That's not really what this is, though. This is about industrial policy and maintaining local industrial and technological capabilities that are, in turn, usefu

That's not really what this is, though. This is about industrial policy and maintaining local industrial and technological capabilities that are, in turn, useful or necessary for defence. There are plenty of examples of this being done all over the world, because many defence industry capabilities are pretty fungible into areas like aerospace, chip design & manufacturing, optical engineering, and so on. So an industrial policy that results in development in those areas has dual benefit. Half the reason Silicon Valley exists is because of this sort of cross investment. It's likely Airbus wouldn't exist in its current form either without it. If it's all humming along nicely, you get good cross-feed in between too, with a lot more stable and long-term low-TRL investment on the defence side feeding into the civilian sector, and high-TRL investment producing better completed systems for the defence side. What will be important to prove in this case is whether the UK investment in civilian nuclear power is done solely to benefit the military nuclear energy industry, or whether there is a valid and viable argument for that investment on its own. I'd be interested in seeing the research.