{"id":21151,"date":"2024-02-21T12:51:37","date_gmt":"2024-02-21T17:51:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/newssprinters.com\/index.php\/world\/a-british-nuclear-missile-test-fails-again\/21\/02\/2024\/"},"modified":"2024-02-21T12:51:37","modified_gmt":"2024-02-21T17:51:37","slug":"a-british-nuclear-missile-test-fails-again","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/newssprinters.com\/index.php\/world\/a-british-nuclear-missile-test-fails-again\/21\/02\/2024\/","title":{"rendered":"A British Nuclear Missile Test Fails, Again"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\n<\/p>\n<div>\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">The British government confirmed on Wednesday that the test launch of an unarmed Trident missile from a Royal Navy submarine last month had failed, raising questions about the state of Britain\u2019s nuclear deterrence capability.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">It was the second straight malfunction of such a launch, coming nearly eight years after <a class=\"css-yywogo\" href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2017\/01\/23\/world\/europe\/uk-theresa-may-trident-nuclear-missile.html\" title=\"\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">another Trident flew off course<\/a> at sea, an incident that at the time drew criticism about the government\u2019s failure to disclose it.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">This time, too, the failed launch was first reported not by the defense ministry but by a London tabloid, <a class=\"css-yywogo\" href=\"https:\/\/www.thesun.co.uk\/news\/26070479\/trident-nuke-sub-missile-launch-fails\/\" title=\"\" rel=\"noopener\" target=\"_blank\">The Sun, which said<\/a> the missile\u2019s boosters failed and it landed in the water not far from the submarine, the H.M.S. Vanguard, which had just come out of a seven-year refurbishment.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Britain\u2019s defense secretary, Grant Shapps, and the top-ranking officer in the Royal Navy were both aboard the Vanguard for the test on Jan. 30. In a written statement to the House of Commons, Mr. Shapps said \u201can anomaly did occur\u201d during the test launch but that it was \u201cevent specific.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div>\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">\u201cThere are no implications for the reliability of the wider Trident missile systems and stockpiles,\u201d Mr. Shapps wrote. \u201cNor are there any implications for our ability to fire our nuclear weapons, should the circumstances arise in which we need to do so.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Britain\u2019s Navy has suffered a string of problems in recent months with its fleet. One of its flagship aircraft carriers, the H.MS. Queen Elizabeth, pulled out of a deployment to a NATO exercise off the coast of Norway earlier this month because of a problem with one of its propeller shafts.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Its sister ship, the H.M.S. Prince of Wales, took its place in the exercise, but its deployment was briefly delayed as well before it departed on Feb. 12. In 2022, the Prince of Wales broke down off the Isle of Wight, also because of a propeller-related issue, and required nine months of repairs.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Military analysts said it was difficult to say exactly what went wrong with the latest launch. Britain has four nuclear-powered submarines equipped with the Trident missile system, which is manufactured by the American firm Lockheed Martin. The missile was not armed with a nuclear warhead during the test.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">\u201cWhether the problem can now be rectified, or even what it is, is not clear,\u201d said Malcolm Chalmers, the deputy director general of the Royal United Services Institute, a think tank in London. \u201cBut Vanguard is getting very old, beyond its planned service life, and it just came out of a seven-year repair and refueling.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<div>\n<div class=\"css-53u6y8\">\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">Mr. Chalmers criticized the government\u2019s handling of the incident, noting that it had announced the test in advance but then failed to report its failure.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">\u201cSomeone was bound to spot this, sooner or later,\u201d he said, \u201cand they should have got out in front of the story.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">The last failed launch, in June 2016, became a political headache for the government of Prime Minister Theresa May when news of it first leaked out several months later. Ms. May was initially unwilling to acknowledge the incident, even as she appealed to Parliament to invest in new Trident-armed submarines.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">With anxieties rising about an aggressive Russia under President Vladimir V. Putin, Britain\u2019s military readiness has again become a political hot button. The opposition Labour Party has accused successive Conservative-led governments of bleeding the armed forces through years of budget cuts imposed by fiscal austerity.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-at9mc1 evys1bk0\">\u201cOver the last 13 years, our army has been cut to the smallest size since the days of Napoleon,\u201d Labour\u2019s lawmaker responsible for defense policy, John Healey, and the party\u2019s chief foreign policy official, David Lammy, wrote in a column last fall in the Daily Telegraph.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<aside class=\"css-ew4tgv\" aria-label=\"companion column\"\/><\/div>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2024\/02\/21\/world\/europe\/a-british-nuclear-missile-test-fails-again.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The British government confirmed on Wednesday that the test launch of an unarmed Trident missile from a Royal Navy submarine last month<br \/><button class=\"read-more\"><a href=\"https:\/\/newssprinters.com\/index.php\/world\/a-british-nuclear-missile-test-fails-again\/21\/02\/2024\/\">Read More &rsaquo;<\/a><\/button><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":21153,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/newssprinters.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21151"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/newssprinters.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/newssprinters.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newssprinters.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newssprinters.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21151"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/newssprinters.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21151\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newssprinters.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/21153"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/newssprinters.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21151"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newssprinters.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21151"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newssprinters.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21151"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}