Login/Logout

*
*  

“For half a century, ACA has been providing the world … with advocacy, analysis, and awareness on some of the most critical topics of international peace and security, including on how to achieve our common, shared goal of a world free of nuclear weapons.”

– Izumi Nakamitsu
UN High Representative for Disarmament Affairs
June 2, 2022
The United States and the Americas

China, U.S. Restore Military Communications


March 2024
By Shizuka Kuramitsu

China and the United States resumed military-to-military contacts with a series of recent meetings, delivering on a decision by their leaders at a November 2023 summit.

Michael S. Chase (C, L), U.S. deputy assistant secretary of defense for China, Taiwan and Mongolia, hosts Chinese delegation led by Maj. Gen. Song Yanchao (C, R), deputy director of the Chinese Central Military Commission Office for International Military Cooperation for meetings at the Pentagon on Jan. 9. (U.S. Department of Defense photo by Navy Petty Officer 1st Class Alexander Kubitza)Two days of meetings, called the China-U.S. defense policy coordination talks, took place Jan. 8-9 at the Pentagon. It was the first formal in-person encounter between the two militaries since January 2020.

The meetings were co-chaired by Michael Chase, U.S. deputy assistant secretary of defense for China, Taiwan, and Mongolia, and Maj. Gen. Song Yanchao, Chinese deputy director of the Central Military Commission Office for International Military Cooperation.

The two sides discussed Chinese-U.S. defense relations and regional and global security issues, including Ukraine, North Korea, and the South China Sea, according to the U.S. Defense Department, which added that it “will continue to engage in active discussions with [Chinese] counterparts about future engagements between defense and military officials at multiple levels.”

In a Jan. 10 news release, the Chinese Defense Ministry said that its delegation expressed a willingness at the meeting “to develop a sound and stable military-to-military relationship with the U.S. side on the basis of equality and respect and work together.”

Meanwhile, on Dec. 21, two weeks before the Pentagon meeting, China and the United States conducted a video teleconference involving teams led by U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Air Force Gen. Charles Q. Brown Jr. and Chinese Gen. Liu Zhenli, the chief of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) Joint Staff Department.

The two sides discussed a number of global regional security issues, the U.S. Office of the Joint Chiefs of Staff said afterward. It also reported that the U.S. delegation reiterated “the importance of working together to responsibly manage competition, avoid miscalculations, and maintain open and direct lines of communication” and “the importance of the [PLA] engaging in substantive dialogue to reduce the likelihood of misunderstandings.”

The Chinese delegation also shared a similar viewpoint, that “the two sides exchanged candid and in-depth views on implementing the important military-related consensus reached between the two heads of state in San Francisco and on other issues of common interest,” Senior Col. Wu Qian, spokesperson for the Chinese Defense Ministry, told a press conference on Dec. 28.

“The video call yielded positive and constructive outcomes,” Wu said. “Going forward, we expect the U.S. side to work with us in the same direction and take concrete actions on the basis of equality and respect to promote the sound and steady development of [the] China-U.S. military-to-military relationship.”

Bilateral military-to-military contacts broke down after U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi visited Taiwan in 2022. Many analysts increasingly have been concerned that Beijing’s and Washington’s inability to communicate directly courts danger if a crisis erupts over Taiwan or some other major flashpoint.

But even after the recent meetings, tensions and differences between China and the United States remain evident. For example, Wu complained that the United States “has been intensifying its military deployment in the Asia-Pacific, which is full of Cold War mentality.”

“We urge the [United States] to abandon the outdated security vision and zero-sum Cold War mentality, view China and China’s military development in an objective and rational light, instead of being obsessed with the pursuit for hegemony,” Wu said.

Similarly, a Chinese Defense Ministry news release on Jan. 10 urged the U.S. side “to take seriously China’s concerns and do more things that contribute to the growth of the mil-mil relationship.”

Both sides seem determined to maintain the restored lines of communication. On Jan. 25, Wu confirmed that, “[w]ith the concerted efforts of the two sides, mil-to-mil dialogues and consultations have been steadily resumed on the basis of equality and respect. Currently, the Chinese military and the U.S. military are maintaining communication and coordination on exchange programs.”

Following the November summit between Chinese President Xi Jinping and U.S. President Joe Biden and the two sets of military-to-military meetings in December and January, U.S. National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan and Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi met in Bangkok on Jan. 26-27.

Given that 2024 marks the 45th anniversary of bilateral diplomatic relations, China said that the two countries “should work together toward mutual respect, peaceful coexistence, and win-win cooperation, finding the way for China and the United States to get along with each other,” according to the Chinese Embassy in Washington.

The U.S. Embassy in Beijing reported that, in his meeting with Wang, Sullivan “stressed that although the United States and China are in competition, both countries need to prevent it from veering into conflict or confrontation.”

Both sides also “recognized recent progress in resuming military-to-military communication…noted the importance of maintaining these channels...[and] discussed next steps on a range of areas of cooperation [including on] holding a U.S.-China dialogue on [artificial intelligence] in the spring,” the embassy said.

It added that the “two sides held candid, substantive and constructive discussions on global and regional issues, including those related to Russia’s war against Ukraine, the Middle East, [North Korea], the South China Sea, and Burma” and that Sullivan “underscored the importance of maintaining peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait.”

Further, the U.S. embassy said that the two sides “committed to maintain this strategic channel of communication and to pursue additional high-level diplomacy and consultations in key areas.”

China and the United States also held long-awaited talks on nuclear arms control on Nov. 6 in Washington D.C., the first such meeting in nearly five years.

Speaking to the Nuclear Weapons and Arms Control Working Group on Feb. 8, Mallory Stewart, the U.S. assistant secretary of state for arms control, deterrence, and stability who led the U.S. delegation to the arms control talks, admitted that “we didn’t see much substantive progress from this first engagement” with China’s representative Sun Xiaobo.

“But the idea that we would make the substantive conversation from the very first engagement that we have not had for many years on our arms control, strategic stability and risk reduction is not realistic,” she said. (See ACT, December 2023.)

“I think the key is to encourage them to appreciate why we need to share our questions and they need to share their questions, and we work together to get to a place where we address each other’s specific understandings,” added Stewart.

Meetings at the Pentagon were the first formal in-person talks since 2020.

Mexican Lawsuit Against U.S. Gun Firms to Proceed


March 2024
By Chad Lawhorn

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit has revived Mexico’s $10 billion lawsuit against U.S. gun manufacturers, which previously was dismissed by a lower court.

Alejandro Celorio Alcántara, legal adviser to the Mexican Foreign Ministry, speaks during a press conference in August 2021 when Mexico announced its suit against U.S.-based manufacturers and sellers of weapons used by organized crime groups in Mexico. (Photo by Luis Barron/Eyepix Group/Future Publishing via Getty Images)The suit accuses six companies, including Smith & Wesson and Sturm, Ruger & Co., of negligent practices that facilitate the trafficking of more than 500,000 guns annually to Mexican drug cartels, exacerbating gun violence in that country.

Despite the broad immunity granted to gun-makers by the U.S. Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act, the Boston-based appeals court unanimously found that Mexico’s lawsuit “plausibly alleges a type of claim that is statutorily exempt from the [act’s] general prohibition,” Reuters reported on Jan. 22.

Alejandro Celorio Alcántara, the lawyer leading the lawsuit for the Mexican government, told El País in an interview on Jan. 25 that the decision to revive the case was “historic.”

“Not only will we have the opportunity to present our evidence, we will be able to ask the defendant companies to share their evidence with us…. That’s the kind of information we’re going to get in litigation. It could be a gold mine,” he said.

The appeals court decision overturns a lower court’s 2022 dismissal, which found that foreign governments cannot sue under U.S. law. It marks a significant legal advancement for Mexico, supported by U.S. gun control advocates.

Mexico has argued that the actions of gun manufacturers have contributed directly to the violence within its national borders.

The lawsuit seeks financial damages and aims to hold these manufacturers accountable for their role in international arms trafficking and related harms, such as declining investment and economic activity in Mexico​​.

Other companies named in the suit are Beretta USA, Barrett Firearms Manufacturing, Colt’s Manufacturing Co., and Glock Inc. All have denied wrongdoing.

The U.S. law typically shields gun manufacturers from liability for the improper use of their products. The gun companies have argued that Mexico does not have legal standing to sue. (See ACT, September 2022.)

The lower court agreed with the immunity argument, ruling that the law prohibits legal action brought by foreign governments. The appeals court determined that the law was designed only to protect lawful firearms-related commerce and not the problem Mexico identified, namely, companies accused of aiding and abetting illegal gun sales by knowingly facilitating the trafficking of firearms into the country.

According to Celorio Alcántara, the gun-makers unsuccessfully attempted to distance themselves from the issue of gun trafficking by describing the scale and scope of supply chains and the number of individuals involved in those processes.

Mexico, on the other hand, focused on the U.S. law and why it did not apply. “We pointed out that [it] has no extraterritorial effect, that there is a direct violation of the machine gun export ban, and that the defendant companies violate state and federal laws,” Celorio Alcántara said.

The decision to revive the case could pave the way for other litigation against gun manufacturers on similar grounds, potentially affecting how firearms are marketed, distributed, and regulated within the United States and internationally.

“Other countries will surely be able to analyze whether this decision…gives them a window to sue, such as Jamaica, Canada, or other countries that are suffering from the same problem,” Celorio Alcántara said.

As the Mexican case proceeds, it likely will encounter more legal and political hurdles given the power of the gun lobby, contentious gun control debates in the United States, and intricate legal arguments surrounding the law.

Mexico’s $10 billion lawsuit against U.S. gun producers had been dismissed previously by a lower court.  

Sentinel ICBM Exceeds Projected Cost by 37 Percent


March 2024
By Libby Flatoff

The U.S. Air Force notified Congress on Jan. 18 that the new Sentinel intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) would cost 37 percent more than expected and take about two years longer than planned to build and deploy.

Cost overruns and production delays plague the new U.S. Sentinel intercontinental ballistic missile system program. (Image by Northrop Grumman)The cost per unit for the Sentinel system originally was projected to be $118 million and now is estimated at $162 million, putting the projected total program cost at roughly $130 billion over the next decade, up from an estimated baseline of $96 billion, the Air Force told Defense News.

The expected delay of the system’s initial operating capability likely will result in greater sustainment costs to keep the existing fleet of Minuteman III ICBMs operational.

The projected overrun would put the new missile system in “critical” breach of the Nunn-McCurdy Act, a law designed to prevent major cost overruns for weapons systems, a chronic problem plaguing the Pentagon.

There are two levels of breaches under the act. A program is in significant breach when the program unit cost increases by 15 percent of the current baseline or 30 percent over the original cost estimate. A critical breach occurs when the cost increases by 25 percent of the current baseline or 50 percent of the original estimate.

In 2020, Northrop Grumman was awarded a sole-source $13.3 billion contract for engineering and manufacturing Sentinel missiles to replace the current arsenal of 400 deployed Minuteman III ICBMs.

The Sentinel development program calls for acquiring 659 missiles, updating 450 launch silos, and modernizing more than 600 facilities to “like new conditions,” according to Air Force Global Strike Command. (See ACT, May 2023.)

In 2020 the Pentagon estimated that the total cost of the next-generation Sentinel program, including decades of operations and support, could be as high as $264 billion. (See ACT, March 2021.) Taking the new cost increases into account, the total cost of the program over its planned 50-year life cycle could be as high as $300 billion, plus another $15 billion for the production of the new W87-1 warhead for the missiles.

Under the act, the Defense Department is required to report to Congress whenever a major defense acquisition program exceeds certain cost thresholds. The notification must include an explanation of the cost increase, changes in the projected cost, changes in performance or schedule, action taken or proposed to control cost growth, and prior cost estimating information.

In addition, the department must submit a new selected acquisition report containing the new status of the total program cost, schedule, performance, cost per unit, and cost breach information. The report on the Sentinel program is due to be submitted within 45 days after President Joe Biden submits his budget to Congress, now set for March 9.

With a critical breach, the Office of the Secretary of Defense is required to conduct a root-cause analysis to determine what factors caused the cost increase.

Under the act, if the program is to continue, the defense secretary must certify no later than 60 days after the new selected acquisition report that the program is essential to national security, the new cost estimates are reasonable, the program is a higher priority than those whose funding will be cut to cover the cost increase, and a new management structure is in place to control additional cost growth. If the certification and requirements are met, the program will be allowed to continue.

At the Air Force Association forum on Feb. 11, Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall said that “nothing is off the table right now.… [W]e’re going to take a look at the totality of the [defense] budget” when addressing how to cover the additional $35 billion needed for the Sentinel program.

Rep. John Garamendi (D-Calif.), a member of the House Armed Services Committee and co-chair of the bicameral Nuclear Weapons and Arms Control Working Group, argued in a statement Jan. 18 that the overrun is “proof that we must look closely at our nation’s nuclear policies…[and] address our security needs without compromising fiscal responsibility.”

Some experts, such as Gabe Murphy, a national security policy analyst with Taxpayers for Common Sense, say that the United States should get rid of ICBMs entirely. “Whatever strategic value nuclear ICBMs may have held in the past, in our current security environment, they serve as little more than a bottomless pit…[into] which the Pentagon throws taxpayers’ hard-earned money,” Murphy wrote in an Feb. 11 essay for Stars and Stripes.

In 2016, former Defense Secretary William Perry wrote in The New York Times “that the United States can safely phase out” its land-based ICBM force. He argued that although the ICBM force is too costly and dangerous, submarine and bomber forces are highly accurate and thus are “sufficient to deter our enemies and will be for the foreseeable future.”

Despite the cost increases, congressional backers of the Sentinel program say it should go full-speed ahead. “Sentinel is absolutely necessary for the future of our nuclear deterrent. I’m committed to conducting vigorous oversight of the program and ensuring the Air Force follows through on making the necessary changes to address the cost overruns while continuing to advance the program,” House Armed Services Committee Chairman Mike Rogers (R-Ala.) said in a Jan. 19 press statement.

Others urged support for Sentinel whatever the cost. “Despite these challenges, abandoning or downsizing Sentinel isn’t an option. Our nation’s safety and prosperity depend on an updated and fully operational nuclear deterrent,” argued Sens. Roger Wicker (R-Miss.) and Deb Fischer (R-Neb.), the ranking members of the Senate Armed Services Committee and its strategic forces subcommittee, respectively, on Jan. 19 in The Wall Street Journal.

The projected overrun would put the new intercontinental ballistic missile program in breach of a law designed to prevent major cost overruns.

Congress Cancels Compensation for Radiation Victims


January/February 2024
By Chris Rostampour

Congress cut compensation for victims of U.S. nuclear testing-related activities from a compromise version of the 2024 fiscal year National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA). The Radiation Exposure Compensation Act (RECA) was passed by Congress in 1990 to offer health benefits and compensation to some victims who had developed serious illnesses due to radiation exposure caused by U.S. nuclear weapons development and testing in the 20th century.

Sen. Ben Ray Luján (D-N.M.), seen here at a Senate committee hearing, has been a leader in the effort to expand U.S. compensation for victims of U.S. nuclear testing-related activities. (Photo by Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)Over the years, as awareness increased about the full effects of these activities and new lawsuits were filed against the U.S. government related to radiation exposure claims, RECA’s narrow scope of coverage was broadened to include more affected communities.

In July, a bipartisan group of senators won approval to include a 29-page amendment to the draft NDAA that would extend RECA for two decades and expand its eligibility coverage to new regions and communities harmed by nuclear testing fallout. Additional harmed uranium miners and workers and certain Missouri communities affected by discarded Manhattan Project nuclear waste would have been covered for the first time. (See ACT, September 2023.)

The Senate passed its version of the NDAA by a vote of 87-13 on Dec. 13, and the House passed its version 310-118 on Dec. 14. The RECA amendment was not part of the House version of the NDAA, and the compromise hammered out by a House-Senate conference committee did not include the Senate amendment. The reconciled legislation was signed into law by President Biden on Dec. 23.

Senators who had introduced the RECA amendment blamed its exclusion on the Republican leadership in both chambers of Congress. “Earlier this year, the Senate made real progress on strengthening [RECA] when Democrats and Republicans passed my legislation” as part of the Senate NDAA, Sen. Ben Ray Luján (D-N.M.) said in a statement. “However, at the eleventh hour, [the] Republican Leadership blocked its inclusion in the final bill.”

Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.), who joined Luján in pushing the amendment, also blamed Republican leaders. In an interview with Bloomberg, he said taking the measure out of the NDAA was “100 percent a leadership decision,” referring to House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.). Hawley told The Hill that Democratic leaders in both chambers “were supportive.”

The Hill reported that McConnell had personally expressed opposition to including the amendment in the bill, telling Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) early in the conference negotiations, “I don’t want RECA in there. I want to get rid of it.”

Hawley filed a motion on Dec. 12 to stop the NDAA procedural vote from taking place, but his plea to table the bill in the Senate failed 26-73.

“The Senate passed the defense bill tonight, but it’s nothing to celebrate. Defense contractors get paid billions, while Missourians poisoned by their government get nothing. It’s a travesty,” Hawley posted on his social media account shortly after the vote.

The RECA program still could still be extended and expanded if it is added as an amendment to another piece of legislation. Luján, who has secured multiple extensions for the program, introduced a separate RECA bill in the Senate in July.

Rep. Teresa Leger Fernández (D-N.M.), who has introduced a companion bill in the House, said in a statement that the fight is not over.

“Our bipartisan coalition will not give up—we will fight to pass RECA and secure justice for our beloved New Mexico communities who unknowingly sacrificed so much for our nation’s security,” she wrote.

 

Congress cut compensation for victims of U.S. nuclear testing-related activities from a compromise version of the 2024 National Defense Authorization Act.

Congress Endorses New Nuclear Weapon


January/February 2024
By Shannon Bugos

Congress authorized $260 million for a new nuclear-armed sea-launched cruise missile (SLCM) for fiscal year 2024, despite the Biden administration’s clear desire not to pursue the weapon’s development.

U.S. representatives, from left, Mikie Sherrill (D-N.J.), Veronica Escobar (D-Texas), Harriet Hageman (R-Wyo.), Laurel Lee (R-Fla.), and Mike Collins (R-Ga.), attend the House and Senate conference committee markup of the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2024 on Capitol Hill on Nov. 29. (Photo by Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images)The administration did not request any funding for the nuclear SLCM in 2023 or 2024 because it assessed that the weapon has only “marginal utility” and would “impede investment in other priorities.” (See ACT, May and November 2023.) But for the second consecutive year, Congress overrode the Pentagon’s decision due to a majority of lawmakers viewing the SLCM as critical in the current nuclear environment.

The fiscal year 2024 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) authorizes $190 million for the missile and $70 million for its associated warhead.

The topline NDAA came in at $874 billion, a 3 percent increase from the 2023 NDAA. The grand total for national defense, which includes additional national discretionary defense spending that falls outside of the NDAA, is $886 billion.

The Senate passed the NDAA in an 87-13 vote on Dec. 13, followed by the House in a 310-118 vote on Dec. 14. President Joe Biden signed the NDAA into law on Dec. 23.

On Dec. 8, Congress unveiled the final version of the NDAA, which resolved differences between the respective House and Senate versions of the legislation passed in June.

Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) lambasted the final version of the NDAA because it no longer included an amendment that would have expanded the law compensating people who were exposed to radiation due to U.S. nuclear testing and production, known as downwinders, to additional states, extended the law for 19 years, and added coverage to uranium workers and Missouri communities harmed by discarded Manhattan Project nuclear waste.

Hawley was one of six Republican senators who voted against the NDAA’s final passage. The amendment’s exclusion is “a betrayal of the tens of thousands of Americans made sick by their government’s nuclear waste who have relied on this program for life-saving help,” Hawley said on Dec. 8, referring to the Radiation Exposure Compensation Act (RECA). With this amendment, Hawley’s state of Missouri, along with Colorado, Idaho, Montana, New Mexico, and Guam, would have been added to RECA, which currently covers people who resided in Arizona, Nevada, and Utah during the years when nuclear testing took place.

Sen. Ben Ray Luján (D-N.M.), a co-sponsor of the amendment, told The Hill on Dec. 8, “We cannot turn a blind eye to those who sacrificed for our national security.”

Overall, Congress fulfilled the Biden administration’s 2024 budget requests for nuclear weapons-related programs and activities, with some adjustments.

Lawmakers authorized $4.3 billion for continued research and development and initial procurement of the new Sentinel intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) system, which reflects a slight decrease of 0.2 percent from the request. The Air Force aims to purchase a total of about 650 Sentinel ICBMs and deploy 400 of them to replace Minuteman III ICBMs.

Bloomberg reported on Dec. 14 that the Air Force may have to assess whether the Sentinel project should be canceled as a result of major unexpected cost increases. One estimate suggests that the project may cost as much as 50 percent more than its projected $96 billion.

The Pentagon on Oct. 30 awarded Lockheed Martin a nearly $1 billion sole-source contract to provide a new reentry vehicle to carry the W87-1 warhead for the Sentinel system by 2039.

The Air Force conducted a routine test of an unarmed Minuteman III on Nov. 1, but the test culminated in intentional destruction of the test ICBM over the Pacific Ocean due to an unspecified “anomaly” during the launch.

For the Air Force, Congress also authorized $5.3 billion for R&D and construction of the B-21 Raider dual-capable strategic bomber and $958 million, a $20 million decrease from the request, for the new nuclear-capable air-launched cruise missile, known as the Long-Range Standoff Weapons (LRSO) system. Over the coming years, the Air Force plans to buy a total of about 100 bombers and 1,000 missiles.

The B-21 bomber, unveiled a year ago, had its highly anticipated first flight test on Nov. 10 in California.

For the Navy, Congress authorized $6.1 billion for R&D and procurement of what ultimately will be a fleet of 12 Columbia-class ballistic missile submarines, a $10 million increase from the request. As planned, this will allow for the purchase of one submarine in 2024, the second submarine of the fleet.

The Army does not have a nuclear weapons program, but has been developing a conventional, ground-launched midrange missile, a capability previously prohibited under the 1987 Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty, which ended in 2019 after the United States withdrew from the agreement. This capability, known as the Typhon system, features modified Standard Missile-6 and Tomahawk cruise missiles.

Congress authorized the requested $170 million for the purchase of 58 new Block V Tomahawk missiles, as well as $32 million for continued R&D.

Although the Pentagon handles nuclear weapons delivery systems, the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) maintains and develops the nuclear warheads.

The NNSA asked in October to amend its 2024 budget request to account for its unanticipated decision to develop an additional variant of the B61 nuclear gravity bomb. (See ACT, December 2023.) Congress granted the request for $52 million for developmental engineering activities for the new variant, the B61-13.

The Pentagon hopes that the B61-13 variant will help catalyze the retirement process of the B83 megaton gravity bomb, which some lawmakers have resisted, believing the B83 to be necessary to target hard and deeply buried targets.

Congress authorized the NNSA requests for the B61-12 gravity bomb, the W87-1 ICBM warhead, the W80 LRSO warhead, and the new controversial W93 submarine-launched ballistic missile programs at $450 million, $1.1 billion, $1 billion, and $390 million, respectively. Lawmakers authorized the requested $1.8 billion for plutonium-pit production at the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico and a $142 million increase to a total of $1.1 billion for plutonium-pit production at the Savannah River Site in South Carolina.

In addition, Congress authorized the Biden administration’s request for $351 million for the Cooperative Threat Reduction program, which endeavors to counter threats from weapons of mass destruction and related challenges, including the spread of dangerous pathogens such as the coronavirus.

Although the NDAA provides the approval for federal defense spending, no money actually can be spent until Congress also passes and the president signs the relevant defense and energy and water appropriations legislation. So far, no appropriations legislation has reached the president’s desk.

Congress authorized $260 million for a new nuclear-armed sea-launched cruise missile for fiscal year 2024, despite the Biden administration’s clear desire not to pursue the weapon’s development.

Congress Eliminates ARRW System Funding


January/February 2024
By Shannon Bugos

As anticipated, Congress discontinued funding for the U.S. Air Force flagship hypersonic weapons program, the Air-Launched Rapid Response Weapon (ARRW).

After a string of testing failures since 2021 and the cancellation of ARRW system procurement earlier this year, Congress zeroed out the Biden administration’s request for $150 million for the hypersonic boost-glide system in the fiscal year 2024 National Defense Authorization Act. (See ACT, May and November 2023.)

The Air Force intends to shift its focus instead to its Hypersonic Attack Cruise Missile program, for which Congress authorized the requested $382 million.

Congress also reduced the procurement budget for the Navy’s hypersonic boost-glide system, Conventional Prompt Strike, by 33 percent as the full requested amount of $341 million was “early to need,” according to budget documents. Lawmakers ultimately authorized $256 million for procurement and $901 million for continued research and development.

The other Navy hypersonic weapons program, the Hypersonic Air-Launched Offensive Anti-Surface Warfare Increment II, was authorized at $92 million, a relatively slight decrease of 4 percent from the request.

Meanwhile, Congress authorized the requested $944 million for continued R&D and $157 million for procurement of the Army Long-Range Hypersonic Weapon (LRHW) system, known as Dark Eagle, despite recent testing setbacks. Less than 10 days after a canceled LRHW test, the Army acknowledged that it would not meet the 2023 deployment goal.

 

The move to discontinue the Air-Launched Rapid Response Weapon was expected after a string of testing failures. 

U.S. Says Shift to Safer Nuclear Fuel Would Be Costly


January/February 2024
By Shizuka Kuramitsu

The United States is making progress in developing a safer low-enriched uranium (LEU) fuel for use in Navy ships, but the project is very costly, and success is not assured, according to a report by the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA).

The issue of nuclear fuel for navy ships has drawn increased attention since 2021, when the United States and the United Kingdom agreed to sell nuclear-powered submarines to Australia. Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese (L), U.S. President Joe Biden (C) and British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak discussed the issue at a press conference in San Diego last March. (Photo by Leon Neal/Getty Images)The United States now relies on highly enriched uranium to provide safe, long-lived, and reliable naval propulsion fuel. But nonproliferation experts have been urging a switch to LEU, which is more difficult to convert for use in nuclear weapons.

In a message accompanying the report, NNSA Administrator Jill Hruby said she was “pleased with the progress…made in this technically challenging effort…[because in] fiscal 2021, we reached a critical milestone” with experiments that will produce the first information evaluating novel fuel-fabrication techniques, as well as fuel performance characteristics.

Nevertheless, the report struck a downbeat tone, concluding that “these initial activities are the first steps on a long, costly path to fuel development and success is not assured.”

It predicted a reactor fuel system design effort lasting 20 to 25 years that would cost more than $1 billion and detract from higher-priority nonproliferation and naval propulsion research and development activities.

“Even if successful, the propulsion system would be less capable, only [be] applicable to aircraft carriers and require several billion dollars, in addition to fuel development costs, to deploy the supporting engineering, manufacturing and testing infrastructure,” the report said.

It added that “the analysis showed that the use of LEU would negatively impact reactor endurance, reactor size, ship costs and operational effectiveness.”But the nonproliferation expert who obtained and publicized the report, which was sent to Congress in 2022 and kept secret until now by the government, argued that the expense for the LEU project should not be questioned. “The program’s price tag is a tiny fraction of the cost of the nuclear Navy or a nuclear terrorist attack,” Alan J. Kuperman, an associate professor at the LBJ School of Public Affairs at the University of Texas at Austin and coordinator of the university’s Nuclear Proliferation Prevention Project, told Reuters.

“These documents clarify three things for the first time: the program is vital to preventing the spread of nuclear weapons, is making rapid progress, and will be implemented only if it can preserve the performance of U.S. Navy vessels,” Kuperman said.

The NNSA has been researching LEU fuel use in Navy systems since 2018 with $50 million appropriated by Congress, but the program is now in doubt after a House subcommittee cut the funding, Reuters reported.

The nuclear fuel issue has drawn increased attention since 2021, when the United States and the United Kingdom raised proliferation concerns by agreeing to sell nuclear-powered submarines to Australia, which would become the first non-nuclear-weapon state to field a ship with an HEU-powered reactor.

The United States is making progress in developing a safer low-enriched uranium fuel for use in Navy ships, but the project is very costly, and success is not assured.

U.S. to Develop Unanticipated New Nuclear Bomb


December 2023
By Shannon Bugos

The U.S. Defense Department unexpectedly announced its intention to develop an additional variant of the B61 nuclear gravity bomb, to be known as the B61-13.

Technicians test load a new nuclear-capable B61-12 gravity bomb for the B-2 Spirit bomber at Whiteman Air Force Base, Missouri, in 2022. The U.S. Defense Department unexpectedly announced on October 27 its intention to develop a new variant of the B61 weapons system, to be called the B61-13. (U.S. Air Force photo by Airman 1st Class Devan Halstead)“Today’s announcement is reflective of a changing security environment and growing threats from potential adversaries,” said John Plumb, assistant secretary of defense for space policy, in an Oct. 27 statement. “The United States has a responsibility to continue to assess and field the capabilities we need to credibly deter and, if necessary, respond to strategic attacks, and assure our allies.”

The Pentagon acknowledged its hope that the B61-13 variant would help catalyze the stagnant retirement process of the B83 megaton gravity bomb.

“The B61-13 will provide the President with additional options against certain harder and large-area military targets, even while the department works to retire legacy systems such as the B83-1,” according to a Pentagon fact sheet.

Members of Congress have strongly resisted retiring the B83, claiming the largest bomb in the U.S. nuclear arsenal at 1.2 megatons is necessary to target hard and deeply buried targets. (See ACT, November 2023.) The Trump administration contributed to this resistance with the 2018 Nuclear Posture Review, which called for retaining the B83 bomb, rather than proceeding with its planned retirement. (See ACT, March 2018.)

But the Biden administration aims to follow through on the retirement of the B83. The megaton-class bomb is “of increasingly limited utility, and retiring it does not change the hard and deeply buried target set,” Plumb told Congress last year.

“The case for the B61-13 is strange,” assessed the Federation of American Scientists in an Oct. 27 blog post. “For the past 13 years, the sales pitch for the expensive B61-12 has been that it would replace all other nuclear gravity bombs,” as well as “cover all gravity missions with less collateral damage than large-yield bombs.”

The B61-13 would be deliverable by modern aircraft and have a maximum yield similar to the 360-kiloton B61-7 variant, a massive increase when compared to the most recent 50-kiloton B61-12. The B61-12 is scheduled for initial deployment this year, replacing the 100 B61-3/4 bombs believed to be stationed across Belgium, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, and Turkey under the NATO nuclear sharing mission.

The Defense Department emphasized that the B61-13 would not increase the overall size of the U.S. nuclear arsenal. “The number of B61-12s to be produced will be lowered by the same amount as the number of B61-13s produced,” according to the Pentagon fact sheet.

In an Oct. 24 letter to Congress, the Energy Department officially requested to amend its fiscal year 2024 budget request to cover development engineering activities for the B61-13.

Whether the request will be granted remains to be seen because Congress has yet to pass the necessary legislation to fund any department for all of fiscal year 2024.

The Defense Department unexpectedly announced plans to develop a new variant of the B61 nuclear gravity bomb.

U.S. to Use Weapons-Grade Uranium in Reactor Experiment


December 2023
By Shizuka Kuramitsu

The U.S. Energy Department is expected to begin work in the coming months on a civilian research project that relies on weapons-grade highly enriched uranium (HEU), a fuel type that the United States and other countries have long sought to phase out for such energy uses.

Researchers at Idaho National Laboratory work on synthesizing and irradiating a molten chloride salt fueled with enriched uranium. The experiment is attempting to validate the safety and reliability of a simple reactor type that could efficiently provide electricity and heat for communities and industry. (Photo via Idaho National Laboratory)The project has raised concerns among nuclear nonproliferation experts, who say it conflicts with long-standing U.S. nonproliferation efforts to minimize the civilian use of HEU, which can be converted more easily than low-enriched uranium (LEU) for use in nuclear weapons.

A group of 20 experts, including university professors, heads of think tanks, and former U.S. government officials, urged the Energy Department to reconsider alternatives to HEU. But department officials rejected such appeals in September and said the project is consistent with U.S. policy.

The U.S. plan is to have government-funded civilian research reactors use more than 600 kilograms of HEU in a six-month experiment to prepare the design of a new type of reactor. Critics say the fuel to be used would be enough for dozens of nuclear weapons.

The project got underway in December 2020, when the Energy Department selected a civilian energy company, Southern Co., to conduct the new research reactor experiment, called the Molten Chloride Reactor Experiment, at the Idaho National Laboratory. The experiment is aimed at advancing the new TerraPower LLC Molten Chloride Fast Reactor technology.

Specific project details were revealed in March. On Aug. 1, the Energy Department issued a draft assessment that analyzed the potential environmental impacts associated with the project and concluded there would be “no significant impact.”

A 30-day public comment period in August generated expressions of opposition to the use of HEU fuel, concern about the project’s “potential effects on the U.S. nuclear nonproliferation efforts,” and laments about “lack of consideration of environmental concerns.”

But after the Energy Department’s Office of Nuclear Energy considered the comments, it affirmed its original support for the project, according to a department document released on Oct. 19.

The 20 nuclear proliferation experts who wrote to the department on May 30, including Alan Kuperman, an associate professor at the Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs at the University of Texas, and Frank von Hippel, a Princeton University physicist, urged the department to suspend work on the project until it considers an alternative design and prepares an assessment of the nonproliferation impact.

If the department “were to proceed with an HEU-fueled [Molten Chloride Reactor Experiment], the damage to national security could exceed any potential benefit from this highly speculative energy technology,” the experts wrote.

They argued that using HEU “would be a convenience rather than a necessity” and that the “reactor does not require HEU fuel.” Converting the project design to LEU fuel would “increase significantly the size of the facility and the amount of fuel, thereby incurring a delay and increasing some costs. However…other costs for security could be reduced,” they added.

In a written response on Sept. 5, the department said this experiment “requires the use of higher enrichment fuel to keep the size of the experimental reactor small.”

It reaffirmed the U.S. policy “to refrain from the use of weapons-usable nuclear material in new civil reactors or for other civil purposes unless that use supports vital U.S. national purposes.” But it also argued that using HEU is fully consistent with this policy because “the experiment will provide vital data to the U.S. national interests assuring the safety and security of this advanced nuclear energy technology” and emphasized that the later commercial operation of the new reactor would not use HEU.

“This experiment does not pose a security or nonproliferation risk akin to the use of HEU in a civilian reactor that operates for decades, continually refuels, and requires production or transport of HEU across distances,” the department letter stated.

Since the 1970s, the United States has led international collaboration to reduce and minimize the use of HEU for civilian purposes. It has converted a total of 71 reactors domestically and abroad from use of HEU fuel to LEU fuel. Over five decades, such diplomatic and financial efforts have contributed to the nonproliferation regime by strengthening HEU minimization norms.

The Energy Department will begin work on a civilian research project that relies on weapons-grade, highly enriched uranium, which the United States and other countries have long sought to phase out for energy uses.

 

Pentagon Struggles to Exploit Advances in AI


December 2023
By Michael T. Klare

The U.S. Defense Department has announced several initiatives designed to accelerate the military’s appropriation of private sector advances in artificial intelligence (AI) while still adhering to its commitments regarding the responsible and ethical utilization of these technologies.

U.S. Deputy Defense Secretary Kathleen Hicks arrives at a classified briefing on artificial intelligence for the Senate at the U.S. Capitol Building in July.  (Photo by Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)Senior Pentagon officials are keen to exploit recent progress in AI in order to gain a combat advantage over China and Russia, considered the most capable potential U.S. adversaries.

But they recognize that the large language models used to power ChatGPT and other such generative AI programs have been found to produce false or misleading outcomes, termed “hallucinations” by computer experts, that make them unsuitable for battlefield use. Overcoming this technical challenge and allowing for the rapid utilization of the new technologies have become major Pentagon priorities. The Defense Department took one step toward that goal on Nov. 2 with the release of an updated “Data, Analytics, and Artificial Intelligence Adoption Strategy,” which will govern the military’s use of AI and related technology in the years ahead.

Pentagon officials said the strategy, which updates earlier versions from 2018 and 2020, is needed to take advantage of the enormous advances in AI achieved by private firms over the past few years while complying with the department’s stated principles on the safe, ethical use of AI.

“We’ve worked tirelessly for over a decade to be a global leader in the fast and responsible development and use of AI technologies in the military sphere,” Deputy Defense Secretary Kathleen Hicks told a Nov. 2 briefing on the new strategy. Nevertheless, she said, “safety is critical because unsafe systems are ineffective systems.”

Although the new strategy claims to balance the two overarching objectives of speed and safety in utilizing the new technologies, the overwhelming emphasis is on speed. “The latest advancements in data, analytics, and artificial intelligence technologies enable leaders to make better decisions faster, from the boardroom to the battlefield,” the strategy states. “Therefore, accelerating the adoption of these technologies presents an unprecedented opportunity to equip leaders at all levels of the Department with the data they need.”

The emphasis on speed is undergirded by what appears to be an arms racing mindset. “[China] and other strategic competitors…have widely communicated their intentions to field AI for military advantage,” the strategy asserts. “Accelerating adoption of data, analytics, and AI technologies will enable enduring decision advantage, allowing [Defense Department] leaders to…deploy continuous advancements in technological capabilities to creatively address complex national security challenges in this decisive decade.”

To ensure that the U.S. military will continue to lead China and other competitors in applying AI to warfare, the updated strategy calls for the decentralization of AI product acquisition and utilization by defense agencies and the military services. Rather than having all decisions regarding the procurement of AI software be made by a central office in the Pentagon, they can now be made by designated officials at the command or agency level, as long as these officials abide by safety and ethical guidelines now being developed by a new Pentagon group called Task Force Lima.

Such decentralization will accelerate the military’s utilization of commercial advances in AI by allowing for local initiative and reducing the risk of bureaucratic inertia at the top, explained the Pentagon’s chief digital and AI officer, Craig Martell, at the Nov. 2 press briefing.

“Our view now,” he said, is to “let any component use whichever [AI program] pipeline they need, as long as they’re abiding by the patterns of behavior that we need them to abide by.”

But some senior Pentagon officials acknowledge that decentralization on this scale will diminish their ability to ensure that products acquired for military use meet the department’s standards for safety and ethics.

“Candidly, most commercially available systems enabled by large language models aren’t yet technically mature enough to comply with our ethical AI principles, which is required for responsible operational use,” Hicks said. But she insisted that they could be made compliant over time through rigorous testing, examination, and oversight.

Overall responsibility for ensuring compliance with the department’s safety and ethical standards has been assigned to Task Force Lima, a team of some 400 specialists working under Martell’s supervision.

The task force was established to “develop, evaluate, recommend, and monitor the implementation of generative AI technologies across [the Defense Department] to ensure the department is able to design, deploy, and use generative AI technologies responsibly and securely,” Hicks said on Aug. 2 when announcing its launch.

As she and other senior officials explained, the task force’s primary initial mission will be to formulate the guidelines within which the various military commands can employ commercial AI tools for military use.

Navy Capt. Manuel Xavier Lugo, the task force commander, said the project will examine various generative AI models “in order for us to find the actual areas of [potential] employment of the technology so that we can go ahead and then start writing specific frameworks and guardrails for those particular areas of employment.”

 

The Defense Department announced initiatives to appropriate private sector advances in artificial intelligence while still using AI responsibly.

Pages

Subscribe to RSS - The United States and the Americas