Does another kind of minefield await HMS Neptune of today?

Published on Saturday 27 January 2007 00:38

ON THE night of 19 December, 1941, there occurred one of the worst British naval disasters of the Second World War. The cruiser HMS Neptune ran into a minefield off the coast of North Africa and exploded with the loss of 764 men.

To go from the heroes of that HMS Neptune to the present-day HMS Neptune is to traverse the radically changing way society views the military. For the modern HMS Neptune is the official name of the Royal Navy submarine base at Faslane, on the Gare Loch, 20 miles from Glasgow.

As the home of Britain's nuclear deterrent, Faslane is a symbol - in some eyes - not of heroes but of mass murder and of the imposition on Scotland of weapons it does not want.

War imposed itself on the quiet reaches of the Gare Loch. Its deep, sheltered waters make a natural harbour. The first naval base was constructed during the Second World War and used by the Americans to train for D-Day.

America's nuclear Polaris submarines arrived in the neighbouring Holy Loch in 1960. The early CND began regular (but good-natured) protest marches. Their singing sparked the revival of the folk song movement in Scotland, making Polaris more entertainment than politics.

In 1963 work began at Faslane, still a quiet village, as a base for the Royal Navy's four Polaris boats. Soon, the first Russian "fishing boats" - spy ships - were to be seen. Faslane had become part of a James Bond world. But most people, while not happy about Scotland being a target in the Cold War, recognised that Faslane was a necessary evil as long as the Soviet Union threatened the West.

The mood changed in the 1990s. The Iron Curtain had gone but a new generation of infinitely more destructive Trident submarines had arrived at Faslane. Why were they needed? The green movement had also been born and faults in the reactors of the Swiftsure submarines, which shared Faslane, made even the locals take a closer look at what was in their backyard.

The scale of protest is set to rise. Work has started on building jetties for a new generation of Astute attack submarines.

As these can carry Cruise missiles suitable for use in war areas such as Afghanistan, Faslane is back in the terrorist target zone - of interest, perhaps, to terrorists.

After that comes the Trident replacement due in the 2020s. Is the modern HMS Neptune heading for its own minefield?