Wheels continuing to come off 'NO' wagon

[NickB]

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Scottish dockyards to carry on building warships even if there is a Yes vote for independence

Scottish independence: Minister says 'yes' vote possible

Looks like Salmond might have got both the timing and the strategy right. With funding pouring into the YES coffers and grassroots activity continuing to build across the country the independence movement looks to be building up a momentum that will be hard to stop.

. . . and at least some of the newspapers look set to jump the unionist ship soon . . .

[Innes Newton]

Of course the Scottish shipyards can go on building warships. But not for the Royal Navy. They'll have to see if they can get interest again from India, Pakistan or Argentina.

As for other sinking ships, I don't think so. The Yes vote averages little better than 28%, and who is surprised. The Yes Campaign boat may still be afloat but it is completely rudderless and lost at sea without any idea either where to go or how to get there. If some Scots would choose to cut Scotland adrift, more fool them.

Looks like Salmond might have got both the timing and the strategy right.

You think Salmond has planned ANYTHING????? He's a chancer who is shamelessly conning his own countrymen. The real shame is that some of them are falling for it.

[NickB]

Nearly everything about your post above is quite simply wrong.

I can't be bothered detailing it, but it is all rubbish.

[Innes Newton]

You honestly believe that rUK would get its future warships built in an independent Scotland? There's a difference between finishing off existing contracts (i.e the two aircraft carriers) and getting new ones.

The UK's defence industry is vital to the UK's economy not least in terms of jobs but technology and security. Do you honestly believe that a Westminster government would give new business to a newly separated Scotland, and give jobs to Scottish workers instead of those in rUK? No chance. Scotland becomes a foreign country. I don't expect an independent Scotland will do rUK any favours, and just as logically rUK will have no reason to do Scotland any favours.

You're not answering because you are just trying to profligate Salmond's ballony and bluster without any facts to back it up. It's the major theme of the Yes campaign: promise anything to get votes. Evade the truth, avoid answering questions. How does anyone expect a fairer society when it will be led by a load of con-men....and women?

[NickB]

Why would rUK deliberately set out to antagonise its second biggest export market?

Cutting off your nose to spite your face may be your style, but it is not the political style of a mature democracy.

[Innes Newton]

Cutting off your nose to spite your face

That would seem to be the way the "Yes" campaigners think. Choosing to give Royal Navy contracts to rUK has nothing to do with cutting off one's nose, but everything to do with supporting UK industry, jobs, economy, defence and security. These are the things that Yes Campaigners are prepared to put at risk for puffed up nationalistic self importance, irrespective of the negative effects it has on all the aforementioned.

[NickB]

Cutting off your nose to spite your face

That would seem to be the way the "Yes" campaigners think. Choosing to give Royal Navy contracts to rUK has nothing to do with cutting off one's nose, but everything to do with supporting UK industry, jobs, economy, defence and security. These are the things that Yes Campaigners are prepared to put at risk for puffed up nationalistic self importance, irrespective of the negative effects it has on all the aforementioned.

Now you are reduced to bluster and nonsense.

RUK ships will be built where it suits rUK to have them built.

[Innes Newton]

RUK ships will be built where it suits rUK to have them built

Absolutely. And it will suit UK shipyards very nicely if they have an excuse not to build them in Scotland. Yes campaigners can hope they won't do that, but really......their campaign always did rest on a hope and a prayer, but never on facts or economic reality.

[NickB]

RUK ships will be built where it suits rUK to have them built

Absolutely. And it will suit UK shipyards very nicely if they have an excuse not to build them in Scotland. Yes campaigners can hope they won't do that, but really......their campaign always did rest on a hope and a prayer, but never on facts or economic reality.

What UK shipyards would those be?

Portsmouth is closing and Barrow only builds submarines.

[Innes Newton]

There is plenty shipbuilding capacity in Birkenhead, Tyneside and Barrow. Portsmouth is having £ 100m invested in it and can easily be reactivated to build ships again. All you need is a 'site' to build ships and access to the water (in the way they built oil rigs at various locations around the coast like Nigg and Ardersier. Chunks of aircraft carriers are currently being built in Birkenhead and Tyneside for assembly on the Clyde.

rUK easily has the means to build any ship it wants to without having to export the jobs and revenue. Scots shipworkers know they need to vote "No".

[NickB]

Aye right. You could build them on any old stretch of beach.

I wonder where you will put the Trident subs.

They are too dangerous to be allowed to live in Devonport.

(Just outside Glasgow is fine though, isn't it?)

[Innes Newton]

I wouldn't have a problem living next to them. A big part of Dounreay was made up by HMS Vulcan where they developed the nuclear submarine reactors....or did you not know that? The nuclear submarine base is at Faslane for strategic reasons, not safety reasons. The hills and rock formations protect the site and deep water channels into the Irish sea that give protected cover out into the Atlantic...geographical features that do not exist in Devonport. A submarine can leave Faslane and very easily disappear. Enemy submarines could get in close to Devonport much more easily. Pacifists don't understand strategy and that's why an independent Scotland will be much more at risk. The talk is that Putin wants to take back what used to belong to Russia. It's not just Crimea, but all of Ukraine, Belarus (do most people know where this is?) Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia and Finland. Suddenly the world looks a bit more threatening and the risk of war in Europe just that little bit closer.

[NickB]

I wouldn't have a problem living next to them. A big part of Dounreay was made up by HMS Vulcan where they developed the nuclear submarine reactors....or did you not know that?

Aye Innes, I knew that fine.

There was a bit of a reminder recently when the MOD were accused of failing to inform the Scottish government about radiation leakage when low levels of radioactivity were detected in a prototype core at the Naval Reactor Test Establishment at Dounreay, in 2012.

STV story

Would you have liked to live next to that and not be informed about it for two years?

The Westminster government have a long history of lying and covering up nuclear incidents, and for that and many other reasons a majority of Scots want the UK's preposterous penis substitute nuclear deterrent out of the Clyde ASAP and no further billions of taxpayers' money wasted on a stupid, unnecessary replacement.

Scotland's current share of Trident's annual running costs is £163 million. That money could be used to :

~ train 3,880 nurses
or
~ train 4,527 teachers
or
~ build between 13 and 20 primary schools

Independence is a chance to make better decisions about how our taxes are spent.

[Innes Newton]

Oh deary me.

There was a bit of a reminder recently when the MOD were accused of failing to inform the Scottish government about radiation leakage when low levels of radioactivity were detected in a prototype core at the Naval Reactor Test Establishment at Dounreay, in 2012.

STV story
Would you have liked to live next to that and not be informed about it for two years?

No, I wasn't there in 2012 when it was only tiny amounts of radiation but I was living 6 miles downwind from Dounreay when there was a proper explosion and radiation leak in 1977. Were you cowering in your bunker then? I'm still here. (and CND has virtually disappeared because the world has realised they were wrong)

Trident is our defence. It allows us to shrink our other armed forces as a huge saving in cost. No doubt you would have been a conscientious objector in WW1 and WW2 and happily let our country be invaded. I have no time for cowards who would put our nation at risk. We need a strong defence in a world of Putins and Kim Jong-Uns. Trident defends our freedom, something you cannot put a price on. What is a waste of money is all those windmills of which Scotland enjoys a hugely disproportionate subsidy, money that could be spent on schools, hospitals, etc, etc.

[NickB]

CND Spring Walk for Peace march and rally April 5th, 10.30 George Square Glasgow.

That's this Saturday.

More info here: http://springwalk.org/