OPINION — “The [U.S.] nuclear weapons program of record grew from five to seven systems this past year.”
That’s National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) Administrator Jill M. Hruby, testifying about the extensive U.S. nuclear warhead development, modernization and production programs before the Senate Armed Services Committee last Wednesday.
I thought it worthwhile to describe the list she presented of American nuclear weapons activity given recent publicity about China’s nuclear weapons increases and Russia’s new nuclear weapon developments.
The U.S. is far from standing still, but as you will see below, there are problems as well with the ongoing American nuclear weapons programs.
Hruby said, “The B61-12 [modernized tactical nuclear bomb] and W88 Alt 370 [modernized warhead for the sub-launched intercontinental ballistic missile (SLBM)] are in production. The W80-4 [modernized cruise missile] warhead remains aligned with the Air Force schedule for the [new, air-launched] Long-Range Stand-Off [cruise] missile and we expect the first production unit in September 2027. The W87-1 [modernized warhead for the new Sentinel intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM)] is currently scheduled to begin production in 2031 or 2032, and the W93 [new SLBM warhead] remains on track with production starting in the mid-2030s.”
Continuing, Hruby said, “With the fiscal 2024 budget enactment, NNSA began work on the B61-13 [new tactical nuclear bomb with higher yield than the B61-12] program, with our first production unit expected in fiscal year 2026. Although the nuclear sea-launched cruise missile or SLCM-N [nuclear warhead for a sea-launched cruise missile] is not in the budget request for FY 2025…NNSA is committed to fulfilling this requirement.”
Asked how much extra burden the development of a warhead for the SLCN-N had placed on NNSA, Hruby said, “There was an appropriation in 2024, so we are working hard on fitting it in, in concert with the Navy, looking at W80-4 and looking for other warheads that would be least disruptive to the program of record and do the job we need to do consistent with the Navy’s trusted platform, when that’s done.”
Summing up, Hruby said, “These seven systems represent modernized weapons for all three legs of the Triad and new capabilities and responses to today’s security environment.”
If all that were not enough, in their prepared joint statement for last Wednesday’s hearing, Hruby and Secretary of Energy Jennifer M. Granholm told the Senators, “In addition to the seven [nuclear warhead] modernization programs mentioned…NNSA has also requested $69 million in the Stockpile Research, Technology, and Engineering program to support two ‘Phase 1’ [technical feasibility of nuclear weapon concepts] system studies for early exploration of hard and deeply buried target defeat and non-ballistic reentry systems.”
Asked if she prioritized these nuclear warhead programs, Hruby replied, “We have to prioritize a lot of things simultaneously given the situation we are in – modernizing our nuclear warheads while we are modernizing our infrastructure, side-by-side and occasionally in the same building. We are worried about it every day. We are making progress, but it is not an ideal situation.”
Delays, high costs, and other setbacks
One example: Plutonium pits, which are the triggers for thermonuclear weapons. The pit itself is a hollow sphere of plutonium. When uniformly compressed by surrounding explosives, the plutonium pit sets off a small nuclear reaction, creating a larger secondary explosion in the main nuclear payload inside a warhead or a bomb that causes the main nuclear explosion.
“NNSA’s highest production modernization priority is re-establishing the capability to produce new plutonium pits that was lost in 1989 when production at Rocky Flats [Colorado] was halted,” Granholm and Hruby said in their prepared statement for Wednesday’s hearing.
The plan has been to re-establish pit production – first in New Mexico at Los Alamos National Laboratory’s existing plutonium facility, with a goal of 30 pits per year by 2026 for the W87-1. Meanwhile, work has been underway at Savannah River National Laboratory, South Carolina, to create a pit production line in an existing facility for the new W93 warhead. The goal was 50 pits per year by 2030.
“Although the W87-1 and W93 programs are setting the quantity and schedule of pit production now,” the Granholm/Hruby statement said, “other future weapons will also require newly produced pits. Pit production will be needed to support the stockpile as long as nuclear weapons exist.”
Delays and higher costs have set back the program. Hruby told the Senate committee it would be 2028 before Los Alamos reaches 30 pits per year. Savannah River represents more of a problem and Hruby said it may not produce usable pits until “a few years” after 2032. Hruby said that means that “the first half” of the W93s would be put together with re-used pits from previously dismantled nuclear weapons which, she added, “introduces some uncertainty.”
The Granholm/Hruby statement described continuing development of scientific methods to support assessment of the current nuclear weapons stockpile, as well as design, development and certification of newly produced nuclear weapons without resuming underground nuclear explosive testing.
Ninety-nine percent of the yield from U.S nuclear weapons occurs under high-energy-density, which can be studied using laboratory-based Inertial Confinement Fusion, which is done by NNSA at four facilities. In addition, the U.S. carries out subcritical experiments in which chemical explosives create extreme heat and pressure in tiny amounts of weapons-grade uranium or plutonium without creating a nuclear chain reaction. Most subcritical experiments are carried out in the Principal Underground Laboratory for Subcritical Experimentation at the Nevada National Security Site near Mercury, Nevada.
The Granholm/Hruby statement said one of the highest priorities for subcritical experiments is the support of an ongoing research program studying plutonium and pit aging, which will give NNSA more confidence in predicting pit lifetimes for each stockpiled U.S. nuclear weapon.
Drones and other dangers
As for security for its facilities, NNSA has been concerned since 2018 about the threat from bomb-carrying drones, which has only been heightened given their widespread use by both sides in Ukraine, by the Houthis against shipping in a crucial Red Sea corridor, and by Iran in its recent attack against Israel.
“We do already deploy UAS (un-crewed aerial system/i.e. drone) detection and counter UAS systems,” Hruby testified in answer to a question, “but they are not good enough for the future threats that we’re already beginning to see. So we are updating those.”
She said NNSA was creating a test range at the Idaho National Laboratory, expected to be completed next year, where people can study and learn how to use new counter-UAS systems. The Granholm/Hruby statement these would include devices using radio frequency, directed energy, kinetic, and radar.
Hruby added, “We are trying to change our policy so that our protective forces, as they detect UAS forces that cross a line to things [facilities] that we are really trying to guard – our crown jewels if you will – that they can counter those systems without additional approval.”
One final matter needs discussion: what the Granholm/Hruby statement called “the largest environmental cleanup program in the world.” That is their description of what they say is “the [U.S.] government’s responsibility to clean up the environment in communities that supported nuclear weapons programs and government-sponsored nuclear energy research” during both World War II and the Cold War.
I believe it worth focusing on because it is another reminder of just how long-lasting the dangers from nuclear weapons are – and even the building of them.
The Granholm/Hruby statement points out, “For nearly 35 years EM (NNSA’s Office of Environmental Management) has achieved significant progress for the environment, completing cleanup at 92 out of a total of 107 sites.” The NNSA 2025 request includes $7.1 billion for defense environmental cleanup activities for next year alone. For comparison, $19 billion is sought for all next year’s nuclear weapons programs.
In other words, environmental cleanup from past years nuclear weapons activities cost a bit less than half of what the U.S. is spending on managing the current weapons stockpile and building new weapons.
By the way, Hruby told the Senators, “Last year we provided the Department of Defense over 200 modernized [nuclear] weapons [warheads or bombs] on schedule.”
A reminder: The latest State Department public report from March 2023, shows the U.S. had 1,419 nuclear warheads or bombs deployed on ICBMs, SLBMs, and Heavy Bombers.
Feel safe.
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