I disagree. I think every country has the right to self defense, and possess these. However I'd be a big fan of a global nuclear weapon's ban that everybody signs.
PS. What are the Scots thinking of trying to be independent? If I were them I'd be happy to be ganged up with England, as long as England is not exploiting me economically because I'm Scot, nor does it restrict my liberties such as freedom of expression, or practicing my own Gaelic mother tongue. tradition. But hey. they are the Scots, and you have to let them decide for themselves. I just think they are proving themselves stupid. Instead of separation, they should be trying to liberties and while united, and only if that's impossible while being united, when push comes to shove, do you have to lower your expectations and strive for independence. But they might be misjudging England, and its willingness to allow for broad reaching internal freedoms, within the UK, such as practicing your own language, etc. United is usually better than divided. The proverb says together we stand, alone we fall. But there are of course many exceptions.
Thank you for your half-baked opinion on why Scotland is "proving itself stupid".
In fact, the freedom to speak Gaelic (which is the "mother tongue" of very few Scots, and still only spoken by a small proportion) has little to do with the push for independence.
Your er.... *eloquent* speech on remaining together did nothing to address the contradiction that traditional Tory voters in their south-east England heartlands are moving against EU membership. The Tories-- afraid of losing votes to UKIP (the UK Independence party) who are pushing this policy- are pandering to *their* potential voters by promising a referendum on EU membership in 2017, which- if they win- would result in the UK leaving the EU.
Scotland is (in general) much more in favour of the EU, and UKIP support here is *much* lower than it is in the south-east of England. But, of course, if the English vote is sufficiently against EU membership... tough for poor Scotland who (hypothetically) remained attached to Little England. Should Scotland "stand together" with the people who didn't "stand together" with the EU?
Devolution has improved things somewhat, but control of the UK overall- including the economy and many devolved matters- remains with Westminster, which is run by an increasingly right-wing Tory government which the Scots did *not* elect, and whose political trajectory has been veering away from Scottish values for a generation. (Some readers may be surprised to note that the Tories once had a significant share of the Scottish vote. In the 1955 general election, they gained a majority of votes and a majority of the seats here. Such a prospect would be unthinkable now- there is only one Scottish Tory MP).
This has been happening since Thatcher came to power in the late-1970s, promising "Where there is discord, may we bring harmony"- either hugely ironic or intentionally hypocritical since she was a divide-and-rule politician with a "them and us" mentality that abandoned any notion of "one nation conservatism", decimated Scottish industry, squandered revenues from North Sea Oil- most of which would have belonged to Scotland if independent- on funding the unemployment her policies caused. In short, she pandered to the Tory heartland of the South East (England), and foisted her values on Scots who profoundly disagreed with them.
In the post-Thatcher era, we got the once left-wing Labour party selling out to stand any chance of being elected by the South East, to the point they were arguably more right wing and more pro free market than the pre-Thatcher Conservatives. Following Blair's nauseating arse-licking of George W Bush (which bought him nothing- as any idiot could see at the time- and was a result of his egotism, hubris and messiah complex) we got the Tories again, even more right wing despite initial promises, and the Liberal Democrats selling out to become their meaningless lapdogs, and Labour giving laughably diluted wishy-washy concessions to their socialist past. All three promising nothing I- and many other Scots- find of value.
And that's partly what it comes down to. Some people clearly did vote for all this- but not the Scots. If the "Yes" campaign loses, it'll be because the "No"s cast sufficient doubt on Scotland's ability to go it alone, not because they had anything inspiring or positive to say about the Union.
I could go on about this all day, but I have other things to get on with. But once again, thank you for your patronising opinion on our stupidity. Cheers!