U.S. Nuclear Deterrence in the 21st Century: Getting it Right

B. The Sorry State of the U.S. Deterrent 

By contrast with the nuclear ambitions of so many others, the United States has engaged over the past seventeen years in what has amounted to a unilateral nuclear freeze.  In March 2008, General Kevin P. Chilton, the Commander of U.S. Strategic Command warned that “Other declared nuclear powers continue to modernize their nuclear weapons, delivery platforms, and infrastructure. Conversely, the U.S. has effectively eliminated its nuclear weapons production capacity and allowed its infrastructure to atrophy.  We no longer produce successive generations of nuclear weapons and we have discontinued underground testing.”¹⁴

Secretary Gates described the disparity between the level of effort with respect to modernization and maintenance of the stockpiles of other nuclear weapon states and that of this country as follows:  “Currently, the United States is the only declared nuclear power that is neither modernizing its nuclear arsenal nor has the capability to produce a new nuclear warhead.”¹⁵

It is worth examining in greater detail three facets of the U.S. nuclear enterprise: 1) the stockpile itself, 2) the weapons complex and 3) the skilled workforce required to sustain both.

1: U.S. nuclear weapons are deteriorating and do not include all possible safety and reliability options.

Those tasked with assuring the integrity of the Nation’s nuclear arsenal have registered significant concern over the effects of aging and what amounts to sustained underinvestment on the safety of U.S. nuclear warheads:

•     Los Alamos National Laboratory Director Michael R. Anastasio (April 2008):  “The weapons in the stockpile are not static. The chemical and radiation processes inside the nuclear physics package induce material changes that limit weapon lifetimes.  We are seeing significant changes that are discussed in detail in my Annual Assessment letter.”¹⁶

•     NNSA Administrator Thomas P. D’Agostino (April 2008): “Although recent studies have placed the life of our plutonium pits at 85 to 100 years, other exotic materials used in our warheads degrade at different rates and many of their aging properties are still not well understood.  The metallurgical and chemical issues we face with our aging warheads continue to be a technical challenge for our best scientists and the risk of catastrophic technical failure occurring as our warheads age cannot be ruled out absolutely.”¹⁷

“To understand the challenges facing our stockpile, an analogy is in order.  Today’s Mustang remains a high-performance automobile, has about the same dimensions and weighs only a few hundred pounds more than the first Mustangs, and has all the modern safety and security features we expect today air bags, anti-lock brakes, GPS navigation, satellite radio, theft deterrent and alarm systems.  The 1965 version had none of these features, not even seat belts!  We deploy warheads today that have 1970-80’s safety, security and anti-terrorism features.  It does not mean that these warheads are not safe and secure, but we can do better and we should do better.”¹⁸

2: The weapons complex is in extremis

The lack of commitment on the part of successive U.S. administrations of both parties to a stockpile modernization program has had detrimental effect not only on the arsenal, but also on the underlying infrastructure necessary to support it.  The following characterize the grave state of this vital and increasingly deficient industrial base:

•     The Strategic Posture Commission (May 2009): “…The Commission believes it is necessary to take a long view. Physical infrastructure is unique in the long time- scale involved in making changes to it.  Although nuclear policy can be altered overnight and force levels can be decreased or increased (to a limited extent) in months or a few years, decisions on infrastructure can take years if not a decade or more to reach fruition.”¹⁹

“[The Commission] also recommends that Congress express a commitment to sustain that funding [for the weapons laboratories] for the foreseeable future, as its fluctuating character over recent years has been a significant programmatic problem.”²⁰

•     STRATCOM Commander General Chilton (November 2008): “We can produce a handful of weapons in a laboratory but we’ve taken down the manufacturing capability…Think about what it’s going to take to recapitalize or replace those 2,000 weapons over a period of time…If you could do 10 a year, it takes you 200 years.  If you build an infrastructure that would allow you to do 100 a year, then you could envision recapitalizing that over a 20-year-period.”²¹

•     Los Alamos National Laboratory Director Michael R. Anastasio (April 2008):“There are ever-increasing standards imposed by environmental management, safety, and security requirements driving up the costs of the overall infrastructure. When coupled with a very constrained budget, the overall effect is exacerbated, restricting and, in some cases eliminating, our use of experimental tools across the complex. This puts at risk the fundamental premise of Stockpile Stewardship.”²²

“This increased responsibility for nuclear facilities and operations must be viewed in the context of a reduction in purchasing power of approximately half a billion dollars over the last five years.  Moreover, from our preliminary planning discussions with the National Nuclear Security Administration, we  anticipate further erosion of our purchasing power by about four hundred million dollars over the next five years, assuming inflation and a flat level of appropriated dollars.”²³

“With growing costs of the full Cold War infrastructure and the prospects for a declining budget, it is becoming more difficult to maintain, use, or enhance the Stockpile Stewardship tools we have put in place.”²⁴

*NNSA Administrator D’Agostino (March 2009): “Our uranium facilities date back to the Manhattan Project of the 1940s.”²⁵

“Our newest plutonium facility is thirty years old and one Los Alamos research building (Chemistry and Metallurgy Research) dates from the early 1950s and has served well beyond its economic lifetime.”²⁶

“A plutonium capability is a core competency that must be retained.  Independent of the quantity of pits needed in the future….”²⁷

“We cannot continue to do 21^st Century national security business with a 50-year-old Cold War infrastructure.  The need for sustaining future plutonium and uranium capabilities is without question.”²⁸