I understand the Committee is considering weapons in space and the United States' plan for a ballistic missile defence system, the national Ballistic Missile Defence (BMD).

  This would both contravene the ABM Treaty, signed by the USA in 1972, and would seriously upset the present balance of power, or rather terror.

  The US also wishes to break Article IV of the Outer Space Treaty that it signed in 1967. Already the next Shuttle launch, sponsored by the Pentagon, will install a sophisticated surveillance satellite covering 80 per cent of the globe. Its purpose is plainly military.

  HMG cannot ignore these signs, given credence by the Commander-in-Chief of the US Space Command, General Ashy, when he said, ". . . we're going to fight in space. We're going to fight from space and we're going to fight into space."

  The threat to both these treaties has already alarmed M Putin and, I hear, HMG.

  By making itself invulnerable to hostile missiles, the US would leave itself free to launch attacks itself without fear of retaliation, leaving Russia, in times of international tension, with the sole option by way of defence of making a pre-emptive strike.

  HMG has expressed doubts about the wisdom of BMD, I believe, but has incomprehensibly allowed the US to develop Menwith Hill as an early warning outpost of BMD.

  The Committee must be aware that, although BMD might protect US territory, it does not cover Europe. Would you respectfully remind it that Menwith Hill would be a prime target for that Russian pre-emptive strike, brought nearer by the international tension that BMD itself would create.

  In my opinion Britain, for its own safety and for the sake of international stability, should dissociate itself from BMD and actively oppose it by demanding the USA respects its commitments to both the ABM and Outer Space Treaties.