We haven't put together a Table Scraps in a while so let's dive right in.

Via friend of NoH and fellow Brewers/Bucks/Badgers/Packers fan extraordinaire Andrew O'Connor, some former custodians of our ICBMs have got it in their heads that UFOs have been monitoring our nukes.  I kid you not.  The group is holding a press conference at the National Press Club next Monday to reveal heretofore undisclosed evidence proving that it ain't only Russia's nuclear arsenal that we ought to be worried about.  I'm eager to find out if said UFOs are a precursor to an Independence Day style invasion of earth.  If so, I take solace in the fact that there are some real-life Russell Casse's out there who can save the planet (even if they aren't exactly pilots)...

In other news, NoH has long admired former NNSA chief Amb. Linton Brook's effectively dry sense of humor when talking about arms control.

Knoxnews' Frank Munger recently caught Brooks in fine form:

Earlier in the summer, Brooks had learned another lesson, and that was that the size of an issue depends on where you sit.

"Secretary of State (James Baker) and the Russian Chief of General Staff had a meeting and came out and the Secretary announced that all the issues were resolved and that the treaty would be signed on the 31st of July. At that point, I had 104 issues which were considered of sufficient importance that I had to get Washington permission before I could agree to any of them."

He added: "But that's what's fun. Otherwise, it's just a giant, boring, contract law negotiation." [emphasis mine.]

As the kids like to say, LOL.

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Nukes on a Blog, Table Scraps, New START (all tags)

J-Lew on Olbermann. Greatest. Interview. Ever.

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Nukes on a Blog, Table Scraps (all tags)

Jason Sigger skillfully critiques Elaine Grossman’s recent story on Pentagon counter-WMD efforts. His closing argument about the value of the military’s role is spot on. Yet I question whether elevating nuclear terrorism’s prominence in U.S. defense white papers and making the corresponding alterations to operational programs ought to be labeled “wasting assets” simply because we all agree that nuclear terrorism is less likely than other threats. It’s important to differentiate between the rhetorical flourishes of national security commentators (“Give me what I want on any issue under the sun or NUCLEAR TERRORISM!!!”), which understandably irk, and the actual allocation of resources (only two-tenths of one percent of U.S. security spending goes toward helping foreign governments stop the theft of nuclear materials). Is two-tenths of one percent wasted on protecting against a contingency that, were it to occur, would produce catastrophic consequences?

Max Bergmann bonks the notion that New START ratification can be de-politicized. Learn it, live it, love it: “[I]t makes little sense to pursue a ratification strategy that seeks to ‘de-politicize’ treaty ratification, when it is clear that treaty opponents will in fact aggressively politicize treaty ratification,” writes Bergman. Not to say that winning in Box #1 will be easy, of course.

The Stimson Center last week released its analysis of the FY 2011 international affairs budget request. There are big increases across the board.

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Nukes on a Blog, Table Scraps, Nuclear Terrorism, FY2011 Budget Request (all tags)

Chalk up another Republican endorsement for the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty.  Last Friday former Utah Republican Senator Jake Garn called on the U.S. Senate to ratify the Treaty.  Said Garn:

Today, one of our greatest security interests is to discourage nuclear weapons testing by others. A global verifiable ban on testing would help block the ability of nuclear-armed countries, such as China, to develop more advanced nuclear weapons. Without nuclear weapon test explosions, could-be nuclear-armed nations — like Iran — would not be able to proof test the smaller, more sophisticated nuclear warhead designs that could be used to arm ballistic missiles.

Evidence that the Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) has some pretty sensible views on nuclear weapons continues to pour in.  Last week Japanese Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama reaffirmed the DPJ's commitment to Japan's three nonnuclear principles.  Meanwhile, in an end of the year letter to Secretary of State Hilary Clinton, Japanese Foreign Minister Okada stated that the Japanese diplomats who told the Congressional Commission on the Strategic Posture of the United States that the TLAM-N is a key piece of the U.S. extended deterrent to Japan might have gone a little overboard.  According to Okada:

Hence, although the discussions were held under the previous Cabinet, it is my understanding that, in the course of exchanges between our countries, including the deliberations of the above mentioned Commission, it was never the case that views were expressed as being those of our government concerning whether or not your government should possess particular [weapons] systems such as TLAM/N and RNEP. If, in some tentative way such a view was expressed, it would clearly be at variance with my views, which are in favor of nuclear disarmament.

In a speech on European Security at L’Ecole Militaire in Paris Secretary of State Clinton reiterated the Obama administration's commitment to a world free of nuclear weapons.  She also commented on the ongoing Nuclear Posture Review.  On the Review Clinton noted: we are conducting a comprehensive Nuclear Posture Review to chart a new course that strengthens deterrence and reassurance for the United States and our allies while reducing the role and number of the nuclear weapons we have.  How exactly this tightrope will be walked will be revealed (as of now) on March 1.

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Nukes on a Blog, Table Scraps, tactical nuclear weapons, Japan, Extended Deterrence, Nuclear Posture Review (all tags)

Pavel Podvig flags a quote from a Russian Ministry of Defense source that the RS-24, a multiple-warhead version of the single warhead SS-27, could begin to be deployed in 2011, after one or two more flight tests.  Russia had originally planned to deploy the missile in December 2009 to coincide with the expiration of START.  Are development/testing problems slowing things down?  It wouldn’t be the first time.  Another theory is that the delay might have something to do with the New START negotiations.  In a recent article published on the Center for Nonproliferation Studies’ website (and written before the Ministry of Defense source announced the delay),  Dr. Alexander A. Pikayev, Director of the Department for Disarmament and Conflict Resolution at the Institute of World Economy and International Relations (IMEMO) in Moscow opined that:

[W]hen in November 2009 the Ministry of Defense disclosed new deployments of the Topol M, it did not mention the RS-24. Nor did the ministry announce any plans to deploy them in 2010.

The decision could be explained by various reasons, from economic to purely technical. But it might also be possible that the inaction reflects the Kremlin's desire not to complicate the situation further at a time that the self-imposed deadline for completing the new [START] agreement had already been missed. If this supposition is accurate, it would demonstrate Moscow's continuing interest in concluding a follow-on treaty.

Continuing on the topic of delays, Global Security Newswire’s Elaine Grossman reports that further refurbishment of the B-61 air-delivered gravity bomb is being delayed by Congress, at least for the time-being.  NoH was all over this back in October when the conference report on the FY2010 Energy and Water Appropriations Bill was completed.  Recall that NNSA's initial funding request last February was only enough to study a non-nuclear refurbishment of the B61.  However, if Gen. Chilton’s now (in)famous briefing slides on the B61 are any indication, STRATCOM definitely wants to tinker around with the weapon’s nuclear explosive package, specifically to enhance Surety.  If the Nuclear Posture Review rules in favor of the B61, we can probably expect funding to be requested and approved to look at the explosive package.

Finally, a couple of duck hunters caused quite a stir last Friday as they tried to set up some decoys on a piece of land near the Pantex Plant, which assembles and disassembles our nuclear weapons.  On a sorta related note, Duck Hunt is hands down the greatest Nintendo game of all time.              

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Nukes on a Blog, Table Scraps, RS-24, B61 (all tags)

According to Reuters, the forthcoming Fiscal Year (FY) 2011 defense budget “foresees spending about $4 billion over the next five years to maintain the U.S. bomber industrial base, study plans for a possible new bomber, and upgrade existing B-2 and B-52 bombers.” Undersecretary of Defense for Acquisition Ashton Carter said yesterday that when it comes to details about the new bomber, "We will provide an answer on what comes next on that within the next year." Secretary Gates said previously that the new bomber would likely get around $1 billion in FY 2011.

At a HASC subcommittee hearing yesterday, CBO analyst Eric Labs said that building 12 new SSBN(X) ballistic missile submarines to replace the 14 Ohio-class subs could cost around $85 billion, with the lead ship costing $11 billion and subsequent ships costing $7 billion apiece. More modern construction techniques could help hold down costs; however, increased labor and material costs, the enhanced capabilities of all Navy subs, and the current low rate of ship construction (i.e. fixed overhead costs spread over fewer ships) might push costs upward.

At the same hearing, CRS analyst Ronald O’Rourke made the point that if the Navy pays for the new SSBN(X) out of its regular shipbuilding budget, it would have to steal money from other programs. This could reduce the total number of ships the Navy is able to procure by 56 (20 percent) and “make a substantial consolidation of some kind of the surface ship construction industrial base a distinct possibility, if not a likelihood,” according to O’Rourke. To deal with this problem, the Navy has started asking whether or not an individual service like the Navy should be responsible for spending so much of its own budget on “force structure elements that serve a national mission of strategic nuclear deterrence,” as O’Rourke put it. Loren Thompson suggested to HASC the creation of a “separate, strategic funding” category for the SSBN(X) that would keep it separate from other shipbuilding programs, a model similar to how the Department of Energy pays for U.S. nuclear warheads even though they are fielded aboard DOD-financed delivery vehicles.

One last thing covered at the hearing was the issue of ship requirements for the Obama administration's rejiggered plan for U.S. missile defense in Europe (yeah, we might consider Aegis missile defense a "strategic" budget priority now). For more detail, read what both Labs and O'Rourke said.

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Nukes on a Blog, Table Scraps, Iran Watch, Missile Defense, Defense Spending, Posture Review, Acquisition, Navy, Air Force (all tags)

Lt. Gen. David Deptula, Air Force deputy chief of staff for ISR, said last week that a new multi-role long-range bomber is his top purchasing priority. "We cannot move into a future without a platform that allows the United States of America to project power over long distances and to meet advanced threat systems in a fashion that gives us an advantage that no other nation has…We can’t walk away from that,” remarked Deptula. Discussion about a nuclear-capable next-generation bomber has simmered for years (see here and here for recent examples) and the Air Force remains strongly committed, perhaps because, as Loren Thompson noted, “The Air Force owes its existence to the strategic bombing mission.”

Inside Defense (subscription only) reported last week that the Navy is trying to figure out the best way to tell Congress that its $80 billion plan to buy 12 next-generation ballistic missile submarines could force shipbuilding cuts and lead to industry consolidation. Production of the next-generation subs is slated to begin in 2019 so that they will be ready when Ohio-class subs start retiring in 2027. The Navy’s 30-year planning document is due to Capitol Hill in two months.

Finally, the Center put together a new fact sheet detailing the pros and cons of bombers, ICBMs, and SLBMs. Our objective was to preemptively referee intra-triad sniping, which we are already seeing now that delivery vehicle reductions may be forthcoming. Of course, none of this is new. As he was researching the fact sheet, Kirk found a great GAO report from 1993 which concluded that the vulnerability of each leg of the U.S. triad was consistently exaggerated during the Cold War by advocates of other legs. As GAO concluded about U.S. submarines:

For the sea leg, this [threat inflation] was reflected in unsubstantiated allegations about likely future breakthroughs in Soviet submarine detection technologies…The projected threat to the sea leg was…used frequently as a justification for costly modernizations in the other legs to “hedge” against SSBN vulnerability. Our specific finding, based on operational test results, was that submerged SSBNs are even less detectable than is generally understood.

Now who in the world would publish such unsubstantiated allegations?

(Yep, that’s a Puff Diddy Daddy reference in the title. Got a problem with it? Do something.)

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Nukes on a Blog, Table Scraps, Navy, Posture Review, Defense Spending (all tags)

More data points calling into question the assertion that Japan might seek nuclear weapons if the United States tweaks its force posture…

On November 13, the United States and Japan released a joint statement on the vision of a world free of nuclear weapons. According to the statement:  

The Government of the United States continues to seek early conclusion of a START follow-on treaty through negotiations with the Russian Federation. The Government of Japan welcomes the progress made in the negotiations and expresses its expectation for early agreement. The Government of the United States and the Government of Japan call upon states that hold nuclear weapons to respect the principles of transparency, verifiability and irreversibility in the process of nuclear disarmament. The Government of the United States is committed to reducing the role of nuclear weapons in its national security strategy, and the Government of the United States and the Government of Japan urge other states that hold nuclear weapons to do the same.

On November 23, Masakatsu Ota of Kyodo News revealed that before the Democratic Party of Japan won a landslide election victory in August 2009, the Liberal Democratic Party-led Japanese government lobbied the Strategic Posture Commission to maintain the capability to deploy the Tomahawk Land Attack Missile/Nuclear (TLAM/N). It’s unlikely that the new government will be so gung-ho about the TLAM/N, especially since, as Jeffrey notes, it could accidentally crash into Japan or South Korea if it were ever fired at North Korea. And don’t forget that, much to former Secretary Schlesinger’s chagrin, the U.S. Navy appears to care less about the TLAM-N.

A Kyodo News survey of the Democratic Party of Japan’s Lower House members conducted in October found that 87.2 percent of the respondents would support a U.S. “no first use” declaratory policy. Only 4.7 percent of the respondents thought that the Japanese constitution’s three nonnuclear principles should be reviewed. The survey drew responses from 211 of the Democratic Party of Japan’s 308 Lower House Members.

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Nukes on a Blog, Posture Review, North Korea, Table Scraps, New START, Japan (all tags)

Our sister organization, Council for a Livable World, regularly sends out snail mail fundraising letters on behalf of congressional candidates that it has endorsed. Sometimes the letters are returned with heartfelt messages thanking CLW for all of its hard work. Sometimes the letters are returned with more unorthodox points of view. Here’s one CLW received a few weeks ago (appropriately smudged to maintain NOH’s immaculate decorum):

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Table Scraps, Jobs (all tags)

Daryl Kimball today offers a comprehensive rebuttal to Sen. Jon Kyl’s recent WSJ op-ed, “Why We Need to Test Nuclear Weapons.”

On Sunday, The Spectrum of southern Utah editorialized in favor of the Test Ban:

As we know in Utah, you don't have to have an atomic bomb land on top of you to kill you. The fallout can be equally deadly as it floats through the atmosphere, causing various cancers that have taken thousands of lives.

[snip]

It's time to put the same principles that proved effective in stopping Divine Strake to pushing for the United States to ratify the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty.

Why? We already have a nuclear arsenal that far outweighs any other on the globe. There have been proposals to reconfigure the existing weaponry into newer, "smarter" nukes that have, thankfully, been defeated. The fact is, if this nation was ever to begin launching nukes, there are more than enough to get the job done, even if some are not quite as powerful as others.

Kirk called The Spectrum to find out about its political leanings. It endorsed Republican John Swallow in both (2002, 2004) of his failed efforts to unseat Democratic Rep. Jim Matheson; Republican Sen. Robert Bennett in 2004; Republican Sen. Orrin Hatch in 2006; and Republican Gov. Jon Huntsman in both of his races (2004, 2008). In other words, it ain’t no liberal rag.

In an op-ed in The Hill last week, former STRATCOM commander Gen. Eugene Habiger wrote:

With the very security of our nation at stake, the time for partisan games is over.  The recommendations of the forthcoming Nuclear Posture Review should reflect the operational necessities of today’s military. And the Congress should prepare to work with the President on the follow-on to START and the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty…The task at hand is serious. So is the President’s policy. We should support it.

The Big Mo rolls on.

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Nukes on a Blog, CTBT, Table Scraps (all tags)