality checking is still needed so if someone says something unustainable or wrong in a public forum then it needs to be corrected, especially if it is merely a matter if ill-founded opinion.
Spot on George.
All those lightening conductors around the Gravel Gerties at Burghfield must be for show….🙄
The issue is that regardless of Faslane and the at sea boat, it is the ‘target’ of the weapon storage facility at Coulport where the operational warheads are kept. Close to (in nuclear weapon terms) and upwind of the Scottish Central Belt. Posing a much reduced risk to England!
Surely if there is a nuclear exchange Coulport might be an early target however our Russian friends have form for turning cities to rubble. Scotland is a militarily strategic location however the population would be surplus to requirements. The Russians have many many warheads to go around I don’t think that it matters where you are, if you are part of a democracy you are likely to be a target.
This thread is actually more about the fact that these target locations are a ling way from English population centres! My comments were in relation to this. Your response though assumes that it is a wipe-out scenario. Though possible it is perhaps less likely that all major cities and other installations are automatically struck at the same time. Not denying that this can occur, but merely pointing out that the principle military target would be Coulport as the weapons store rather than the next to impossible to find underwater weapin platforms. The benefits of an all out multiple nuclear exchange are nil for all sides. Faslane itself is not the location of the operational launch systems (I don’t think the missiles could be launched directly into the air, but willing to be told otherwise) merely a car park and maintenance base for the boats. Russia of course has to contend with 30 plus countries spread around the world for its targets, while we only need to concentrate on parts of one country. Targetting Coulport merely also only addresses a second strike possibility though I doubt that the loading and putting to sea of the other boats could be accomplished very quickly!
Yes you are correct I am assuming that a strike on military targets (many of which will be in England and close to population centres) is likely to be closely followed by a wipe out scenario just as night follows day. Military strikes on strategic locations invite a strategic response from the UK, France and the US. What has Russia then got to lose? It must strike whilst it still can and not just nuclear powers. Yes a conventional war could in theory remain conventional and small battlefield nukes might (big might) be shrugged off however ICBMs …..
I’m told that strikes on military targets would have been widespread and immediate certainly from a NATO point of view and probably Soviet. Hackett’s WW3 scenarios have been widely derided over the years.
The whole purpose of the nuclear deterent is that it deters which it has done successfully for over 70 years. Once nukes start flying it is difficult to see restraint as an option. If we assume that without nukes world wars would have continued at the same rate we might consider that instead of being in the middle of WW5 we might now have saved a conservative 150,000,000 lives including our own.😀Any scenario, like Hacketts, (and including those I have outlined) are likely to be derided but are interesting and perhaps helpful nevertheless.
All options need to be considered and up to a reasonable point planned for. Hackett was writing a docu-drama, but the scenarios shouldn’t be dismissed. As the saying goes, plans fall apart on first contact witht the enemy. Which means adaptability and resourcefulness is the key, so having a plan to dust off in case it is needed is essential.
Gen z are the solution to wars lol they wont go !
Once we are talking about a nuclear wipeout they will be in it regardless.
launched directly into the air – got to be submerged.
I know. I was just pointing out that being able to reload the subs and get them back out to somewhere hidden is not viable for a second strike. Which means that our deterrent is a single use weapon and the storage site let alone the reloading faciity will have been destroyed, and the remaining subs if not also now destroyed are useless.
Not sure if it was on here but an ex-RN sailor who’d served on the boats said they’d practised surge deployments and were able to get at least one, and sometimes two extra out on patrol. There should have been five, of course, to ensure at least two continuously at sea.
Didn’t you read the article?
This thread is actually more about the fact that these target locations are a ling way from English population centres!
Only last time I checked, Aldermaston & Burghfield were in central southern England. And if you think Coulport is close to Glasgow (27 miles), Burghfield is less than 4 miles from the centre of Reading.
The naval bases in Portsmouth and Plymouth are also first-strike targets (as are the American airforce bases in Suffolk).
Given how much more densely populated southern England is than southern Scotland, I’d bet way more people in England are in the firing line in the case of a nuclear first strike.
Though every time I’ve heard this particular point brought up (usually in the context of Scottish Nationalism), they say they have safety concerns about the weapons themselves (that there would be an accidental detonation or some kind of leak), not the fear of a Russian nuclear fist strike.
Your are right about distance, but the main weapon store is not in England, that is merely the tertiary maintenance location and has no immediate military use. Coulport is where the weapons are stored for use. If however Aldermaston as well as Coulport, Faslane are all targetted together in the same strike the argument is null and void! These of course only affect our nuclear strike capability, I would think there would be others. But another critical thing to think about is that of a targetted single strike as an expression if intent, then perhaps Coulport becomes more relevant on its own. And striking Coulport removes our Naval as well as nuclear resupply capability!
Correct. In a nuclear war English AND Scottish cities would be targets along with military ones like Northwood, Portsmouth, Devonport, etc…
Coulport, My favourite draft in 17 years in the Royal Navy! Loved the place.
Interesting comments written when you don’t know the facts…….
I think you mean “Some” Scots ……… I certainly don’t believe the drivel the “London boys” come away with in here is representative of everyone in engerlandshire.😉
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You should talk to my Scottish cousins, of which there are many. My mother was Scottish, one of 4 sisters. Now large numbers of children & grandchildren.
home to the Atomic Weapons Establishment (AWE), plays a pivotal role in Trident’s operations.
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If only we’d kept Broughton Moor open…
On serious point, given rail is safer, why are the moves not conducted by rail?
Disruption to the existing rail traffic. A few lorries plus escort vehicles on the motorways and local roads. all done probably at night
taking a wild guess here, but there is only a single rail line near to the base, so any protesters would know with ease where to block the tracks…. At least with roads the further you get from the base the more road options open up…
Even “the Man Who Never Was” took to the rudimentary roads of Britain in the Second World War to keep his berth appointment Aboard HMS Seraph before he washed up on a Foreign Shore for his story to develop further, It would seem I refer to “Operation Mincemeat” here
Scientific Research Instruments would seem to have been the cover story for the contents of his travel container (Body) and Commander Jewell no stranger to Covert Operations, Apparently, I read the Obituary in the Glasgow Herald Print Edition some years ago
Given that the Russians always know far more than the civpop, I welcome the transparency.
The Defence admin waste billions behind secrecy.
More from the liars and misinformed otherwise none as the CND supporting SNP. Boy the SNP are getting desperate. Our policies have failed, we have failed and we need distraction from the Lorna Green DRS catastrophic policy. Let’s frighten the people into voting for us. However, I suspect the Scots are aware of the consequences of radiation and that the English are not immune from its affect !
This was one SNP’s main arguments before they managed to prove their total incompetence as a government.
The RAF command bunker at High Wycombe north of London was apparently third on the UK Soviet target list. I also recall from ‘Cabinets & The Bomb’ that quite a few places were considered along the UK west coast.
Just to inform the debate, I used Nukemap to model a 2.4Mt groundburst (largest Russian warhead I could find in their pre-set options) at each of the sites above
Assuming a (most likely) prevailing wind from the SW & groundburst to maximise fallout
The model doesn’t calculate likely fallout deaths, so all figures are for blast deaths & injuries
Burghfield – 61,000 dead, 155,000 injured (with large parts of London in the fallout zone)
Aldermaston – 21,000 dead, 110,000 injured (ditto for fallout zone)
Faslane – 3000 dead, 29,000 injured. Glasgow outside of light damage zone. Fallout avoids Glasgow, Edinburgh etc
Coulport – 2400 dead, 29,000 injured (I suspect most likely place for a groundburst, to get to the storage bunkers)
Airburst would cause far more casualties (for example 129.000 dead/ 377.000 injured for Burghfield, 11,000 dead/65,000 injured for Coulport), but reduce fallout to almost nothing
In both cases a Westerly is the worst wind for fallout issues, affecting Glasgow/ Edinburgh in Scotland & Greater London in England
Of course, all of the above are estimates – there are a huge number of possible variables
a good article….
The locations are based on practicality not politics. If you want to arm SSBNs you need weapon’s storage nearby. The SSBNs are in Scotland as they have good access to the Atlantic and the harbours are sheltered in all weathers. There is also something to be said for a more remote location. The Scottish side could be done in England but that would take some extra work. For example Barrow could be extended further to do SSBN maintenance. SSBNs could be based with SSNs. A secure storage site could be added to a base down south. The idea that England needs Scotland to have a nuclear deterrent is not the case. We could even use King’s Bay in the States at a pinch…. after all the USN used Scotland for many years as a base for their nuke subs.
Myths are usually based on some underlying fact and as with all myths tend to grow arms and legs. Sometimes the facts support a contention other times not.
The ‘nukes’ are part of a strategy to keep Britain safe from nuclear attack. They have to go somewhere. Regardless of the CND vision they have had a purpose but we will never know if they do or did in fact prove their worth or not. If they do get used then clearly they didn’t act as a deterrent. So in the absence of such an attack it remains debatable whether or not they are deterring. They do however maintain a balance of arms. Though it has to said that the only nuclear threats have been addressed at the more aggresive nuclear weapons holders and not against those who don’t have them. They are intended as last resort existential defence or mutual devastation responses so unless a state is actually under such a threat they are not likely to use them, even initially on a tactical basis. Despite possessing this capability Russia has not actually theatened Ukraine with their use, instead directing such threats at Ukraine’s supporters. Repelling an invasion force while stopping at the defacto border is not an existential threat, and of course that is where conventional weapons and manpower rule. Hiding behind the nuclear umbrella has allowed successive UK governments this century to undermine and hollow out our conventional forces which means we will be more likely to resort to MAD than would otherwise be the case, as other threads on this site frequently observe.. There has never been a threat of invasion against a nuclear weapons possessor, which supports the contention of keeping us safe, but does nothing to repel threats against our other interests in trade and wider society. The gamble of the defence cutters is that the nuclear deterrence alone is sufficient to protect our society and way of life, in which case they contend we do not need much in the way of conventional forces. This is very much a case of wishful thinking, and exposes the futility of expecting to be able to reconstruct our capability at short notice without massive tax increases.
The other analysis also needs to consider why they were sited where they are. Clearly when constructed the main risk was from seaborne attack and therefore it made some sense to ‘hide; them away in an otherwise inaccesible location. Sadly of course the proximity to a large population centre was less than desirable and based on the premise that an all out devastatig attack would destroy most f the British Isles as well as much of the rest of the world. In that sense it didn’t matter where they were put. However the most likely attack on the bases if not the whole of UK will almost certainly be from ballistic or high speed long range stand off precision missiles against which we have no effective defence. The likelihood of a limited first strike to disable our own response capability is probably inreased along with the possibility of a single ‘demonstration of intent’ strike which is aimed at the military target of Faslane and Coulport with one high yield weapon. This changes the analysis somewhat and it is clear that in that more likely scenario the Central Belt of Scotland would be incapacitated and therefore the so called myth of keeping England or the rest of the Isles safe gains some considerable traction. As such Glasgow in particular is seen as expendable.
The problem here is that there is only one base, no standby capability exists which in military terms makes no sense whatsover. All our eggs are in one easily fallible basket! If Faslane and Coulport were rendered inaccessihble by conventional means we have in effect lost our capability and cannot resupply or even service without immense difficulties and delay either the aircraft carriers or Trident.
This therefore forms the basis of opposition to siting these weapons in Scotland.
“Clearly when constructed the main risk was from seaborne attack and therefore it made some sense to ‘hide; them away in an otherwise inaccesible location.”
Wrong.
It was all to do with the proximity of deep water access to the North Atlantic. Having that an established base at Faslane cemented the choice.
If there was a nuclear war London would be the primary target. Also there would be many more targets in England then Scotland. Also shooting at Scottish bases is not that helpful to an attacker as the subs that carry our nukes are already at sea ready to retaliate.
Like the CND supporters who said that ‘Trident doesn’t work’ because of a missile failure last year, the Scots Nats are working behind the ‘veil of ignorance’. In the event of WW3 breaking out there would be an immediate ‘exchange’ of ‘tactical’ nuclear weapons on significant military targets (almost everything) throughout Europe. Faslane would merely be one horror among hundreds, or possibly thousands.
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Nick Cole all this talk of fallout over Scotland biggest cities , I grew up in the sixties exactly mid way between Manchester and Liverpool.
If a nuclear exchange took place Liverpool 2 nukes at least 1 for docks 1for airport , Manchester at least 2 1 for city 1 for airport.
I also live 3 miles from what was RAF Burtonwood one of Europe’s biggest US armies biggest storage sites no hills or mountains in way my survival
Chances were less than zero . This might not have changed much as Russia is not the greatest at changing targets so Burtonwood probably still on list
It’s not just Scotsmen that will die in a nuclear exchange the area covered by those 5 bombs has a greater population than Scotland in its entirety.
Strikes at Birmingham and London same without some deterrent Russia would have attempted annexation or destruction of western Europe, I do not agree with nuclear weapons
But understand the necessity of them .
That might be a compelling argument if not for the unclassified reports stating it clear as day that sites in Portsmouth and devonport are too risky and not viable due to loss of life in case of an incident.