Quote Originally Posted by Red Rat View Post
Of course it is recent accounting innovation to bring Trident into the core defence budget. Previous nuclear programmes were kept separate simply because while their strategic utility was not questioned, neither was their lack of tactical utility.
Certainly any such drastic change in budgeting raised eyebrows, as consistency is for very good reasons a key principle in accounting. Such a shift should have a much better arguments on it's side as the previous stance supposedly also had its pros.

There is no doubt that facilitating the ill-conceived and poorly executed austerity policy of the recent government was a major factor in this decision. Maybe supported by the ability to show 'strong British commitment' to it's Nato partners by puffing up the percentage of British military spending by subtracting x on one side and adding x on the other.

Even if it's sounds ridiculous this shift pretty likely had already on impact on British defence spending. The specific accounting logic certainly influences more or less the way countries and companies operate. In this case the rest of the defence budget should be under heavier pressure then with the former accounting policy.