The obvious corollary is that when we divvy up this arsenal, most of it should be disposed of at knock-down prices. There is plenty of precedent for this. After all Britain spent £3.8bn developing Nimrod replacement and then scrapped them and sold the bits for peanuts and left the aerial surveillance of Scotland’s Atlantic coast uncovered.
Maybe independence could become a wake-up call for the whole of the UK to look at the defence budget. I can see there being an “independence dividend” for the rest of the UK, particularly with respect to Trident. After all, it is only an expensive deterrent which nobody will ever use, but if nobody will ever use it who is it going to deter?
George Leslie
North Glassock
Fenwick, East Ayrshire