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Air Force Association (Whoa!) Sees Bomberless Dyad in U.S. Future
Travis | Dec 14, 2009 |
0 The Air Force Association’s Mitchell Institute for Airpower Studies released a new report this month that sees a “de facto nuclear dyad” of ICBMs and SLBMs – sans bombers - as the future nuclear force posture of the United States.
As with many nuclear weapons issues right now, however, properly interpreting the report hinges on what your definition of “modernization” is…
It’s hard to imagine the Air Force giving up nuclear bombers. After all, “they have wings,” as one Air Force officer jokingly put it at a briefing several months back.
The Mitchell Institute, however, is vigorously pro-Air Force and has a good sense of what the Air Force is thinking (to the extent that any large, complex organization thinks monolithically). Thus, the Mitchell Institute report may suggest that elements within the Air Force are beginning to think seriously about what an altered U.S. nuclear force posture might look like down the road (remember that New START won’t require any substantial force reductions, as a senior official reiterated to Josh Rogin).
On the other hand, the report may be meant to function as more of a doom-and-gloom warning about the bomberless future that awaits the United States if it does not get serious about the Next Generation Bomber. The report says that bomber modernization is “in disarray” and that bombers are “armed with weapons of questionable reliability.” Yet these assessments are debatable. As Kingston and I have both written, the United States currently invests significantly in each leg of its nuclear triad - including bombers - and Secretary Gates has publicly committed to funding the B-X in the 2011 budget. That would seem to constitute “modernization,” don’t you think?
Anyway, here is the report’s conclusion:
Based on this analysis, we conclude that the US Department of Defense should pursue an ICBM/SLBM Dyad as it moves to reshape its nuclear force posture at lower warhead levels. Essentially, the US is already moving in this direction: the ICBMs and SLBMs remain robust, with modernization scheduled and funded, but the aging ALCM calls into question the value of the B-52 fleet, while the modernized but very small B-2 force is assuming a niche role. In short, the United States will soon field a de facto nuclear Dyad. Rather than evolving to a Dyad by default, we believe that the following steps should be taken as a way to hedge against force structure changes, policy developments, and budgetary uncertainties. For the near term, the United States should:
• Maintain the 450 ICBM force as a substitute for the declining bomber leg.
• Maintain the current SSBN fleet and continue plans to develop the Ohio class replacement.
• Maintain and modernize the B-2 force to retain the capability to conduct nuclear strikes.
• Phase out the B-52 from a nuclear role as the ALCMs are retired from service.
• Divest any planned investments dedicated to keeping the B-52 in a nuclear role and put them into a new conventional bomber that could be manned or unmanned. This divestiture would also include R&D funding of a new nuclear-capable ALCM. Although conventional long-range strike capabilities will be even more important in the emerging security environment, the research and development of a new nuclear cruise missile and a new nuclear bomber do not appear to be prudent investments in an era of nuclear force reductions.
UPDATE 12/16: Bob Mackey weighs in at Obsidian Wings.
UPDATE II 12/16: Elaine Grossman covers the report at GSN. Some of the feedback she received:
The report authors wrongly base their recommendations "on warfighting capability, missing the point that nukes are political and nukes are a deterrent," asserted Billy Mullins, Air Force associate assistant chief of staff for strategic deterrence and nuclear integration.
"Bombers have a very unique place in their being able to signal [intent]," he told GSN in an interview last week. "They're very visible when you generate them. ... Not as much when you flush subs, and definitely you can't tell anything is going on in the [ICBM] missile fields."
[snip]
"Some of the assumptions -- a lot of the numbers and math -- were off significantly enough to color your outcomes," said an Air Force colonel.
An analytical tool the group used in the report "doesn't tend to capture" the relative importance of the various attributes of the different legs of the nuclear triad, artificially weighing each attribute equally, another colonel complained.
[snip]
"The Air Force and DOD have seriously considered going conventional-only [on the] bombers," said the retired service officer, speaking on condition of not being named in discussing a politically sensitive matter. "I don't know that the Air Force is particularly an advocate for the nuclear bomber today."
That said, "I don't believe that the current leadership of the Air Force is willing to expose themselves to not aggressively pursuing nuclear forces," according to this source. "But clearly I think they look at the nuclear mission as being marginal."
Nukes on a Blog, START, New START, Posture Review (all tags)
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