>However, the British were able to maintain the ability to defeat that system and destroy Moscow with a single submarine, all on their own

What are you referring to here?

The missiles on the UK's nuclear missile submarines were fitted with decoys. One of the three warheads carried by each missile was replaced with a dispenser that would deploy 27 decoys. A single submarine carried 16 missiles, so it could launch 32 warheads and 400+ decoys at Moscow. The Moscow defenses had 100 interceptors, so it was pretty much guaranteed that at least one warhead would make it through.

More recently, they upgraded to newer missiles which could carry 8 warheads each, allowing them to overwhelm Moscow's defenses without decoys.

See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chevaline

I haven't found any evidence that ethyl ascorbic acid is more stable in aqueous solution than ascorbyl glucoside

In skincare, propylene glycol is used as the solvent for ethyl ascorbic acid, not water.