Would you press the ‘fire’ button on a nuclear missile? Would you actually be responsible for the imminent destruction of (possibly) millions of people, most of them uninvolved in whatever the row is about, even if there was similar coming our way? And if that was the case, what good would the ‘retaliatory strike’ do, other than give you some posthumous vengeful satisfaction?

But we’re hard-wired to defend ourselves, right to the very end. Yet it has to be ‘proportional’. So if the good citizens of Halifax choose to jeer at Theresa May when she read her election manifesto there, exercising their democratic right, why didn’t she just bomb the place? I would have. Because the fall-out would have taken out not just Halifax but most of the people north of Watford, south of Glasgow. Hmmmm…

At tai chi we learn self-defense. And if someone tries to hit you/stab you/kick you, the most expeditious conclusion to the problem is ‘break his arm’. Which may not be as ‘proportional’ as asking him to stop and slapping him back, but it works much much better, much more quickly. So you get on with going out for lunch.

Jeremy Corbyn doesn’t eat at McDonalds. He eats in workers’ canteens or not at all. He can’t digest globalised food. Certainly wouldn’t drink a Starbucks coffee. He’s also nuclear-intolerant. Which, if I’m honest, on some level, we all are. Because no-one really would ever want to deploy the ‘ultimate deterrent’. Unless it was on Saudi Arabia or Manchester, obviously. But you have to maintain that deterrent because if you don’t, in politico-military parlance; you’re fucked.

Countries are not all run by sane people. North Korea certainly isn’t. Iran? Hell, no. And those countries are the ones who might just think twice before pushing their own buttons and sending nukes to a country that has the capability to retaliate. But would Kim Jong Un think twice about bombing anyone else? He’s a nutter. Wouldn’t give it a second thought.

Whatever he may say to placate the population, Jeremy Corbyn would never push that button. Fine, that’s his right. But does that make us safer? Or make us a potential target for rogue nations confident in our lack of response? And if he won’t push the button, why renew our Trident missile system at a cost of £2billion which could otherwise probably get pissed down the health service toilet? (I’m a big believer in the NHS but NOT just pumping more money into the terribly organised waste of money system it is now).

So the Shadow Foreign Secretary yesterday claimed that Labour’s previous ‘we will reconsider updating Trident’ position may not happen. Only for the Shadow Defence Minister to contradict her and tell her its not her brief. Oooooh, yet more conflict in Labour. Handbags at dawn is preferable to nukes at (eternal) dusk. And certainly more fun.

Happy Saturday

A xxxx