Revealed: Trump’s secret $264 million plot to put nuclear doomsday weapons in Britain to face down Putin
Daily Mail, By NICK ALLEN, US NEWS EDITOR (POLITICS), 22 December 2025
The true scale of President Donald Trump‘s ambitions to turn the U.K. into a potential nuclear launchpad has been revealed.
A massive $264 million plan to overhaul a Royal Air Force base in the English countryside includes knocking down at least half a dozen existing buildings, setting up secure intelligence facilities, protecting the surrounding area against enemy electronic pulse attacks, and sending over 200 American personnel, according to Pentagon funding proposals.
It represents confirmation that American nuclear weapons will return to Britain for the first time since President Barack Obama withdrew them 17 years ago.
However, despite widespread speculation that U.S. nuclear weapons have already arrived in the U.K, the documents indicate it will not happen for several years.
The idea that they had already been sent gained steam on July 17 when a massive U.S. Air Force C-17 Globemaster III arrived at RAF Lakenheath in Suffolk.
The aircraft had been tracked by flight data sites traveling 10 hours from Kirtland Air Force base in New Mexico, where America stores its nuclear arsenal.
Experts speculated that it may have been carrying B61-12 nuclear gravity bombs, each with a potential power bigger than the weapon dropped on Hiroshima in 1945.
Lakenheath is home to the U.S Air Force’s 48th Fighter Wing, known as Liberty Wing, which flies F-35A aircraft capable of being fitted with B61-12s.
However, detailed Pentagon assessments of Lakenheath’s suitability as a nuclear base, reviewed by the Daily Mail, make clear that it is far from ready.
Bizarrely, one of the reasons given was that some of those involved in the U.S. nuclear operation would not have quick access to a toilet during an Armageddon-style scenario.
The existing building that would be used as the primary command post is in ‘adequate condition but beyond its useful life,’ the documents said.
It said controllers within the ‘Emergency Action Cell’ would ‘not have direct, restricted access to a restroom’ in the current facility.
In addition, ‘cooling and air filtration’ was not good enough to support a SCIF – a Sensitive Compartmented Information Facility – which is a high-security room used by the U.S. government and military to discuss extremely sensitive classified intelligence.
The Lakenheath operation is described as a ‘Surety’ mission, which is a term the Pentagon uses when discussing the security and safety of nuclear weapons and associated facilities.
The Air Force’s budget estimates for the 2026 financial year suggests $104 million will be needed for a ‘Surety command post.’
It would house facilities including a control center for Air Force Nuclear Command, Control and Communications……………………………………………………………………………………………
The U.S., rather than NATO, is expected to pay for developments at Lakenheath because it is ‘necessary to complete the project in the timeframe required by United States military commanders.’
Construction of the command post is expected to start in August 2027 and be completed by July 2031.
A separate operations compound is priced at $149 million and will involve demolishing half a dozen existing buildings and creating an armory with massively thick concrete walls, and possible storage for anti-tank weapons.
‘This project is required to provide enhanced security capabilities supporting the potential stationing of specialized weapons at Royal Air Force Lakenheath,’ the project outline said.
‘Specialized weapons surety includes materiel, personnel, and procedures, contributing to the safeguarding and reliability of specialized weapons, and to the assurance that there will be no specialized weapon accidents, incidents, unauthorized weapon detonation, or degradation in performance at the target.’
The budget also details the addition of over 200 U.S. security personnel at the base.
A current building to be used by the first security personnel is said to be in ‘deteriorated condition.’
It ‘cannot accommodate the additional weapons, ammunition, and equipment associated with the increase in manpower required for the potential Surety Beddown mission.’
The problems include asbestos, lead based paint, poor ventilation, and ‘improper sanitary sewer drainage.’
Improvements are needed to ‘accommodate the potential Surety mission beddown’ and without them, security forces personnel would not be able to implement the minimum response times, safeguarding, and assurance procedures required for specialized weapons.’
Construction of the second compound is not expected to start until 2028 and finish in 2031…………………………………………………………….
Funding documents show an additional $11 million is expected to be spent on electronic security systems, bringing the total for the nuclear mission at Lakenheath to $264 million.
B61-12 nuclear bombs, which are 12ft long and weight about 800 pounds – are a staple of the U.S. arsenal.
They are unguided ‘gravity bombs’ dropped over targets and are equipped with four fins to increase accuracy to within 30 meters of the target.
They are ‘tactical’ nuclear weapons intended for use against specific military targets, such as wiping out battlefield units or bases, rather than for leveling cities.
However, their power can still be three times the size of the bomb dropped on Hiroshima.
The warhead used in B61-12s has a variety of options for how much explosive power it can yield with the minimum being 0.3 kilotons and the maximum 50 kilotons
The bomb that destroyed Hiroshima in 1945 hade a yield of roughly 15 kilotons.
Meanwhile, Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer confirmed this month that the U.K. is set to buy 12 F-35A fighter jets from the U.S.
The U.K. will receive its jets at the end of this decade and it will be the first time it has had an air-launched tactical nuclear weapon since 1998.
While it will own the jets, the U.S. will retain ownership of the nuclear weapons they come with.
It means the U.K. will not be able to deliver a nuclear strike with those bombs without explicit approval from Washington…………… https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-15375073/Trumps-secret-264-million-plot-nuclear-doomsday-weapons-Britain-face-Putin.html
Memory as Resistance: Why Hibakusha Testimonies Matter for Nuclear Justice Today
By Monalisa Hazarika
ICAN Australia and Monalisa Hazarika, Dec 19, 2025, https://icanaustralia.substack.com/p/memory-as-resistance-why-hibakusha?utm_source=post-email-title&publication_id=6291617&post_id=181742900&utm_campaign=email-post-title&isFreemail=true&r=1ise1&triedRedirect=true&utm_medium=email
How do we live with memories of discrimination when they are woven into our earliest or most defining experiences? How do we find the strength to speak about encounters we would rather protect our loved ones from? And how do we ensure that the injustices we faced are never repeated? For hibakusha, these questions are not rhetorical; their testimonies turn memory into resistance—insisting that lived experience remains central to struggles for nuclear justice today.
The Story of Lee Jong Keun
The following tells the story of Lee Jong Keun, a non-Japanese hibakusha, as shared by his legacy successor, Mozume Megumi—who has been entrusted to convey his testimony. Mr. Lee, born in 1928, was a Zainichi (residing in Japan) Korean with the Japanese name Egawa Masaichi. He, like many other Koreans at that time, was forced to adopt Japanese-style family names as part of Soshi Kaimei—a Japanese colonial policy aimed at broader assimilation efforts. As a Zainichi, he experienced persistent discrimination from childhood, including being targeted for something as simple as bringing Korean food in his lunchbox. He noted that in school, he was routinely singled out and blamed for wrongdoing, reflecting the broader social prejudice faced by Korean minorities in Japan.
At sixteen, Mr. Lee was a mechanic living in the suburbs of Hiroshima, taking the train each day to his workshop. But on the morning of August 6, 1945, he missed his usual stop and boarded a tram instead—a small change that, as he later said, ended up saving his life. He recalled seeing a sudden pika (a blinding flash), thinking it was a flare bomb, and instinctively covered his eyes, nose, and ears, and crouched on the ground. When he opened his eyes again, the previously sunny morning had turned into pitch-black darkness. People were running for shelter, others trapped under rubble were crying for help. The city was unrecognisable. He described seeing people with peeling skin, charred bodies, and desperate cries for assistance; images that left him feeling helpless, confused, and overwhelmed by fear and pain.
As a railroad worker, he received the limited medical care available, mostly Mercurochrome—a red antiseptic containing mercury—which his family used to treat his burns. He remembered his mother quietly crying as she cleaned the wounds each day, removing maggot eggs and tending to the foul-smelling injuries on his back. Her whispered fear that death might have been kinder than such suffering stayed with him. Yet amid the devastation, he also remembered the kindness of his neighbours. One family, despite having very little themselves, shared a small jar of vegetable oil each week to soothe his burns—an act of generosity that stood in stark contrast to the stigma and isolation survivors faced during that time.
Hibakusha and Non-Japanese Hibakusha
Hibakusha—atomic bomb survivors—faced profound social, economic, and psychological discrimination rooted in widespread misconceptions about radiation sickness. In post-war Japan, many believed that radiation-related conditions were contagious or hereditary, resulting in exclusion from employment, healthcare, marriage prospects, and community life. For non-Japanese hibakusha such as Mr. Lee, this marginalisation was compounded by ethnic discrimination. They endured both the trauma of the bombings and the persistent stigma of being perceived as “outsiders,” leading some, including Mr. Lee, to conceal their survivor status from even close family members for decades. They faced social stigma linked to radiation’s visible effects and persistent institutional neglect tied to their nationality and residency status
Beyond social prejudice, non-Japanese hibakusha have continued to confront bureaucratic obstacles, limited political recognition, and inconsistent access to state support. Restrictions on eligibility for medical subsidies, complex residency verification processes, and legal battles over compensation have left many without adequate care. Their exclusion from formal policymaking spaces has further limited their ability to advocate for their rights. Despite incremental progress, these survivors remain on the margins of disarmament and public health policy, underscoring the need for sustained diplomatic attention, inclusive historical acknowledgment, and equitable survivor support frameworks.
Stories like Mr. Lee’s are not alone and stand as stark reminders of the human cost of misguided policies pursued in the name of national or global security. Across Japan and around the world, thousands of hibakusha, their descendants, and dedicated activists continue to shoulder the burden of history while working tirelessly to ensure its lessons are not forgotten with a collective message: never again!
Hibakusha testimonies are not only records of past violence—they are acts of resistance. By insisting on truth, dignity, and accountability, they challenge systems that normalise nuclear harm and demand justice in the present.
Under Article 6 of the United Nations Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW), states must provide age and gender sensitive assistance to victims of nuclear weapons use or testing. This must be enacted without discrimination, including medical care, rehabilitation, and psychological support, and provide for their social and economic inclusion. Countries must be obligated to assist survivors, many of whom share a similar story to Mr Lee, and ensure that nuclear weapons use and testing are prohibited in the future, possible through the advocacy of the TPNW.
About the Author
Monalisa Hazarika is the Strategic Communication and Partnership Officer at the SCRAP Weapons Project. She is one of the UN Youth Champions for Disarmament under the United Nations Office for Disarmament Affairs’ #Youth4Disarmament programme. She is an emerging voice in conventional arms control and meaningful youth engagement, featuring most recently at a UNGA-ECOSOC Joint Meeting. Her areas of expertise and research focus include small arms and light weapons, especially non-industrial weapons and their trends in illicit manufacture and trade, transnational organised crime, and the proliferation of 3D-printed weapons.
New UK-France Nuclear Steering Group Meets to Advance Cooperation Under Northwood Declaration
Statement by the United Kingdom and the French Republic on Nuclear Policy and Cooperation.
From: Cabinet Office, 18 December 2025, https://www.gov.uk/government/news/new-uk-france-nuclear-steering-group-meets-to-advance-cooperation-under-northwood-declaration
At the UK-France Summit in July 2025, Prime Minister Keir Starmer and President Emmanuel Macron affirmed their commitment to strengthening the UK-France nuclear relationship. They signed the Northwood Declaration, which established the UK-France Nuclear Steering Group in order to provide political direction and coordinate bilateral work across nuclear policy, capability and operations.
On 10 December, the Nuclear Steering Group met for the first time in Paris, jointly chaired by senior officials from the UK Cabinet Office and the Presidency of the French Republic.
They were accompanied by senior military personnel and officials from defence and foreign ministries to discuss Euro-Atlantic security issues and coordination of their respective independent deterrents. They discussed their approach to strengthening deterrence in Europe and confirmed their ambition for bilateral co-operation on nuclear deterrence.
They also observed Operation POKER which was the first time foreign officials were given access to this demonstration of France’s strategic nuclear airborne component.
‘Unquestionably an Act of War’: Trump Declares Naval Blockade Against Venezuela
“This is the Iraq War 2.0 with a South American flavor to it,” warned one Democratic senator
Jake Johnson, Common Dreams, Dec 17, 2025
US President Donald Trump late Tuesday declared a blockade on “all sanctioned oil tankers” approaching and leaving Venezuela, a major escalation in what’s widely seen as an accelerating march to war with the South American country.
The “total and complete blockade,” Trump wrote on his social media platform, will only be lifted when Venezuela returns to the US “all of the Oil, Land, and other Assets that they previously stole from us.”
US President Donald Trump late Tuesday declared a blockade on “all sanctioned oil tankers” approaching and leaving Venezuela, a major escalation in what’s widely seen as an accelerating march to war with the South American country.
The “total and complete blockade,” Trump wrote on his social media platform, will only be lifted when Venezuela returns to the US “all of the Oil, Land, and other Assets that they previously stole from us.”
“Venezuela is completely surrounded by the largest Armada ever assembled in the History of South America,” Trump wrote, referring to the massive US military buildup in the Caribbean. “It will only get bigger, and the shock to them will be like nothing they have ever seen before.”
The government of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, which has mobilized its military in response to the US president’s warmongering, denounced Trump’s comments as a “grotesque threat” aimed at “stealing the riches that belong to our homeland.”
The US-based anti-war group CodePink said in a statement that “Trump’s assertion that Venezuela must ‘return’ oil, land, and other assets to the United States exposes the true objective” of his military campaign.
“Venezuela did not steal anything from the United States. What Trump describes as ‘theft’ is Venezuela’s lawful assertion of sovereignty over its own natural resources and its refusal to allow US corporations to control its economy,” said CodePink. “A blockade, a terrorist designation, and a military buildup are steps toward war. Congress must act immediately to stop this escalation, and the international community must reject this lawless threat.”
The announced naval blockade—an act of aggression under international law—came a week after the Trump administration seized an oil tanker off the coast of Venezuela and made clear that it intends to intercept more.
US Rep. Joaquin Castro (D-Texas), one of the leaders of a war powers resolution aimed at preventing the Trump administration from launching a war on Venezuela without congressional approval, said Tuesday that “a naval blockade is unquestionably an act of war.”
“A war that the Congress never authorized and the American people do not want,” Castro added, noting that a vote on his resolution is set for Thursday. “Every member of the House of Representatives will have the opportunity to decide if they support sending Americans into yet another regime change war.”………………………………………….https://www.commondreams.org/news/unquestionably-an-act-of-war-trump-declares-naval-blockade-against-venezuela
Scottish National Party says UK nuclear deterrent is ‘America-first’.
By Tom Dunlop, UK Defence Journal, December 17, 2025
A disagreement over defence innovation and reliance on US technology surfaced in the House of Commons during Defence questions.
SNP MP Dave Doogan argued that what he described as an “America-first posture” is harming UK defence innovation, particularly in relation to the nuclear deterrent. He said the system relies heavily on US technology, citing components including “fusing, firing, arming, neutron initiators, the gas transfer system and the Mark 4 aeroshell.” Doogan also criticised plans to buy additional F-35 aircraft for what he characterised as “US-manufactured gravity-delivered nuclear weapons.”
He questioned why the government appeared aligned with US priorities while, in his view, overlooking European initiatives. “President Trump will put America first, but it is difficult to understand why this Labour Government seem keen to do the same, while spurning the innovation opportunity of the £130 billion SAFE programme in the EU,” Doogan told the House……………https://ukdefencejournal.org.uk/snp-says-uk-nuclear-deterrent-is-america-first/
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Nuclear flashpoints to fallout
New Internationalist, 1 January 2026, Amy Hall
Could the threat of nuclear war be closer than ever? Amy Hall explores how we got here and the pathways out of the crisis.
If you want to get a nuclear-powered submarine refitted, repaired or refuelled in Britain, there is only one place to go – Devonport dockyard in Plymouth, the biggest naval base in Western Europe.
Running across more than six kilometres of waterfront, the dockyard has been part of the landscape for generations. It dominates the western edge of the South West England city, encased by high fenced walls, security cameras and warning signs about police dogs and potential arrest for ‘unauthorized activity’.
The main refit and maintenance area is owned and operated by British defence company Babcock International, which in 2024 made $1,273 million in revenue from nuclear weapons work. In 2025, it celebrated a 51 per cent surge in profit.
But Plymouth itself has not seen the same boost. ‘Most of the money generated goes out of the city,’ says local campaigner Tony Staunton, who is also the vice chair of the Campaign For Nuclear Disarmament (CND). Authorities say that Devonport generates around 10 per cent of Plymouth’s income, but neighbourhoods next to the dockyard remain among the poorest five per cent in the country.
Devonport doesn’t just work on operational nuclear submarines, it is also a ‘graveyard’ for retired ones. Twelve out of the 16 decommissioned submarines at Devonport are still carrying their fuel – effectively a stockpile of nuclear waste.
Over the last 30 years, at least 10 serious radioactive leaks have been documented at Devonport, and chemicals like plutonium, americium and tritium have been found on the Plymouth coastline, including at a wildlife reserve close to the dockyard. Staunton says he has met former dockworkers with cancer who are convinced that their illnesses date back to the time they worked at Devonport, but a ‘culture of secrecy’ about any negative impact of the docks pervades over this military city.
Local authorities have taken steps to prepare for a serious radiation leak at the dockyard, which is within a residential area. An investigation by Declassified UK found that in 2018 the Ministry of Defence distributed 60,900 iodine tablets to schools, emergency services and healthcare settings in local areas.
Nuclear-powered submarines are not only able to carry warheads; they are an essential part of the nuclear warfare infrastructure. And, as the British government jumps with both feet into the nuclear arms race, Devonport is key. The facility is set to receive £4.4 billion (just over $5 billion) in government investment over the next 10 years.
In 2024 the UK spent a larger percentage of its military budget (13 per cent) on nuclear weapons than any other country. The 2025 Strategic Defence Review described them as ‘the bedrock of the UK’s defence and the cornerstone of its commitment to NATO and global security’.
The race is on
As the world becomes more insecure, nuclear-armed states are reaffirming commitments to the most destructive weapons humans have developed. During the first six months of 2025, five nuclear-armed countries were engaged in military hostilities or outright war. And, after decades of decline, the trend of more retired nuclear warheads being dismantled than new ones being deployed looks set to be reversed.
Nearly all of the nine nuclear-armed states (US, Russia, Britain, France, China, Israel, India, Pakistan, North Korea) have been busy modernizing and growing their arsenal. Over the past five years global spending on nuclear weapons increased by just over 32 per cent, with the US and UK’s spending rising by 45 and 43 per cent respectively between 2019 and 2023. One year of global nuclear weapons spending could feed 45 million people in danger of famine for 13 years.
Meanwhile, nuclear-armed states are dialling up confrontational rhetoric. The threat posed by nuclear weapons was one of the factors leading the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists to reset their ‘Doomsday Clock’ to 89 seconds to midnight in 2025 – the closest it has been in its 78-year history. ‘Continuing on the current path is a form of madness,’ the scientists’ statement said. ‘The United States, China and Russia have the prime responsibility to pull the world back from the brink.’…………………………………………………….New START – the last remaining agreement limiting Russian and US deployed nuclear warheads – expires in 2026 unless renewed………………………………………………………………………………
Experts warn that states are becoming increasingly secretive about their nuclear weapons. Israel is perhaps one of the least transparent, maintaining a policy of nuclear ambiguity despite widely accepted evidence that it began developing nukes shortly after its founding in 1948. Israel has collaborated with several other countries’ nuclear programmes, including that of apartheid South Africa during the 1970s and 1980s, ‘conditioned by a perceived common threat in the rise of post-colonial nationalism that drew the two states together’.
You’ve got a nuclear-armed state that is carrying out a genocide, breaching international law – completely outside of any kind of international norms,’ says Bolt. ‘When you look at what Israel is capable of doing, why would it not use its nuclear weapons? If a country can get away with carrying out a genocide in full view, then what’s the next taboo?’
The myth of deterrent
They’re for our own protection. That’s how nuclear weapons are framed by the governments and arms companies that depend on them. They are said to deter attacks – the threat of annihilation is what will save us. And if a potential political leader refuses to say they will press the ‘nuclear button’ they are considered ‘weak’…………………………
Challenging this is essential. And there is plenty of evidence that the endgame will be catastrophic………………………………………………….
Building the movement
‘Countries that have nuclear weapons still continue to integrate them into their security doctrines,’ explains Sanders-Zakre. They ‘see them as essential tools of security, and that makes it very difficult to go from simply reducing numbers to zero.’……..
Overall, the world has far fewer nuclear weapons today than in the mid-1980s, largely due to the anti-nuclear movement that emerged following World War Two and resurged during the Cold War.
People power has won key treaties and agreements to limit the testing and development of nuclear weapons, from international ones like the 1963 Partial Test Ban Treaty to regional examples like the Treaty of Tlatelolco which established a nuclear-weapon-free Latin America and Caribbean.
While disarmament was not achieved, these mass movements certainly succeeded in slowing the race.
One of the most debated international agreements is the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), which came into force in 1970, focused on limiting the spread of nuclear weapons. Five countries – Britain, the US, Russia, China and France – already had nuclear weapons at the time. The NPT is criticised for its focus on non-proliferation over disarmament, entrenching the power of those five states. ‘Though presented as steps to disarmament, their over-riding purpose was to safeguard the interests of the major nuclear possessors,’ wrote activist and disarmament expert Rebecca Johnson in 2016.
Today, as the British government itself admits, ‘the future of strategic arms control … does not look promising’. But civil society has got behind the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW) which makes acquiring, proliferating, deploying, testing, transferring, using and threatening to use nukes illegal.
‘TPNW is really significant,’ explains Sanders-Zakre. A nuclear-armed state joining it must agree to a time-bound programme for eliminating its arsenal. https://newint.org/arms/2025/nuclear-flashpoints-fallout
Chris Hedges: Rebranding Genocide
The newest form of genocidal celebration in Israel — where social media and news channels routinely chortle over the suffering of Palestinians — is the sprouting of golden nooses on the lapels of members of the far-right political party Otzma Yehudit, Israel’s version of the Ku Klux Klan, including one worn by National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir.
December 16, 2025 By Chris Hedges , https://scheerpost.com/2025/12/16/chris-hedges-rebranding-genocide/
First, it was Israel’s right to defend itself. Then it was a war, even though, by Israel’s own military intelligence database, 83 percent of the casualties were civilians. The 2.3 million Palestinians in Gaza, living under an Israeli air, land and sea blockade, have no army, air force, no mechanized units, no tanks, no navy, no missiles, no heavy artillery, no fleets of killer drones, no sophisticated tracking systems to map all movements, or an ally like the United States, which has given Israel at least $21.7 billion in military aid since Oct. 7, 2023.
Now, it is a “ceasefire.” Except of course, as usual, Israel only abided by the first of the 20 stipulations. It freed around 2,000 Palestinian captives held in Israeli prisons — 1700 of whom were detained after Oct. 7 — as well as around 300 bodies of Palestinians, in exchange for the return of the 20 remaining Israeli captives.
Israel has violated every other condition. It has tossed the agreement — brokered by the Trump administration without Palestinian participation — into the bonfire with all the other agreements and peace accords concerning Palestinians. Israel’s extensive and blatant flouting of international agreements and international law — Israel and its allies refuse to abide by three sets of legally binding orders by the International Cout of Justice (ICJ) and two ICJ advisory opinions, as well as the Genocide Convention and international humanitarian law — presage a world where the law is whatever the most militarily advanced countries say it is.
The sham peace plan — “President Donald J. Trump’s Comprehensive Plan to End the Gaza Conflict” — in an act of stunning betrayal of the Palestinian people, was endorsed by most of the U.N. Security Council in November, with China and Russia abstaining. Member states washed their hands of Gaza and turned their backs on the genocide.
The adoption of resolution 2803 (2025), as the Middle East scholar Norman Finkelstein writes, “was simultaneously a revelation of moral insolvency and a declaration of war against Gaza. By proclaiming international law null and void, the Security Council proclaimed itself null and void. Vis-à-vis Gaza, the Council transmuted into a criminal conspiracy.”
The next phase is supposed to see Hamas surrender its weapons and Israel withdraw from Gaza. But these two steps will never happen. Hamas — along with other Palestinian factions — reject the Security Council resolution. They say they will disarm only when the occupation ends and a Palestinian state is created. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has vowed that if Hamas does not disarm, it will be done “the hard way.”
The “Board of Peace,” headed by Trump, will ostensibly govern Gaza along with armed mercenaries from the Israel-allied International Stabilization Force, although no country seems anxious to commit their troops. Trump promises a Gaza Riviera that will function as a “special economic zone” — a territory operating outside of state law governed entirely by private investors, such as the Peter Thiel-backed charter city in Honduras. This will be achieved through the “voluntary” relocation of Palestinians — with those fortunate enough to own land offered digital tokens in exchange. Trump declares that the U.S. “will take over the Gaza Strip” and “own it.” It is a return to the rule of viceroys — though apparently not the odious Tony Blair. Palestinians, in one of the most laughable points in the plan, will be “deradicalized” by their new colonial masters.
But these fantasies will never come to fruition. Israel knows what it wants to do in Gaza and it knows no nation will intercede. Palestinians will struggle to survive in primitive and dehumanizing conditions. They will, as they have so many times in the past, be betrayed.
Israel has committed 738 violations of the ceasefire agreement between Oct. 10 and Dec. 12, including 358 land and air bombardments, the killing of at least 383 Palestinians and the injuring of 1,002 others, according to the Government Media Office in Gaza and the Palestinian Health Ministry. That’s an average of six Palestinians killed daily in Gaza — down from an average of 250 a day before the “ceasefire.” Israel said it killed a senior Hamas commander, Raed Saad, on Saturday, in a missile strike on a car on Gaza’s coastal road. Three others were also apparently killed in the strike.
The genocide is not over. Yes, the pace has slowed. But the intent remains unchanged. It is slow motion killing. The daily numbers of dead and wounded — with increasing numbers falling sick and dying from the cold and rain — are not in the hundreds but the dozens.
December saw an average of 140 aid trucks allowed into Gaza each day — instead of the promised 600 — to keep Palestinians on the edge of famine and ensure widespread malnutrition. In October, some 9,300 children in Gaza under five were diagnosed with severe acute malnutrition, according to UNICEF. Israel has opened the border crossing into Egypt at Rafah, but only for Palestinians leaving Gaza. It is not open for those who want to return to Gaza, as stipulated in the agreement. Israel has seized some 58 percent of Gaza and is steadily moving its demarcation line — known as “the yellow line” — to expand its occupation. Palestinians who cross this arbitrary line — which constantly shifts and is poorly marked when it is marked at all — are shot dead or blown up — even if they are children.
Palestinians are being crammed into a shrinking, fetid, overcrowded concentration camp until they can be deported. Ninety-two percent of Gaza’s residential buildings have been damaged or destroyed and around 81 percent of all structures are damaged, according to UN estimates. The Strip, only 25 miles long and seven-and-a-half miles wide, has been reduced to 61 million tons of rubble, including nine million tons of hazardous waste that includes asbestos, industrial waste, and heavy metals, in addition to unexploded ordnance and an estimated 10,000 decaying corpses. There is almost no clean water, electricity or sewage treatment. Israel blocks shipments of construction supplies, including cement and steel, shelter materials, water infrastructure and fuel, so nothing can be rebuilt.
Eighty-two percent of Israeli Jews support the ethnic cleansing of the entire population of Gaza and 47 percent support killing all civilians in cities captured by the Israeli military. Fifty-nine percent support doing the same to Palestinian citizens of Israel. Seventy-nine percent of Israeli Jews say they are “not so troubled” or “not troubled at all” by reports of famine and suffering among the population in Gaza, according to a survey conducted in July. The words “Erase Gaza” appeared more than 18,000 times in Hebrew-language Facebook posts in 2024 alone, according to a new report on hate speech and incitement against Palestinians.
The newest form of genocidal celebration in Israel — where social media and news channels routinely chortle over the suffering of Palestinians — is the sprouting of golden nooses on the lapels of members of the far-right political party Otzma Yehudit, Israel’s version of the Ku Klux Klan, including one worn by National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir.
They are pushing a bill through the Knesset which seeks to mandate the death penalty for Palestinians who “intentionally or indifferently causes the death of an Israeli citizen,” if they are said to be motivated by “racism or hostility toward a public,” and with the purpose of harming the Israeli state or “the rebirth of the Jewish people in its land,” the Israeli human rights group Adalah explains. More than 100 Palestinians have been killed in Israeli jails since Oct. 7. If the new bill becomes law — it has been cleared through its first reading — it will join the wave of more than 30 anti-Palestinian laws enacted since October 7.
The message the genocide sends to the rest of the world, more than a billion of whom live on less than a dollar a day, is unequivocable: We have everything and if you try and take it away from us, we will kill you.
This is the new world order. It will look like Gaza. Concentration camps. Starvation. Obliteration of infrastructure and civil society. Mass killing. Wholesale surveillance. Executions. Torture, including the beatings, electrocutions, waterboarding, rape, public humiliation, deprivation of food and denial of medical care routinely used on Palestinians in Israeli prisons. Epidemics. Disease. Mass graves where corpses are bulldozed into unmarked pits and where bodies, as in Gaza, are dug up and torn apart by packs of ravenous wild dogs.
We are not destined for the Shangri-La sold to a gullible public by fatuous academics such as Stephen Pinker. We are destined for extinction. Not only individual extinction — which our consumer society furiously attempts to hide by peddling the fantasy of eternal youth — but wholesale extinction as temperatures rise to make the globe uninhabitable. If you think the human species will respond rationally to the ecocide, you are woefully out of touch with human nature. You need to study Gaza. And history.
If you live in the Global North, you will get to peer out at the horror, but slowly this horror, as the climate breaks down, will migrate home, turning most of us into Palestinians. Given our complicity in the genocide, it is what we deserve.
Empires, when they feel threatened, always embrace the instrument of genocide. Ask the victims of the Spanish conquistadors. Ask Native Americans. Ask the Herero and Nama. Ask the Armenians. Ask the survivors of Hiroshima or Nagasaki. Ask the Indians who survived the Bengal famine or the Kikuyu who rose against their British colonizers in Kenya. Climate refugees will get their turn.
This is not the end of the nightmare. It is the beginning.
Trump Declares Fentanyl a Weapon of Mass Destruction as His ‘Lawless Killing Spree’ Escalates
One expert said the Trump White House is “replaying the Bush administration’s greatest hits as farce.”
Jake Johnson, Dec 16, 2025, https://www.commondreams.org/news/trump-weapon-of-mass-destruction
US President Donald Trump on Monday signed an executive order designating fentanyl a “weapon of mass destruction,” a move that came hours before his administration carried out another flurry of deadly strikes on vessels in the eastern Pacific accused—without evidence—of drug trafficking.
Trump’s order instructs the Pentagon and other US agencies to “take appropriate action” to “eliminate the threat of illicit fentanyl and its core precursor chemicals to the United States.” The order also warns of “the potential for fentanyl to be weaponized for concentrated, large-scale terror attacks by organized adversaries.”
Brian Finucane, a senior adviser with the US Program at the International Crisis Group, said in response to the executive action that Trump is “replaying the Bush administration’s greatest hits as farce,” referencing the lead-up to the Iraq War. Trump has repeatedly threatened military attacks on Venezuela, Colombia, and Mexico, citing fentanyl trafficking as the pretext.
Ahead of the official signing of the fentanyl order, an anonymous State Department official suggested to the independent outlet The Handbasket that the directive’s “purpose is a combination of designating fentanyl cartels as terrorist organizations and creating justification for conducting military operations in Mexico and Canada.”
The official also suspected “that it will be used domestically as justification for rounding up homeless encampments and deporting drug users who are not citizens,” reported The Handbasket’s Marisa Kabas.
Hours after Trump formally announced the order, the US Southern Command said it carried out strikes on three boats in the eastern Pacific, killing at least eight people.
“The lawless killing spree continues,” Finucane wrote late Monday. “The administration justifies this slaughter by claiming there’s an armed conflict. But it won’t even tell the US public who the supposed enemies are. Of course, there’s no armed conflict. And outside armed conflict, we call premeditated killing murder.”
Kenneth Roth, former executive director of Human Rights Watch, argued that “Trump’s classification of fentanyl as a ‘weapon of mass destruction’ will do nothing to salvage the blatant illegality of his summary executions off the coasts of Venezuela and Colombia because fentanyl largely enters the United States from Mexico.”
US President Donald Trump on Monday signed an executive order designating fentanyl a “weapon of mass destruction,” a move that came hours before his administration carried out another flurry of deadly strikes on vessels in the eastern Pacific accused—without evidence—of drug trafficking.
Trump’s order instructs the Pentagon and other US agencies to “take appropriate action” to “eliminate the threat of illicit fentanyl and its core precursor chemicals to the United States.” The order also warns of “the potential for fentanyl to be weaponized for concentrated, large-scale terror attacks by organized adversaries.”
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Brian Finucane, a senior adviser with the US Program at the International Crisis Group, said in response to the executive action that Trump is “replaying the Bush administration’s greatest hits as farce,” referencing the lead-up to the Iraq War. Trump has repeatedly threatened military attacks on Venezuela, Colombia, and Mexico, citing fentanyl trafficking as the pretext.
Ahead of the official signing of the fentanyl order, an anonymous State Department official suggested to the independent outlet The Handbasket that the directive’s “purpose is a combination of designating fentanyl cartels as terrorist organizations and creating justification for conducting military operations in Mexico and Canada.”
The official also suspected “that it will be used domestically as justification for rounding up homeless encampments and deporting drug users who are not citizens,” reported The Handbasket’s Marisa Kabas.
Hours after Trump formally announced the order, the US Southern Command said it carried out strikes on three boats in the eastern Pacific, killing at least eight people.
“The lawless killing spree continues,” Finucane wrote late Monday. “The administration justifies this slaughter by claiming there’s an armed conflict. But it won’t even tell the US public who the supposed enemies are. Of course, there’s no armed conflict. And outside armed conflict, we call premeditated killing murder.”
Kenneth Roth, former executive director of Human Rights Watch, argued that “Trump’s classification of fentanyl as a ‘weapon of mass destruction’ will do nothing to salvage the blatant illegality of his summary executions off the coasts of Venezuela and Colombia because fentanyl largely enters the United States from Mexico.”
Monday’s boat bombings brought the death toll from the Trump administration’s illegal strikes in the Caribbean and eastern Pacific, which began in early September, to at least 95.
Writing for Salon last week, Drug Policy Alliance executive director Kassandra Frederique and former counternarcotics official James Saenz observed that “the US is bombing boats that have nothing to do with fentanyl or the overdose crisis devastating American communities.”
“These recent military actions have negligible impact on the transshipment of illicit drugs and absolutely no impact on the production or movement of synthetic opioids. And fentanyl, the synthetic opioid responsible for most US overdoses, is not produced in Venezuela,” they wrote. “These developments raise serious questions about the direction of US drug policy. We must ask ourselves: If these extrajudicial strikes are not stopping fentanyl, then what are the motives?”
“History should be a warning to us. In the Philippines under Rodrigo Duterte, the drug war became a tool of fear,” Frederique and Saenz added. “Thousands were killed without trial, democratic institutions were hollowed out, and civil liberties stripped away—all while drugs continued to flow into the country.”
Drones targeting European and UK nuclear weapons infrastructure
Online Analysis , Dr Daniel Salisbury, 12th December 2025
Amid concerns of Russian hybrid activity across Europe, reports of a series of mysterious drone flights over NATO’s nuclear bases are raising questions about espionage, potential sabotage operations and the vulnerability of strategic infrastructure.
In early December 2025, French officials reported the detection of several drones over the Île Longue nuclear-submarine base in Brittany, western France. The base hosts France’s nuclear-powered ballistic-missile submarine (SSBN) fleet, which carries the bulk of the country’s nuclear warheads on submarine-launched ballistic missiles (SLBMs).
The drones were allegedly intercepted using a jamming system. French sources have been cautious in assigning culpability. Commander Guillaume Le Rasle, spokesperson for the maritime prefecture, also claimed that ‘sensitive infrastructure was not threatened’ by the suspicious flights.
High value nuclear targets
The submarine base at Île Longue is heavily protected because it handles nuclear warheads, missiles, and submarine nuclear-reactor fuel. France’s SSBN fleet carries around 240 of the country’s estimated 290 nuclear warheads, constituting most of its strategic deterrent. Recently, French forces have been at the centre of a debate over European nuclear deterrence amid concerns over Russian aggression and a withdrawal of support from the United States.
Events at Île Longue are the latest in a series of similarly mysterious flights over NATO nuclear bases as well as a range of other military and civilian targets.
Drones were observed over Kleine-Brogel Air Base in Belgium on three consecutive nights in early November 2025, prompting a helicopter deployment in response. Guards shot at ten suspicious drones seen over Volkel Air Base in the Netherlands in late November, although no wreckage was recovered. In December, two Dutch F-35s from Volkel scrambled to intercept an unidentified aircraft, reportedly a drone. Kleine-Brogel and Volkel are two of six bases located in five European countries (Belgium, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands and Turkiye) that together host 100 US non-strategic nuclear B61-12 gravity bombs.
In the United Kingdom, there were reports of similar drone flights around RAF Lakenheath in November 2024. The base has not hosted US nuclear weapons since their quiet withdrawal from the country in 2008. However, mounting open-source evidence since 2022 suggests US nuclear weapons will return to Lakenheath. In the summer of 2025, the British government announced it would base 12 nuclear-capable F-35As (procured by Whitehall for NATO’s dual-capable nuclear mission) at nearby RAF Marham.
12th December 2025
Drones targeting European nuclear weapons infrastructure
Amid concerns of Russian hybrid activity across Europe, reports of a series of mysterious drone flights over NATO’s nuclear bases are raising questions about espionage, potential sabotage operations and the vulnerability of strategic infrastructure.
In early December 2025, French officials reported the detection of several drones over the Île Longue nuclear-submarine base in Brittany, western France. The base hosts France’s nuclear-powered ballistic-missile submarine (SSBN) fleet, which carries the bulk of the country’s nuclear warheads on submarine-launched ballistic missiles (SLBMs).
The drones were allegedly intercepted using a jamming system. French sources have been cautious in assigning culpability. Commander Guillaume Le Rasle, spokesperson for the maritime prefecture, also claimed that ‘sensitive infrastructure was not threatened’ by the suspicious flights.
High value nuclear targets
The submarine base at Île Longue is heavily protected because it handles nuclear warheads, missiles, and submarine nuclear-reactor fuel. France’s SSBN fleet carries around 240 of the country’s estimated 290 nuclear warheads, constituting most of its strategic deterrent. Recently, French forces have been at the centre of a debate over European nuclear deterrence amid concerns over Russian aggression and a withdrawal of support from the United States.
Events at Île Longue are the latest in a series of similarly mysterious flights over NATO nuclear bases as well as a range of other military and civilian targets.
Drones were observed over Kleine-Brogel Air Base in Belgium on three consecutive nights in early November 2025, prompting a helicopter deployment in response. Guards shot at ten suspicious drones seen over Volkel Air Base in the Netherlands in late November, although no wreckage was recovered. In December, two Dutch F-35s from Volkel scrambled to intercept an unidentified aircraft, reportedly a drone. Kleine-Brogel and Volkel are two of six bases located in five European countries (Belgium, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands and Turkiye) that together host 100 US non-strategic nuclear B61-12 gravity bombs.
In the United Kingdom, there were reports of similar drone flights around RAF Lakenheath in November 2024. The base has not hosted US nuclear weapons since their quiet withdrawal from the country in 2008. However, mounting open-source evidence since 2022 suggests US nuclear weapons will return to Lakenheath. In the summer of 2025, the British government announced it would base 12 nuclear-capable F-35As (procured by Whitehall for NATO’s dual-capable nuclear mission) at nearby RAF Marham.
Likely culprits?
The characteristics of the drones and their flight patterns provide clues about their origins. At Kleine-Brogel, the flights unfolded in specific phases: the first, according to Belgian Defence Minister Theo Francken, used ‘small drones to test the radio frequencies’. Later phases allegedly involved drones ‘of a larger type and flying at higher altitude’, and deploying a jammer to counter them was unsuccessful. Francken suggested the activity was espionage, but stopped short of speculating who was responsible. He claimed that the drones had ‘come to spy, to see where the F-16s are, where the ammunition are, and other highly strategic information’.
The flights at Île Longue, Kleine-Brogel and Volkel all started at around 6–7pm and continued late into the night.
Flights around RAF Lakenheath also involved systems described as ‘large “non-hobby”’ sized drones.
There are possible explanations for these incidents that are less concerning. Hobbyist and drone photography activity has increased due to the widespread availability of drones. Environmental pressure groups have also used drones to target nuclear facilities, and have trespassed on nuclear bases in the past.
In 2024, a drone panic around New Jersey saw 5,000 tip-offs reported to the FBI, who attributed them to a ‘combination of lawful commercial drones, hobbyist drones, and law enforcement drones, as well as manned fixed-wing aircraft, helicopters, and stars mistakenly reported as drones’.
However, the patterns of the drone incursions around nuclear bases – the use of more capable non-hobby drones, the similarities between incidents, and the spate of them in quick succession at a time of high tension in Europe – suggest a hostile state actor is behind them.
In recent months, Russia has undertaken a campaign of probing NATO airspace, flying drones and aircraft in Estonian, Polish and Romanian airspace, testing Alliance resolve, and leading Poland and Estonia to invoke Article 4 of the Washington Treaty that requests NATO consultations. These activities form part of Moscow’s broader effort to intimidate NATO allies, highlight vulnerability, and sow fear and unease amongst populations………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………
A spider’s web of escalation?
The drone flights raise concerns about the vulnerability of NATO’s European nuclear assets. During the war in Ukraine, Kyiv has used drones to target Russian nuclear-capable assets. Earlier this year, Operation Spiderweb saw over 100 short-range, explosive-laden uninhabited aerial vehicles (UAVs) (launched remotely from the back of a cargo truck parked fewer than ten kilometres from Russian air bases) wreak havoc on the Russian Aerospace Forces – including its nuclear-capable aircraft.
The operation destroyed seven of Russia’s 58 Tu-95MS/MS mod Bear bombers and four of the country’s 54 Tu-22M3 Backfire C bombers, as well as damaging at least another two Backfire aircraft. Although it was a costly lesson, it likely opened Moscow’s eyes to the opportunities afforded by these capabilities.
The asymmetric nature of the operation highlights how states with even minimal capability can use emerging technologies to hold nuclear assets at risk. In a conflict scenario, this could create escalation risks – particularly in Europe, where nuclear capabilities are smaller and often co-located with conventional military assets. https://www.iiss.org/online-analysis/online-analysis/2025/12/drones-targeting-european-nuclear-weapons-infrastructure/
Decades of Global Drone War Made Trump’s Caribbean Killing Spree Possible
“Suspicion of smuggling is not an imminent threat. Even if known traffickers were on board, it would not give the military the authority to launch missiles at a civilian vessel”
The Caribbean is not a war zone.
The so-called war on terror laid the foundations for Trump to turn international waters into one-sided battlefields.
By Emran Feroz , Truthout December 13, 2025
In September 2, 2025, a small fishing boat carrying 11 people was targeted by a U.S. Reaper drone off the coast of Venezuela. Hellfire missiles were fired. Two survivors clung to the wreckage. Their identities and motives were unknown. Their behavior showed no hostility. Moments later, the drone operator launched a second strike — the so-called “double tap” — killing the final survivors. This scene is shocking, but it should not be surprising to anyone who has followed the trajectory of the U.S.’s drone wars. This tactic is familiar from Afghanistan, Pakistan, Yemen, and, most recently, Gaza, where the Israeli military has used much worse violence to conduct genocide.
The U.S.’s first drone strike in the Caribbean, and the footage of the incident, reignited a debate about a conflict that Washington refuses to call a war — because it isn’t one. Instead, the Trump administration is using sheer violence to terrorize non-white populations and, as usual, has normalized lethal force far from declared battlefields and without any legal mandate.
U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has approved at least 21 additional strikes in the Caribbean and eastern Pacific since September, killing at least 87 people. He has aggressively defended the very first operation, insisting he would have authorized the second strike as well — despite claiming he did not see it. Hegseth even misinterpreted the visible smoke on the video as the “fog of war,” seemingly unaware that the term refers to uncertainty in conflict, not the physical aftermath of a missile strike.
The details matter because they reveal something essential: the senior leadership overseeing these operations does not appear interested in the law, accuracy, or the basic meaning of proportionality. Instead, it has embraced escalation and mass murder as official policy.
Illegal Violence Dressed Up as Counter-Narcotics
Almost all legal experts agree that the U.S. strikes in the Caribbean violate international law. The Trump administration claims that suspected smugglers are “narco-terrorists” and therefore legitimate targets. But as Khalil Dewan, a legal scholar at London’s School of Oriental and African Studies who has studied U.S. and British drone programs for years, told me: “Drug trafficking is a crime, not an armed conflict.”
International law permits lethal force outside war zones only to prevent imminent threats to life. There is no indication that any of the boats the U.S. targeted — including the one in the September 2 video — posed such a threat. Dewan is clear: these are extrajudicial killings taking place on the high seas.
Former Air Force drone technician Lisa Ling, who left the program under the Obama administration due to the civilian casualties she witnessed, shares the same assessment. “Suspicion of smuggling is not an imminent threat. Even if known traffickers were on board, it would not give the military the authority to launch missiles at a civilian vessel,” she told me. Ling emphasizes a point that U.S. officials seem intent on ignoring: The Caribbean is not a war zone.
Ling also raises a question the military prefers not to confront: Who bears responsibility? “We were taught to disobey unlawful orders,” she said. “I’m still waiting to see that principle applied to those who carried out strikes on civilian boats in international waters.”
A Pattern With a Long History
The U.S. drone program did not begin with Trump. Its first lethal strike took place on October 7, 2001, in Kandahar province, targeting Taliban founder Mullah Mohammad Omar. It missed and killed civilians instead. That pattern — high-value targets declared dead, only to reappear alive — became common………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….
Trump Escalation and Total Blowback
Trump has not only expanded the use of drone strikes but also removed the few modest oversight mechanisms Obama left behind. Now, under his second administration, the U.S. is openly striking vessels in international waters with almost no pretext.
…………………………….For years, critics of the war on terror have warned that a globalized drone program, paired with militarized domestic security agencies, would eventually produce consequences within the Americas too. That moment is here.
At least one family in Colombia has announced legal action after a fisherman, Alejandro Carranza, disappeared at sea. At the same time, Washington claimed to have killed “three violent drug-smuggling cartel members and narco-terrorists.” Carranza leaves behind a wife and five children.
What happens in the Caribbean today is not an anomaly. It is the outcome of two decades of policy decisions made by presidents of both parties. The world was declared a battlefield long before Trump returned to office. What we are seeing now is the cost of refusing to confront that reality. https://truthout.org/articles/decades-of-global-drone-war-made-trumps-caribbean-killing-spree-possible/?utm_source=Truthout&utm_campaign=f725ba5970-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2025_12_13_05_12&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_bbb541a1db-f725ba5970-650192793
The worrying new detail in UK plans for nuclear-capable jets
Bill Kidd MSP: Thanks to the publication of a new Nuclear Education Trust report, Stepping Back From The Brink: The Myths Of Tactical Nuclear Weapons And Limited Nuclear War, we have additional detail on how the Ministry of Defence is to spend billions reintroducing tactical nuclear weapons into
the RAF.
We also know that these are weapons the RAF will not own or control. Re-nuclearising the RAF requires much more than the purchase of an additional squadron of F-35A jets at around £1 billion. Creating the logistical and command and control infrastructure will be 10 times the cost of just the aircraft. What additional cuts to our already stretched public
services will that presage?
Going back on his word is, of course, how Starmer was elected. He conned the public with his slogan of change, when he really meant more of the same.
The National 13th Dec 2025, https://www.thenational.scot/politics/25695116.worrying-new-detail-uk-plans-nuclear-capable-jets/
How nuclear submarines could pave the way for nuclear weapons in South Korea
Bulletin, By Sharon Squassoni | December 12, 2025
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The mystique of nuclear-powered submarines has been captured by at least half a dozen popular Hollywood films. Some have centered on the drama of undersea warfare and the risk of global nuclear apocalypse should the nuclear-tipped missiles aboard most of them be launched. Others confront the issues of rogue submarine commanders or the dilemmas of decision-making when out of communication with national leadership. One or two, including Kathryn Bigelow’s K-19 Widowmaker, portray real-world disasters of a reactor meltdown aboard submarines. (Bigelow is also the director of the new film, A House of Dynamite, which depicts the last 20 minutes before a nuclear-armed missile of unknown origin falls on an American city.)
The underlying message of these fictional works is that nuclear submarines—powered by reactors and armed with atomic missiles—are a tightrope act. One misstep could endanger many, many lives.
The United States’ recent nuclear submarine deal with South Korea is a tightrope act for a different reason. Lost in the noise about nuclear submarines, the Trump administration has agreed to let South Korea enrich uranium and reprocess commercial nuclear spent fuel. This step—which could give South Korea a virtual or latent nuclear weapons capability—is needlessly destabilizing.
US nuclear technology exports. In the last five years, the United States has made deals with Australia and South Korea to hasten the day when some countries will deploy nuclear-powered submarines that don’t carry nuclear missiles. Under the 2021 AUKUS deal (a partnership between Australia, the United Kingdom, and the United States), Australia will build nuclear-powered submarines using UK reactors and US highly enriched uranium fuel at the latest estimated cost of $368 billion. And in October, South Korea scored a political coup in convincing US President Donald Trump to allow its pursuit of nuclear-powered submarines.
South Korea has sought nuclear-powered submarines for more than 30 years. Sparked by the first international crisis over North Korea’s nuclear weapons program, Seoul has dabbled in the relevant technologies in an on-again, off-again fashion. Past forays included a 1994 directive to the Korean Atomic Energy Research Institute to design a nuclear-powered submarine (cancelled in 1998) and the so-called “362” covert task force formed in 2003 that reportedly utilized Russian help to design a submarine reactor. This task force was disbanded in 2004 after South Korean officials revealed that scientists had enriched uranium without declaring it to the International Atomic Energy Agency.
More recently, Moon Jae-in campaigned on South Korea acquiring nuclear-powered submarines in 2017, and Korean officials since 2020 have suggested that their next generation of submarines would be nuclear-powered. Speculation persists over whether South Korean efforts to develop small modular reactors fueled with 19.5 percent high-assay low-enriched uranium could be adapted or modified for naval applications.
Many details about South Korea’s nuclear submarines are still unknown— when, where, and how they will be built. Those details will matter a great deal in terms of the proliferation implications. Allowing South Korea to indigenously produce its own nuclear submarines could be riskier than if South Korea were to purchase US subs or the reactors that go into these subs.
Nuclear-powered vs. nuclear-armed. Nuclear-powered submarines make total sense to nuclear weapon states, which weigh the risks and costs of these vehicles against the benefits of stealth, range, and having a platform for assured, nuclear retaliation. (In theory, such submarines can enhance stability because they provide assured destruction in case an opponent seeks advantage by striking first—the so-called delicate balance of terror.) Already engaged in high-cost and high-risk nuclear projects, nuclear-powered submarines are not a huge step up for countries with nuclear weapons.
For countries without nuclear weapons, however, the costs far outweigh the benefits.
Per unit, a single modern diesel-electric attack submarine with air-independent propulsion costs between $500 million and $900 million. A modern nuclear-powered attack submarine will cost between $3 billion and $4 billion each, based on the current cost of Virginia-class nuclear attack submarines in the United States, a country with experience in building such ships. This is on top of the considerable investment in shipbuilding that countries like South Korea and Australia would have to make. For instance, South Korea has vowed to invest $350 billion in the United States, of which half will be spent on US shipbuilding…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………… https://thebulletin.org/2025/12/how-nuclear-submarines-could-pave-the-way-for-nuclear-weapons-in-south-korea/
THE EUROPEANS: BLIND TO REALITY, DEAF TO ALL WARNINGS & HEADED FOR DISASTER
Will Merz, Macron and Starmer finally open their eyes on Ukraine before their war juggernaut hits the wall of hard reality? Can the future EVER forgive them for their endlessly fatal delaying tactics?
Aearnur, Dec 13, 2025, https://aearnur.substack.com/p/the-europeans-blind-to-reality-deaf?utm_source=post-email-title&publication_id=312403&post_id=181444169&utm_campaign=email-post-title&isFreemail=true&r=ln98x&triedRedirect=true&utm_medium=email
When one side cannot reconcile themselves to a relationship being over and refuses to accept this reality an entirely different scenario presents itself to one where both sides agree to part. Someone determined to pursue the relationship at all costs will blindly employ ever more radical measures, measures that worsen an already bad situation, toward potentially dangerous, even fatal levels.
The current crop of European leaders, primarily those of Germany, France and the UK cannot reconcile themselves to the fact of the Ukrainian regime losing the conflict with Russia. They cannot bear this reality and, until the last 24 hours have appeared ready to take ever more ultimately self-harming measures in an utterly futile quest to create an unattainable reality from pure fantasy.
Without the sanctions upon Russia working, without Russia’s trading partners turning their backs upon it, without the West’s so-called gamechanger weapons being effective and without NATO becoming directly involved, the Ukrainian regime in Kiev and its western sponsors were ALWAYS going to lose this conflict. Everything the West tried has failed. Everything the West could now try (which is extremely little) would also fail. Since the USA finally grasped the reality on the ground of the conflict in Ukraine the big question was then always going to be just how long the suicidally deluded Europeans would continue to futilely escalate matters. How long would the Europeans delay while Ukraine lost more men and more land before they finally bowed to reality and convinced the Kiev regime to settle?
Over the next few days we may finally see the Europeans finally accepting the inevitable. Their delay in doing this by not lending their pressure along with that of the U.S. on Zelensky has already cost tens of thousands, arguably hundreds of thousands of Ukrainian lives. By late-2023 it had become clear that Russia would prevail. Nothing on anything remotely approaching a fundamental level was working against an unassailable Russian ability to fight, destroy resistance or attacks from the enemy and to advance. The political, media, financial and military might of the West had completely failed. This was obvious to anyone who knew anything about the comparison of Russian material resources, manpower availability and industrial capacity to that of Ukraine and indeed by comparison with those of the entire collective west.
The inability of western politicians to confront the realities described above has brought them into massive disrepute across the global majority while at the same time vastly enhancing the status of the Russian nation and its endlessly insightful president.
The incompetence, general self-willed blindness and recklessness of western political elites over the question of Ukraine will go down in history as the conclusive ending of a multi-generational blight upon the world. Being unable to extricate themselves from unearned, self-awarded levels of entitlement led them to sacrifice at least a million Ukrainians on the alter of their overweening arrogance.
And for this they will never be forgiven.
Submarines in for repairs at Rosyth could contain nuclear weapons
Dunfermline Press, 11th December, By Clare Buchanan, Local Democracy Reporter – Clackmannanshire and Fife
The Ministry of Defence says it will not reveal if nuclear weapons will be aboard submarines being repaired at Rosyth in future, and confirmed residents would be given potassium iodate tablets to block radiation in the event of an emergency.
The revelations came as members of Fife Council’s South and West Fife area committee were given an update on plans for Rosyth to be the temporary repair base for the UK’s new fleet of nuclear deterrent submarines.
While it was explained that “non-nuclear” repairs would be carried out from the dockyard when required, some vessels at the Fife yard could be carrying nuclear weapons – but an MoD spokesperson told councillors that they would not reveal whether or not they were.
Rosyth has been earmarked as a temporary contingent for the UK Government’s Dreadnought class of submarines – the first of which is expected to launch towards the end of the decade.
The proposals also include setting up an emergency planning zone, which could stretch more than a kilometre and includes a residential area…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….When probed, Mr Brown also told councillors that policy would mean there would be no confirmation of if nuclear weapons were on board.
“My position is we do not comment on the condition of the boat whether it is armed or not,” he added…………………………………
Rosyth councillor Andrew Verrachia welcomed the plans…………………….“I don’t want to think about the public being frightened. If any more communication can be put out to the wider public because the last thing anyone wants is frightened, worried members of the public. This should be a good news story.”
Committee convener David Barratt was less pleased with the plans.
“Morally, and as a CND member, I find the existence of nuclear weapons abhorrent,” he said………… https://www.dunfermlinepress.com/news/25689904.submarines-repairs-rosyth-contain-nuclear-weapons/
AUKUS Caucus
The AUKUS agreement allows any party to withdraw with one year’s notice. But here’s the lethal asymmetry: Australia’s payments are subsidies, not deposits; they are not refundable, and there is no guarantee that the submarines will ever be delivered.
How the AUKUS Caucus built a cargo cult and called it strategy.
14 December 2025 David Tyler Australian Independent Media
There’s a certain kind of Australian politician who never quite grew out of childhood. You know the type: Richard Marles, Tony Abbott, Christopher Pyne. Peter Pan to a man. Their eyes light up whenever a Pentagon staffer remembers their name. They sit bolt upright like kelpie pups on the back of the ute, ears pricked for master’s return. They mistake condescension for intimacy, patronage for partnership, obedience for relevance.
Marles, Pat Conroy (Defence Industry), and Brendan O’Connor (Veterans’ Affairs) along with “Rear Admiral-Albo” and Wayfinder Penny Wong make up the AUKUS Caucus: a dream team. Not bound by evidence, timelines, or arithmetic; only by faith. Faith that if Australia sends enough money, bases and deference across the Pacific, the Great Mate in the Sky will someday descend bearing nuclear submarines and strategic salvation.
Australia’s $368 billion imaginary friend.
The Cargo Cult Playbook
Cargo cults arise when isolated societies witness advanced powers arrive with miraculous technology. Locals build imitation runways; light signal fires hoping the planes will return. The AUKUS Caucus has updated the ritual for the modern age. Our runways are ports. The offerings are our sovereignty. The signal fires are AUSMIN pressers. And the planes, as ever, do not land.
Richard Marles, Labor’s embattled Defence Minister, is the cult’s high priest. Asked about implementation delays, he smiles wanly and intones the sacred words: “Full steam ahead.” Full steam ahead to where is never explained.
AUKUS is sold as strategic realism. In practice, it operates as faith: belief substituted for capacity, ritual for delivery, loyalty for leverage.
The Hegseth Problem
This week Marles and Wong flew to Washington for the annual, ceremonial abasement known as AUSMIN. Their opposite number is Pete Hegseth. Former Fox News shouter, veterans’ charity mismanager, and a chap once carried from a strip club by mates after trying to storm the stage. Now improbably directing US defence as Secretary of War.
Hegseth’s character matters because AUKUS asks us to entrust our strategic future to decision-makers whose judgment, attention span and institutional grip are already demonstrably strained. His own mother calls him as an “abuser of women” who “belittles, lies and cheats,” urging him to “get some help and take an honest look at yourself.”
When a nation stakes $368 billion on the judgment of a man disqualified by his own mother from trust, it has crossed from strategy into pathology.
8 December, Marles and Wong are pictured nodding earnestly as Hegseth endorses a $368 billion submarine fantasy he cannot possibly deliver. He barks approval of AUKUS as “pragmatic hard power.” Wong, cryptic as ever, merely echoes Trump’s mantra: “full steam ahead.” The boats are not coming, so who cares what fuels the boiler?
The Pragmatic Hard Power Con
Pragmatic hard power? It could be a new brand of laundry detergent. The absurdity runs deeper than performance.
Australia is trading real sovereignty for imaginary submarines.
AUKUS legislation effectively transfers operational priority and access over key Australian military bases to the US. The terminology is pure institutional dissemblance: “expanded US rotational presence” and “integrated command arrangements.” In plain English: we concede control over our own strategic assets. We slip a few lazy billion to US and British shipyards to “expedite” production; meaning we subsidise their accumulated backlogs. We bind our “defence posture” so thoroughly into US command that when Washington sneezes, Canberra catches cold.
But we do get to wave flags. Hum anthems. Pay invoices.
Each concession merits national debate. Yet, the AUKUS Caucus has sealed the deal without meaningful parliamentary inquiry, without detailed public costings, only an “oversight” committee denied subpoena power, denied independent costing, and so carefully neutered it might as well be chaired by a shredder.
The Legal Trap
And yes, the legal architecture is exactly what critics feared. Under the agreement, Australia provides $4.7 billion (with more coming) to US and UK submarine builders, and according to questioning in Senate Estimates, there is no clawback provision; Australia does not get its money back if the US fails to transfer nuclear submarines.
The AUKUS agreement allows any party to withdraw with one year’s notice. But here’s the lethal asymmetry: Australia’s payments are subsidies, not deposits; they are not refundable, and there is no guarantee that the submarines will ever be delivered.
The US and UK can walk away at any time. They keep the cash, the upgrades, the expanded industrial bases and the sovereign right to prioritise their own needs. Which, as serious countries, they will do.
Australia, meanwhile, is padlocked like a rental fridge in a share-house. Jiggle the handle all you like, but the thing won’t open unless the bloke with the key decides you’ve paid up.
A Big Perhaps
At some point, the more unsettling explanation has to be entertained. Perhaps the submarines are not delayed. Perhaps they are not even expected. Perhaps AUKUS is not failing at all, but performing exactly as intended. The money flows early and without clawback. The bases open. Command structures integrate. Strategic dependency is formalised. The submarines remain permanently over the horizon, always promised, never required. If this were a ruse designed to secure American basing access and regional posture while outsourcing the political pain to future governments, it would be hard to design it differently. Whether Australia’s political class believes its own story, or merely finds it convenient, becomes almost beside the point. The outcome is the same.
And whatever the truth of the submarines, Defence needs a bit of a rescue.
Defence’s House of Horrors
Marles’ predicament worsens when you look at Defence itself: a moral, administrative and institutional nightmare he inherited and, like his predecessors, Linda Reynolds and Peter Dutton, has failed to master. Could anyone? Australia’s predicament worsens also.
The Brereton inquiry exposed 39 unlawful killings in Afghanistan. The stain remains. Atop this moral wreckage sits administrative farce: a Defence official leaked confidential information before walking straight into a job with a private weapons contractor.
The Hunter class frigates tell the broader story. What began life as a $45 million per ship concept has metastasised into $2.6 billion per ship, with hundreds of millions in variations already locked in, and the program at least 18 months late due to design immaturity.
When Labor took office, 28 major Defence projects were running a combined 97 years behind schedule, with roughly a quarter of procurement unfunded. Over it all looms $368 billion we’ve agreed to throw at AUKUS, as a $60 billion annual defence budget swells toward $100 billion by 2034, absorbing failure without correcting it. (AUKUS costs are a guess, announced without consulting Treasury, Parliament or any other authority.)
What Do We Actually Get?
And what does Australia receive for this tithe?
- Not submarines.
- Not even capability.
- A promise.
Five SSN AUKUS boats to be built in Adelaide at some conveniently indeterminate date. Early 2040s if all goes well. If Britain remembers how to build submarines at scale. If the US has spare industrial capacity. If history pauses politely to accommodate our fantasy.
The BAE Systems Track Record
BAE Systems, cast as AUKUS’s industrial saviour, spent two decades struggling to deliver the UK’s Astute class submarines……………………………………………………..
The Pillar Two Mirage
When reality intrudes, the faithful point to Pillar Two, the sideshow of defence tech collaboration; AI, cyber and hypersonics; meant to suggest strategic depth where there is only debt. Scott Morrison dubbed it “AUKUS in Space,” as if adding a preposition and some stars transformed a lopsided submarine purchase into visionary strategy.
But the real achievement is rhetorical: substituting buzz-words for credible policy. In this sense, AUKUS is Scott Morrison’s most enduring legacy.
The Question Marles Won’t Answer
No-one likes a smart-arse but the pitiful Richard Marles still cannot explain why nuclear submarines are worth this ruinous spend when modern diesel-electric boats exist.
Modern diesel-electric submarines provide maximum range, endurance and stealth, operating underwater before having to resurface to snorkel and recharge batteries. Australia’s own Collins-class diesel submarines demonstrated during 2003 multinational exercises that they were comparable in underwater warfare to US Los Angeles-class nuclear-powered attack submarines, trading roles and achieving , successful attacks despite being smaller and less powerful……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..
The Runway at Dusk
For $368 billion, AUKUS is not a procurement program. It is a wager on dependency.
Australia is paying staggering sums for submarines that do not yet exist, to be built by industries in chronic difficulty, on timelines that belong to fantasy, while ceding real autonomy over real assets in the present. In return, we receive reassurance. Access. Attention. The comforting sense that someone larger, louder and more heavily armed is standing somewhere behind us………………………………………………………………………………
History will not ask whether the submarines eventually arrived. It will ask why a nation willingly surrendered so much, so early, for so little certainty in return. And it will judge us not by the promises we believed, but by the choices we made when the risks were already plain. https://theaimn.net/aukus-caucus/
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