Because I am all about posture not politics, the message and not the manifesto is my mainstay.

Whether this tiny country, out of Europe and with an ever decreasing military, needs a nuclear capability is a debate for others. But I would hope that given the staggering amount of money we pay for Trident the very least we can expect is that it works.

Sheepishly the MoD has confirmed that for the second time in a row, a recent Trident missile test firing had failed. They said the failure was "event specific". 

Well, what kind of message is that? What else would it be?

Don’t be misled. This is a desperately embarrassing situation for the Royal Navy, whose four much-vaunted Vanguard class Trident submarines are parked up the road and round the corner at Faslane. Things are as squirmingly ghastly as they can get for the Navy first, and the government second.

Message again. Think how many potholes you could fill, and NHS waiting lists you could clear, and schools you could build, for what Trident costs. And there goes another message.

Trident is endlessly and ennui-inducingly described by the Royal Navy as a deterrent. This trope is tiresome; it’s an opinion and not a fact. And let’s face it, it’s not much of a deterrent if it doesn’t work - and Putin knows it.

We’ve had nuclear weapons, for good or bad, since they were invented. Our enemies had them too. And if we all had them then everyone knew that if it all kicked off, there would be nothing left for the winner. It was a vast, 80-year, multi-billion pound stand-off, as we all waited for Godot. Back then, nuclear war was an existential threat. Now it’s corporeal.

I am surprised that the media hasn’t latched onto the Navy’s embarrassment more doggedly, in an election year with a war on NATO’s eastern front and the prospect of a pro-Russian American President to the west.

And it’s from our putative ally that our biggest threat comes. If Trump gets in and withdraws the colossal US military from NATO, as he has threatened to do, stops funding Ukraine, as he has threatened to do, and gives his old mucker Vlad the green light to invade any NATO country, as he has already done, where are we then?

Here’s where. Ukraine falls and Russia heads west. NATO retaliates, but without the US it is a toothless, mangy mutt. With the US out of the game, the remaining nuclear weapons in the NATO arsenal belong to France and the UK.

But as ours don’t seem to work, we might as well pack it in, go home, throw Trident in the bin and leave the job to Paris.

And, by the way, if that happens, we lose.