Should the US be concerned about the state of its nuclear arsenal?

The Pentagon has been struggling to ensure the readiness of its nuclear capabilities, according to a former commander of US Strategic Command (USSTRATCOM). Long-lasting issues involving budget, bureaucracy, complexity of the systems and low levels of flexibility of an ageing arsenal have been playing a relevant role in putting the US in what Gen (ret.) C. Robert Kehler, former commander of USSTRATCOM, considers an alarming situation.

Designed and built in the Cold War era, Washington’s systems have been in service for more than five decades. Although they have passed through life extension, these platforms feature an old architecture that hampers efforts to maintain their operation.

“Literally, we are going to get spare parts out of museums,” Kehler stressed during a recent webinar conducted by the US-based think-tank CSIS.

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The ground-based leg of the US nuclear triad is the Minuteman III (MMIII) Intercontinental Ballistic Missile (ICBM) system which was first deployed in the 1960s.

Ohio-class submarines, in turn, were built from 1976 through to 1991. Originally designed with a 30-year service life, those platforms were later certified to operate for 42 years.

In terms of aerial systems, the US Air Force (USAF) nuclear-capable fleet currently comprises B-1, B-2 and B-52 bombers. The first B-1 was produced in the 1980s while initial deliveries of B-2s took place in 1993.

The B-52 Stratofortress heavy bomber plane, in turn, entered service between 1955 and 1962 and has been upgraded to remain in operation past 2040.

Gen Anthony J. Cotton, the current commander of USSTRATCOM, claimed that, although the nuclear triad is “still safe, secure, effective and incredibly credible”, the US “must do everything in our power to make sure that we can modernise the current forces that we have”.

“What I pay attention to every single day is understanding that I have a legacy system that can be maintained and sustained until the new, modernised systems also come in line,” Cotton said. “Are we at a point now where we just need to modernise all three legs of the triad? Absolutely.”

Investments in the nuclear triad

The cost of the acquisition of new systems and capabilities represents another obstacle for the DoD as the update of the US arsenal has been estimated to last for the next three decades and cost around US$1 trillion.

“It is 4% of the defence budget that extends 30 years,” Cotton explained. “We are not talking about one leg, we are talking about the entire three legs of the triad getting modernised. I think when you put it in that perspective, it comes out to be not cost prohibitive by any stretch of imagination.”

The improvement of US nuclear capabilities, however, competes for funds against several other efforts across the Pentagon. In its FY2025 budget proposal, the DoD allocated fewer resources for the purchase of Virginia-class platforms compared to the last fiscal year.

In FY2024, the US Navy received $9 billion to procure two submarines. In FY2025, however, its $5.7 billion fund will cover the acquisition of just one submarine.

Meanwhile, the Sentinel ICBM programme, the planned replacement for the MMIII, is at least two years delayed compared to its initial schedule and has exceeded its baseline cost projections.

The effort to update the ground-based leg of the nuclear triad is now estimated to cost $140.9 billion which represents an 81% increase compared to its 2020 baseline cost estimates.

Another US concern is related to the integration of new capabilities and the improvement of the Nuclear Command, Control and Communications (NC3) system.

“The triad doesn’t work without those other [NC3] systems that stitch it all together,” Cotton pointed out.

Sarah Mineiro, senior associate (non-resident) at the CSIS Aerospace Security Project, stressed that the complexity of the NC3 upgrading initiative could also represent an issue for the DoD.

“The DoD is working with more than 200 programmes of record that are part of the NC3 system of systems – everything from radios all the way up to satellites to ground terminals,” Mineiro noted.

In addition, the process to improve both the triad and the NC3 can be impacted by the multiple levels of bureaucracy and the Pentagon’s approach to procuring and upgrading capabilities.

Its requirement-based acquisition system, for instance, involves determining a non-flexible set of prerequisites for its procurement programmes, which might limit the industry’s capacity to innovate and create emerging defence solutions.

Michael Drews, VP for global situational awareness and NC3 advanced capabilities and mission strategy at Lockheed Martin, commented: “Nobody sat down at Apple and said ‘here is a requirement for the iPhone’. Somebody walked in the door and said ‘look what we could do with all this stuff and how we get these pieces to fit together’.” 

Moreover, the DoD must keep pace with current and future technologies in order to allow the enhancement of the nuclear arsenal over its operation cycle.

Drews stressed that a modular, open system architecture approach with open standards allows bringing “the best of breed technologies” into the defence sphere in a “continuous, persistent” improvement process.

“We can no longer think of modernisation of the triad or nuclear modernisation writ large, as like one and done,” Drews added.

Mineiro, in turn, claimed that the US “should be able to harness what is going on in the commercial world, specifically in the amazing stuff in space, software, all of this, while also meeting the non-negotiable requirements that nuclear surety demand”.

Near-pear adversaries

The current great power competition involving multiple actors also increases the pressure on the Pentagon to modernise its nuclear capabilities.

According to the US Congress, the country has 3,708 nuclear warheads in its military stockpile, of which approximately 1,744 have been deployed with five delivery components.

Meanwhile, Russia’s reserves comprise around 1,550 and an active stockpile of up to 2,000 non-strategic nuclear warheads, as stated by the 2022 US Nuclear Posture Review (NPR).

The document also stated that China has been expanding and diversifying its nuclear forces and intends to possess at least 1,000 deliverable warheads by the end of the decade. If combined, Moscow and Beijing’s stocks would surpass US current reserves.

“I don’t know that we have sanctuary in the continental US anymore, [or if] we think about that differently, as opposed to the way we thought about it in the past,” remarked Cotton.

Drews, concurrently, claimed that a collaboration among adversaries “is exponentially more complicated” and “more complex”.

From Kehler’s perspective, the current international scenario is “so different” from the Cold War environment as it adds a new set of concerns the country has not had before.

“We cannot think of where we are today as a new Cold War,” Kehler said. “To quote Dorothy [from The Wizard of Oz], ‘we are not in Kansas anymore’ regarding nuclear weapons, nuclear use [or the] nuclear deterrence scenarios we might face.”

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