Britain’s nuclear deterrent and strategy are configured for a strategic environment that no longer exists. Nuclear weapons have returned to the forefront of international politics, driven by intensifying great-power competition, nuclear coercion and increasingly collaborative adversaries. Yet, Britain’s strategic assumptions are still grounded in the unipolarity of the post-Cold War period, during which time it retired its sub-strategic capabilities, leading its Trident-armed submarines to be tasked with providing all levels of Britain’s nuclear capability. At the same time, Britain’s institutional expertise was allowed to wither, risking it entering a more dangerous nuclear era without the thinking or the means to deter effectively.

This complacency is no longer sustainable. The international system has entered a markedly more dangerous phase in which nuclear weapons are once again central to statecraft rather than residual instruments of last resort. Arms control frameworks are eroding and nuclear coercion is becoming increasingly commonplace while Britain’s adversaries are deepening their nuclear collaboration. Russia has adopted increasingly aggressive forms of nuclear coercion, China is rapidly expanding and modernising its arsenal and the US is pivoting its strategic attention toward Asia. In this context, Britain lacks both the range of nuclear options it preserved throughout the Cold War, and the institutional expertise within government to deploy its capabilities effectively.

To meet the demands of this more dangerous, multipolar era, Britain must do more than modernise hardware. It must rebuild the intellectual and institutional foundations of deterrence itself: restoring expertise across government, renewing doctrine and recovering the strategic judgement necessary to deterrence. Alongside this, the report presents several potential options to ensure greater technical and operational flexibility, including strengthening the Continuous At-Sea Deterrent, deepening cooperation with close allies and the potential development of an independent sub-strategic option. Without renewal, Britain risks entering this new age of nuclear risk with neither the theory nor the capabilities to maintain credible deterrence. 

Policy Exchange Nuclear Enterprise Commission

As the UK enters a decisive decade for its energy and economic future, the Policy Exchange Nuclear Enterprise Commission will continue to set out the bold, practical reforms required to rebuild a world-class nuclear enterprise, cut through the inertia of the past two decades, and deliver the nuclear renaissance Britain urgently needs.

The Commission will produce a series of discussion papers and research notes addressing the most pressing questions facing the UK’s nuclear enterprise. Drawing together expertise from across government, industry and academia, its research and events will span subjects from the nuclear deterrent and the nuclear threat landscape to regulation, the nuclear industrial base and dual-use technologies. This breadth will enable the Commission to propose in a final publication a wide array of answers to the considerable challenges at the heart of energy and national security policy.

It should be noted that all research papers produced under the banner of the Policy Exchange Nuclear Enterprise Commission are intended for discussion and do not necessarily represent the views of every member of the Commission, or the Commission as a whole.

Members of the Commission

• Rt Hon Lord Case CVO PC, former Cabinet Secretary (Chair)
• Dr Won-Pil Baek, Senior Research Fellow at Korea Atomic Energy Research Institute
• Professor Wyn Bowen, Head of the School of Security Studies at KCL and Professor of Non-Proliferation and International Security
• Joshua Buckland, Director of Strategy and Policy at EDF and a Senior Fellow at Policy Exchange
• Tom Greatrex, CEO, Nuclear Industry Association; former Shadow Minister for Energy of Great Britain
• Lt Gen H R McMaster (USA, Ret.), 25th U.S. National Security Advisor
• Frank Miller, former Special Advisor on nuclear matters to President George W. Bush and Nuclear Defence Specialist at the Department of Defence
• Professor Dame Fiona Murray DCMG CBE, Associate Dean for Innovation at the MIT Sloan School of Management and Vice-Chair of the Board of Directors of the NATO Innovation Fund
• Professor Sir David Omand GCB, former Director of GCHQ 
• Rt Hon Lord Robertson of Port Ellen KT GCMG PC, former NATO Secretary General and Secretary of State for Defence
• Hon William J Schneider Jr, former Under Secretary of State for International Security Affairs
• Air Marshal Edward Stringer CB CBE, former Director-General of the Defence Academy and former Assistant Chief of the Defence Staff 
• Paul Taylor CBE, former Director General of Strategic Technologies at the Ministry of Defence
• Rt Hon Anne-Marie Trevelyan, former Minister of State for Indo-Pacific and Secretary of State for International Trade
• Dr Heather Williams, Director, Project on Nuclear Issues at the Centre for Strategic and International Studies
• Admiral Rt Hon Lord West of Spithead GCB DSC PC, former First Sea Lord

The launch of this report was covered by:

• City A.M.
• POLITICO’s London Playbook