Aug 28, 2009

Pentagon Vetting Could Delay Warhead Modernization Plan

By Elaine M. Grossman, Global Security Newswire

WASHINGTON -- U.S. Defense Department leaders plan to submit to outside technical review their forthcoming recommendation on how to proceed with nuclear warhead modernization, a process that might delay a decision on the contentious plan until next year, according to a senior official (see GSN, Aug. 18).

Pentagon officials say they are weighing an array of modernization options as part of the congressionally mandated Nuclear Posture Review, a broad assessment of the nation's strategy, forces and readiness due in December.

One alternative could be to continue maintaining the existing stockpile through reuse and refurbishment, officials say. Another might be to replace aging warheads with a newly crafted design aimed at boosting the safety, security and reliability of the stockpile.

Once recommended modernization options have been narrowed down, Pentagon leaders expect to submit them for assessment by outside scientists -- a process that might well extend beyond the due date for the posture review, the defense official said in an interview yesterday. How many months of delay might be involved remains uncertain.

"It's better to understand those considerations in advance, [and] decide if you agree with them or not, rather than to have them come up after the fact," said the senior official, who declined to be identified because of political sensitivities surrounding the posture review.

"It would be preferable if it happens within the NPR" time frame, the senior official told Global Security Newswire.

However, "if the technical details aren't sorted by then," the official said, the posture review might indicate instead: "OK, here's what the basic principles are that should guide where we go in the future, and here are the next decisions that need to be taken, and the next research actions or technical analysis actions that need to be considered."

President Barack Obama's national security team remains deeply divided over how best to maintain the viability of an aging arsenal in the absence of explosive testing. The United States has implemented a moratorium on underground tests since the early 1990s.

While serving as President George W. Bush's defense secretary, Robert Gates advocated building a Reliable Replacement Warhead, but Congress twice rejected funding for the effort. Lawmakers argued that an untested RRW design could actually raise doubts about nuclear-weapon reliability -- potentially harming deterrence -- and undermine Washington's efforts at thwarting nuclear proliferation around the globe.

Now serving a new president, Gates has pushed behind the scenes to revive a "replacement" approach to nuclear arms modernization. Despite growing support for warhead replacement among other Cabinet leaders, Vice President Joseph Biden in June rebuffed the idea, saying it could derail Obama's vision for reducing the role nuclear weapons play worldwide, GSN reported last week.

During the presidential campaign, Obama said he opposed "rushing to produce a new generation of warheads." Once in the Oval Office, the president committed to pursuing the eventual elimination of nuclear weapons. For the foreseeable future, though, the United States will "maintain a safe, secure and effective arsenal," Obama said during a major address in Prague.

How the president opts to proceed with nuclear warhead modernization is "an issue of great interest -- not just in DOD and DOE -- but across the government," said the senior Pentagon official, referring to the Defense and Energy departments.

Beyond that, "potential adversaries are likely watching closely to see how the new administration balances its security needs and its alliance commitments with the president's goal of global nuclear elimination," Thomas Scheber, a senior Pentagon official during the Bush administration, said yesterday.

"It is somewhat of a schizophrenic Nuclear Posture Review," Hans Kristensen, who directs the Federation of American Scientists' Nuclear Information Project, said at a press briefing yesterday. "The planners are being asked to do, in a way, two very different things. How do you do that?"

Few observers expect Biden's protest to be the last word on the matter.

In fact, the senior official indicated the Nuclear Posture Review would likely regard "replacement" as at least one facet of any effort aimed at extending the lives of today's nuclear warheads.

"The starting point for analysis is that life extension [is] generally understood to include everything -- all the three R's," said the official, referring to warhead reuse, refurbishment and replacement.

A critical distinction is that any replacement parts or warheads would stop short of improving a weapon's military capabilities against a target, and instead would simply enhance its safety, security or reliability, according to the defense official.

"I think warhead replacement ought to be an option available to policy-makers as a last resort in the event of a significant failure in one or more life-extension programs," said Jeffrey Lewis, who directs the New America Foundation's Nuclear Strategy and Nonproliferation Initiative. "That means drawing a bright line" between research aimed at maintaining a replacement option, and "engineering development work to actually exercise it," he said.

The senior defense official noted that the devil is very much in the details of any approach to nuclear modernization.

"I hope we're going to be successful in defining a framework for thinking about the problem," said the official, describing a process of sorting out exactly which initiatives are -- and are not -- technically and politically feasible.

Some "elements" of the modernization framework are in place as the review coalesces, the senior defense official said, but the Pentagon-led assessment has not yet completed its proposal for maintaining the stockpile.

One idea on the table is to introduce "common design elements" across multiple warheads in the arsenal, according to the defense official.

"In the future, we may not always have different warheads for our ICBMs and our SLBMs, in particular," the official told GSN. However, he did not elaborate on the cost or technical reasons for introducing more warhead commonality into the arsenal, or the modernization benefits to be achieved.

The official did say that such an approach "would involve mixing and matching primaries and secondaries" -- the two explosive stages of a thermonuclear weapon -- that were proven functional in past experiments, prior to the moratorium.

"I think everybody agrees that even if you add some safety features and if you improve reliability and take other steps, [and] if you're using existing primaries and secondaries, that would be not a replacement but a reuse," said the official, suggesting this might be a politically palatable approach.

Not everyone would agree.

If one or more components common to warheads across the arsenal were at some point found to be defective, the reliability of a sizable portion of the stockpile might be thrown into question overnight, Kristensen noted. For that reason, the Bush administration emphasized the importance of maintaining "warhead diversity" across the sea, land and air legs of the nuclear triad.

"An untested, modernized warhead would seem to compound the risks of [a common-warhead] strategy," Kristensen told GSN yesterday in an e-mailed response to questions.

The senior defense official conceded "it's possible" that some scientists would raise a red flag on the idea of increasing warhead commonality. However, he said some other initiatives might be undertaken to mitigate the risks of warhead failure in the absence of explosive testing.

One approach might be to mix and match only those parts that have been extensively tested in the past, the official said. Another could be to increase the design margins in modernized warheads, making them less sensitive to small defects and less likely to fail.

The idea of vetting the Nuclear Posture Review's near-final modernization options with the scientific community reflects a lesson learned from the Pentagon's experience in pursuing the Reliable Replacement Warhead, the official said.

"People involved in this [review] have seen what happened with RRW and the fact that, at one moment, there appeared to be a technical consensus that this was the right approach," the official said. "And the next thing you know, you have it picked apart by JASONs and others. And the consensus behind it came apart and it came to be seen as an unnecessary and potentially 'new' weapon."

The JASON group -- an independent panel that frequently advises the U.S. government on scientific and technical matters -- in 2007 raised questions about whether the replacement warhead might run a higher risk of failure than existing designs in today's stockpile. Panel members voiced concerns that the RRW design combined warhead parts that had never been explosively tested in this new configuration (see GSN, Oct. 1, 2007).

The scientific community's worries -- though not universally shared -- led lawmakers to demand further study before they would appropriate funds to develop the new warhead.

"That history is not lost on us," the senior defense official said. "So as we go through and develop an approach and plan -- before we go public with it -- we want to be sure that it will sustain rigorous technical analysis. ... That means getting a second and a third opinion."

"It reaffirms how badly the previous administration got burned on the RRW that [Obama administration officials] are still uncertain about how to approach the modernization question," Kristensen said.

The senior defense official also said it might be impossible to identify a single, proposed modernization solution for each type of warhead in the arsenal before year's end. In such a case, further studies -- apart from the external technical vetting -- might be warranted.

It is "possible" the "NPR will recommend moving forward with a study of different options" for modernization affecting one or more warheads in today's stockpile, the senior defense official said.

Further study "could be as narrow as [considering] how to deal with issues associated with a specific warhead or couple of warheads, or it could be more fundamental," the official added. "If we don't have it all tied up in a bow -- which is very possible -- I think it's more likely to be a somewhat narrow set of questions."

The objective, the official said, would be to winnow down the potential recommendations undergoing further study "as much as possible," while offering "a very firm technical basis for what the NPR is recommending" when it debuts in December, the official said.

Scheber, now vice president of the National Institute for Public Policy, counseled against any significant delays on modernization.

"The can has already been kicked down a long road," he told GSN.

However, one advantage to further putting off a decision on potential replacement options could be "that in a few years, we will have a much better sense of how well the ongoing life-extension programs are going," Lewis said.

The Energy Department, its semiautonomous National Nuclear Security Administration and the national laboratories are providing scientific and technical support for the posture review. These organizations have supported an RRW-type approach in the past, though Kristensen asserted they have used their responsibility to maintain the nuclear stockpile "as an excuse for modernization."

The senior official would not say whether the JASON panel or others would be tapped to perform the external scientific study.

"Given the extremely technical nature of some of the issues that come up, there is not a very large community to which we're going to reach out," said the official.

Kristensen welcomed the concept of an external study, provided that reviewers are given adequate access to nuclear weapon information and data.

However, he argued that the postponement might help advance a replacement-warhead approach by allowing Pentagon officials to unveil the plan after national attention on the Nuclear Posture Review results diminishes, thereby minimizing the potential for renewed controversy.

"The risk is that this is really RRW through the back door," Kristensen said. The Pentagon might build "gradual support for incremental enhancements to individual systems without confronting the Obama pledge [not to build new weapons] head-on," he said.

35 comments:

Anonymous said...

Incremental enhancements? Isn't that just the LEPs? Aren't those just baby-steps towards refining the systems we already have towards the same goal RRW had in one big leap? Fine -- we won't bother with a single reliable REPLACEMENT warhead. We'll just do a sequence of reliable REVISED warheads.

Anonymous said...

Administrator highlights NNSA’s safety record in remarks to 2009 Integrated Safety Management Conference
Friday, Aug 28, 2009

http://www.yournuclearnews.com/administrator+highlights+nnsa%E2%80%99s+safety+record+in+remarks+to+2009+integrated+safety+management+conference_38161.html

“- On NNSA’s Seamless Safety for the 21st Century (SS21) Campaign: “For example, our Pantex site has been a trailblazer in merging best business practices with best safety practice. They adopted the principals of a High Reliability Organization (HRO) and have utilized advanced tools like Human Performance Improvement (HPI), Behavioral Based Safety, and a robust Causal Factor Analysis Program. As a result, there has been over a 90% improvement in quality (96% fewer defects) and a 44% reduction in total reportable cases of safety concern. This was all accomplished with an 82% increase in production. That’s not a coincidence. This was done deliberately. And it was done by working closely with the DNFSB and implementing a program we called SS21, or Seamless Safety for the 21st Century. It took time and money to do this, but the results have been nothing short of remarkable. As I said, we doubled production, we improved quality, and we reduced reportable safety concerns by almost 50%.”

Keep in mind this is National Nuclear Security Administration Administrator Thomas D’Agostino making these comments – not B&W.

All I can say is to make those kind of improvements their performance must have been lower than whale dung to start with –
• “96% fewer defects”,
• “82% increase in Production” or whichever (“we doubled Production”

What a hoot – their operating at about 20% of the designed production capacity of PX & he says they accomplished an 82% increase in production (or doubled production he notes later). With the help of the DNSB they decreased production capacity by 80+% & now they take credit for doubling Disposals from 100 to 200 per year using 3X more labor than previous.

PX is no national lab but, they have essentially the same contactor as LANL & a few other NNSA sites. Get use to it- they’re here till the dismal end of the weapons complex.

Cool-ade – some just can’t get enough. Let’s have a Raise & Bonus for all the high performing managers.

Anonymous said...

Thank God we had a functioning National Laboratory system in the 1970's.

Anonymous said...

I can't believe the current administration will in any way support RRW/WR1 or any replacement design. They'll continue to kick it down the road. They want No Nukes, not newer nukes.

Anonymous said...

Scheber, now vice president of the National Institute for Public Policy, counseled against any significant delays on modernization.

Tom is a another former LANL employee who recognized the demise and collapse of the LANL weapon program after Dr. John Immele.

Eric said...

I am probably missing something. But, doesn't another delay in addressing this problem mean that more and more of the people with the requisite expertise to address this national need retire or die? So the ability to address the problem decreases year by year.

It seems that delay may be the likely political strategy but the costs of delay are very, very high. Many of the people who have made actual tests by blowing things up are now in their 80's and will now be around much longer.

Is my view wrong?

Anonymous said...

We are a weak generation that will neither compromise, nor face hard choices. We are losers. When Ted Kennedy is a hero, better to be a coward. Better to kick the can down the road.

What are the implications?

In 20-50 years, in a national crisis where we are near the brink, when we actually face the tough questions again, STRATCOM or its successor will look into the averted eyes of a National Lab director who says "Yes, these jalopies will work", and will not believe him. Because the National Lab director has a unproven team that hasn't done a thing in 40 years.

He won't risk a Challenger disaster for the whole nation. So he will recommend to the President that we back down. And so perhaps Taiwan will be conquered, or Russia will expand back into Poland or Iraq will become a Shia state or Australia will become Moslem or some other moderately serious turn will occur.

After that loss, we will begin anew. Newly motivated, talented youngsters will study and rediscover. Early Nevada shots will again fail, and eventually after more frantic and expensive effort, successful tests will prove that another generation, armed with the latest technology, will be protected by an effective nuclear deterrence.

I am ok with this, the greatest generation is followed by mine, the worst. There is nothing that can be done until we baby boomers complete our selfish exploitation and die off.

I see no downside.

Anonymous said...

Cash for Clunkers

Turn in your old B61s and B83s on something with modern technology....

Some technologies age well, others don't. Consider the Iowa class battleship, or the B52. Though the original mission for both is gone, some elements of the platforms endure because they are so well suited to the environment. This is true of 30-year old nuclear weapons.

But.....

Old platforms need to be modernized. A modern B52 doesn't fly with vacuum tubes and the original jets. Indeed almost nothing is original in these jets older than the fathers of the pilots who fly them.

The BB61 battleship class was modernized with modern electronics, cruise missles, point defense systems and rocket-assisted main cannon projectiles.

Both 30-40 year old platforms, when modernized, became effective enough to play a role in the Iraq war.

The same must be done with nuclear weapons, and it must be done while someone who knows how is still alive.

Otherwise, you have a nice 1965 Chevy Biscayne ready to go.

Anonymous said...

It is perhaps better to admit that the loss of nuclear weapons capability within the United States doesn't matter.

For the foreseeable future, vital interests of the United States will not be protected by Nuclear posture. In a crisis, if the President doesn't trust the state of the arsenal or those who certify it, he will simply back down.

As for other lab adventures, they matter even less.

The contribution to preventing actual terror events is nil.

Fusion is silly. We have plenty of coal, gas and oil for many generations. Moderate use will either limit the man-made contribution to global warming or won't, it doesn't matter, we have time to adapt.

If this assessment is proven wrong, existing nuclear technology can be doubled and quadrupled in time to satisfy future needs. Therefore fusion is unnecessary.

The other peripheral sciences are here to try to keep weapons scientists happy enough to stick around. The value is rarely anything beyond that.

BIg simulations? They bring 10% more accuracy to things that '40's-era scientists could do in the same period on binder paper with a slide rule.

So. for a long time, nothing the weapons production complex does matters.

We were transitioned to private industry to make sure we could be managed by the buck. I am content now merely to collect the buck.

Anonymous said...

Remember when the NPR was being touted as the 'be-all' document to set the course of the weapons complex in a steady direction?

Now we learn there will be yet more delays. We'll kick the can down the road for another decade or two. Funding will continue to whither away. Congress and the Administration are incapable of making definitive choices in this matter so they'll continue to dither as the complex dies.

Any bright scientist at a NNSA lab should be able to figure this out by now. NNSA science labs are slowly dieing and the all-mighty dollar rules under Bechtel's eye. Escape if you can. It seems it is not going to get any better with time and your sanity and career is not worth this NNSA cluster-f*ck. Joe Martz made the smart choice in bailing out.

Anonymous said...

11:58 am: "NNSA science labs are slowly dieing..."

Typos are part of posting and are expected to occur now and again. However, persistent misspelling by supposedly educated people is sad, and not a little annoying. The word is "dying."

Anonymous said...

"Keep in mind this is National Nuclear Security Administration Administrator Thomas D’Agostino making these comments – not B&W." (6:42 AM)

Capt. Tom D'Agostino is a liar. He's been caught doing this before to boost his image.

I'm surprised that he has yet to be removed as head of the NNSA. He's been a success at doing only one thing at NNSA... completely demoralizing and destroying what's left of a once robust US nuclear weapons research and development complex. Either Bechtel or BWXT will probably see to it that he is well compensated once he finally leaves the NNSA.

Anonymous said...

The frequency with which typos appear in the comments left on this blog are a reflection of the overall quality of staff at the lab, which of course is a reflection on the overall quality of the management here. Sadly, there is still plenty of room for more down-trending.

Anonymous said...

Or simply the haste in which the posting was written. Furthermore, some of the smartest people I know cant spell. Dyslexia may play a part in that.

I would much rather see the misspelled (sic)words than misthunk thoughts and misdirected venom often on display here.

Anonymous said...

We must be blessed, then 1:31, because we frequently get venom, misspellings, and poor grammar all wrapped up into a single fragrant dropping here.

Anonymous said...

2:07 Not to mention the outright lies intended to cause unwarranted alarm among the not so blessed.

Anonymous said...

The word is "dying."

8/28/09 12:35 PM

Thanks, 12:35 pm, for the timely correction. I'll never make that mistake again. You, however, will be a pendejo forever. Look it up.

Anonymous said...

"I am probably missing something. But, doesn't another delay in addressing this problem mean that more and more of the people with the requisite expertise to address this national need retire or die? So the ability to address the problem decreases year by year."


Ironically, it’s called change you can believe in.

Anonymous said...

"..So the ability to address the problem decreases year by year."

Think of it as a stealthy form of unilateral US disarmament. With stealthy disarmament, you slowly give up your nuclear weapon research capabilities, but the rest of the world doesn't even give you credit for disarming. It's the worst of all worlds.

Anonymous said...

Bush couldn't do it. It certainly isn't going to happen now.Next topic.

Anonymous said...

"What a hoot – their operating at about 20% of the designed production capacity of PX & he says they accomplished an 82% increase in production" - 6:42 am

That's the way the for-profit NNSA contractors all like to work. It makes both the contractors and the NNSA look very good... unless, of course, some busy-body like 6:42 am starts pointing out the obvious.

It also results in bonuses and raises for all the LLC executives because of the bogus gains they can claim. LANS is currently using the same technique right here at LANL.

Anonymous said...

Ha, ha, ha... this is a funny news story! NNSA can't seem to retain the "best and brightest" at their research labs. Never the less, they are launching a big campaign to bring in more young, bright scientists to come work here.

Good luck with that, D'Agostino. Do you also plan to tell them that they'll be working for Bechtel Construction Company and that you plan on further staffing cuts in the weapons complex? Do they know about the NNSA mandated crippled laptops, polluted drinking water, continuous piss testing, endless amounts of online training and the Work Free Safety Zones? And most important of all, are they ready to start wearing shoes that GRIP?

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Nuclear Agency Plans Recruitment Drive

Friday, Aug. 28, 2009

The U.S. National Nuclear Security Administration said yesterday it plans to roll out an initiative over the next half-year aimed at promoting interest in nuclear security careers (see GSN, June 30).

A new recruitment and entry programs director is expected to help academic institutions develop curricula in areas relevant to the agency. The semiautonomous Energy Department organization also hosted a recent visit by 20 graduate students from George Washington University in the nation's capital.

“One of the great challenges NNSA will face in helping implement President [Barack] Obama’s unprecedented nuclear security agenda is recruiting and retaining the next generation of nuclear security professionals,” NNSA Administrator Thomas D’Agostino said in a press release. “Not only are we working every day to improve our aging infrastructure, but as a large percentage of our work force is approaching retirement NNSA needs to be nimble and creative to make sure we’re getting America’s brightest to join our ranks as new employees. The opportunity to speak to graduate students is a critical step in engaging them in a career in nuclear security” (U.S. National Nuclear Security Administration release, Aug. 27).

www.globalsecuritynewswire.org/
gsn/nw_20090828_5013.php

Anonymous said...

It's all part of the plan.

Anonymous said...

8/28/09 9:27 PM

My guess they are recruiting students so NNSA can turn them into mindless federal employee bureaucrats to oversee and micromanage the dying NNSA labs.

Does any LANL employee actually know any NNSA employee that provides any added value to the lab's work?

Anonymous said...

Nuclear Agency Plans Recruitment Drive

Friday, Aug. 28, 2009

The U.S. National Nuclear Security Administration said yesterday it plans to roll out an initiative over the next half-year aimed at promoting interest in nuclear security careers (see GSN, June 30).

A new recruitment and entry programs director is expected to help academic institutions develop curricula in areas relevant to the agency. The semiautonomous Energy Department organization also hosted a recent visit by 20 graduate students from George Washington University in the nation's capital.

“One of the great challenges NNSA will face in helping implement President [Barack] Obama’s unprecedented nuclear security agenda is recruiting and retaining the next generation of nuclear security professionals,” NNSA Administrator Thomas D’Agostino said in a press release. “Not only are we working every day to improve our aging infrastructure, but as a large percentage of our work force is approaching retirement NNSA needs to be nimble and creative to make sure we’re getting America’s brightest to join our ranks as new employees. The opportunity to speak to graduate students is a critical step in engaging them in a career in nuclear security” (U.S. National Nuclear Security Administration release, Aug. 27).

www.globalsecuritynewswire.org/
gsn/nw_20090828_5013.php

8/28/09 9:27 PM

The only nuclear careers left at the National Laboratories and LANS in particular are cleaning up Low Level Waste and High Level Waste at TA-46 and TA-55. After personally spending 30-years working in the elegant and prestigious nuclear weapon program with multiple engineering degrees I (and many others) was forced out, by corrupt LANS managers, including the Laboratory Director. The remainder of my career will be filling out paperwork to transport nuclear waste. This is exactly what new hires will find themselves doing should they decide to work at LANS. There is no exciting future or careers for new hires at LANS. Nuclear security... bullshit!

Anonymous said...

"The remainder of my career will be filling out paperwork to transport nuclear waste." - 11:20 AM

Just wait until Bret Knapp begins to work his management "magic" on the people over in X Division. Duck and cover!

Anonymous said...

Just curious -- how is William Rees working out as the PAD for the folks over in PADGS (Global Security)?

Anonymous said...

FYI, with DOE Q-clearances now being granted quickly, your TS level clearance may not be worth as much as you think:

--------------
Munger: With jobs on the line, clearances come quickly (Knoxville News, Aug 26)

With hiring on the increase at the government's Oak Ridge facilities because of record funding levels, including a sizable influx of Recovery Act money, the time required to get a top-level "Q" security clearance is on the decrease.

"The average time is between three to four months," Steven Wyatt, a federal spokesman at the Y-12 nuclear weapons plant, said. "At one time it was much longer than that."

In years past, the time needed to get a Q clearance often exceeded a year. That may still be true for difficult investigations, where an applicant has lived in multiple places around the world and held a variety of jobs. But, generally speaking, the process has been accelerated - presumably because of more money available in the stimulus programs.

I recently asked John Krueger, who's heading the Recovery Act cleanup projects at Y-12, if getting clearances for new personnel had been a problem at the high-security facility.

"No," he said. "In fact, we're getting clearances out here faster than ever before. I think the average is down to about three months."

It'll be interesting to see if this pattern holds up beyond the first wave of Recovery Act hirings.

-
www.knoxnews.com/news/2009/aug/26/
with-jobs-on-the-line-clearances-come-quickly/

Anonymous said...

Just a nitpicky point. Waste resulting from TA-55 is either LLW or transuranic (TRU). High level waste, by definition, can only result from nuclear reactor operations.

Anonymous said...

"Does any LANL employee actually know any NNSA employee that provides any added value to the lab's work?"

I can honestly say, "No, not a single one."

Frank Young said...

4:31 PM,
LANL disagrees with you.

"Improvements to the Laboratory's Radioactive Liquid Waste Treatment Facility at Technical Area 50 clear the way for high-level radioactive liquid waste to be accepted.

The liquid waste comes to the facility from stockpile mission activities at TA-55."

Anonymous said...

Again, high level and TRU are sometimes used interchangeably:


http://www.nrc.gov/waste/high-level-waste.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-level_waste

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transuranic_waste

Last time I checked, TA-55 does not reprocess spent fuel.

Anonymous said...

and lastly:

http://www.lanl.gov/environment/waste/ops.shtml

High-level by definition, must have actinides+fission products,which results from spent fuel reprocessing, like you would see at former operations at SRS and Hanford.

TA-55 has waste resulting from weapons production, i.e. TRU or LLW.

Frank Young said...

Harmless is also used interchangeably with high-level. It's harmless if it leaks and high-level if credit is being taken for handling it properly.

Anonymous said...

"Pentagon Vetting Could Delay Warhead Modernization Plan"

Let just continue to kick the can down the road for another decade... or two.. or, maybe three.