The President nominating former Sen.Chuck Hagel (R-Neb.) as Defense Secretary, could be interesting for NNSA.
Hagel is a board member of Global Zero (international movement for the elimination of all nuclear weapons).
He coauthored last year a report that called for the US (through negotiations with Russia) to reduce over a ten year period the US arsenal to a maximum of 900 total nuclear weapons. This included going from the delivery system triad to a dyad (10 Trident subs and 18 US based B-2 bombers). Eliminating tactical nukes deployed overseas and converting US nuclear ICBMs to non-nuclear prompt global strike ICBMs (with conventional warheads). Also a downsized NWC; no PF-4,CMRR, or UPF. Only 4 types of nuclear weapons would be kept; W-76 and W-88 on Trident SSBNs, and the B61 (mods 7 and 11) and B83 on B-2 bombers.
I wonder what would now happen if NNSA got moved into DOD.Don't really think this will happen, but it looks like there will be a customer (SecDef) that has a really different vision and smaller future in mind for the NWC and DOD nuclear forces.
It could really really get interesting if they put another Global Zero member (like former LLNL and DOE nuclear weapons executive Philp Coyle) over NNSA.
The full report is at:
http://www.globalzero.org/en/us-nuclear-policy-commission-report
Hagel is a board member of Global Zero (international movement for the elimination of all nuclear weapons).
He coauthored last year a report that called for the US (through negotiations with Russia) to reduce over a ten year period the US arsenal to a maximum of 900 total nuclear weapons. This included going from the delivery system triad to a dyad (10 Trident subs and 18 US based B-2 bombers). Eliminating tactical nukes deployed overseas and converting US nuclear ICBMs to non-nuclear prompt global strike ICBMs (with conventional warheads). Also a downsized NWC; no PF-4,CMRR, or UPF. Only 4 types of nuclear weapons would be kept; W-76 and W-88 on Trident SSBNs, and the B61 (mods 7 and 11) and B83 on B-2 bombers.
I wonder what would now happen if NNSA got moved into DOD.Don't really think this will happen, but it looks like there will be a customer (SecDef) that has a really different vision and smaller future in mind for the NWC and DOD nuclear forces.
It could really really get interesting if they put another Global Zero member (like former LLNL and DOE nuclear weapons executive Philp Coyle) over NNSA.
The full report is at:
http://www.globalzero.org/en/us-nuclear-policy-commission-report
Comments
I take it as a given that this $10 billion program will soon be mothballed, much like the CMRR. With its removal, large layoffs will be necessary at LLNL, LANL and SNL unless the massive funding allocated for this program is redirected to other lab programs.
As Hiawatha used to tell the Iroiqois,
You need a few more bullets than targets, and there are a lot of targets.
Semper paratus or not.
I vote for 10000.
Followed by a couple of years of our torpedoes bouncing off Japanese shipping because they had not been tested under realistic conditions. Oh well, we have computers and NIF now, so we don't need no testing.