When the program for modernizing America’s vast nuclear arsenal started
being discussed, proponents in both parties argued that the high cost
was acceptable, and that there was no cost too high for new nukes.
But they’ve been spending years testing this theory, with ever-mounting
estimates for how much the program would ultimately cost. They may
finally have hit that cost limit Thursday, when the Congressional Budget Office upped the cost another 23%, to $494 billion.
It no longer seems everyone is on board with that. Rep. Adam Smith
(D-WA), the new House Armed Services Committee Chairman, says the
modernization plan is just flat out “unaffordable.”
Smith warned that it was time to stop blindly following that path
without asking bigger questions about the cost of maintaining a credible
deterrent. Smith’s predecessor as committee chair, Rep. Mac Thornberry
(R-TX) shrugged off the price increase, saying he was sure people would
discuss it, but saying it was a fairly small percentage of America’s
vast military expenditures.
Call Russia and ask them how they can have updated nukes on such a tiny budget.
Russia put it’s efforts into strategic and selected tactical weapons instead of hundreds of bases around the globe. The DC political class seeks to rule.the planet and dominate everyone on it. So the US military is based on projecting power through those bases and such things as aircraft carrier battle groups. VERY expensive to do. Russia’s military.is basically defensive in nature.
Then, of course, occupying multiple countries with hostile indigenous populations isn’t cheap either.
And DC also stands for the District of Corruption. Lots of pay offs, thousand dollar toilet seats and such. Add in the cost of a military that is long in expensive generals and short in ability…..
Mission creep promoted by neo-con creeps does not help either .
I suspect the US is hiding in the nuke budget all the costs of its programs for advanced stand off weapons. They are the improvements meant for the nuclear weapons, but they are also the whole next generation of conventional weapons. They would not get funded for conventional war, against a peer like China, but they might as nuclear weapons.
I am also wondering if the huge amounts are related to nuke modernization. This means nothing. But it may mean that they are taking into consideration all the new classes of weapons Russia is rolling out. And having to — for the first time since WWII actually THINK about defence. Soviet Union and US were competitors, but in reality, other then by mistake — there was no decisive advantage on either side to contemplate first strike.
After Cold War, folliwed by chaos in Russia and other countrjes emerging from Soviet Union, US and EU allies, embarked on a comprehensive process of undermining Russia. Internal politics, end economy, simultaneously intervening into Central Asia. Since INF did not include submarines, the ocean going navy expanded its reach in forward positioning, nuclear and conventional missiles became part of submarine capabilitiy. Bottom line, Russia saw no advantages in complaining about its predicament, until able to deal with it. Getting around INF prohibition to place land based short range missile, US declared such installations in Rumania and now in Poland to be “missile defence” against Iran. And in South Korea or Japan, against North Korea. Russia and China understood everything after the model of dismembering Yugoslavia, secession if Kosovo, and embarked on joint strategy in 2000, when SCO was founded.
US — assured of its advantages, was only thinking about first strike, and fallout. For that pupose, it needed to get as many countries in Europe, Middle East and Asia — on its side. By persuasion or by force. Because getting as many countries as possible into business of becoming the retaliatory target — means minimizing the return strike to US mainland. China was to be coddled with trade snd earning money in US, so it will have no stake in supporting Russia. Even though both played their role perfectly until 2014, cards were laid on the table then. It was Ukraine and Crimea.
I do not think — even after explicit announcements, that anybody here believed that Russia and China are REALLY working jointly, not duplicationg efforts.
Now is rather late to look back. Rusdia did not invest at all in its forward projecting navy. It worked on giving China its head start on naval capacities, as China actually needs them. Now, after two of the four announced weapons are either in operation or final tests comllete
— it became clearer that these are no projects on paper. And ince Poseidon entered trials, it is a brand new situation.
The cost of these programs is vastly inflated by corruption and graft (as I’m sure everyone here knows). And also the constant demand for bleeding edge tech that may or may not work, vs common sense reasonable upgrades.
The Russians have been upgrading there nuclear forces for years at a tiny fraction of these absurd costs.
Who cares about the American people, peace or the world environment, if the USA has the biggest and best nukes (or the smallest, usable darlings)?
Unfortunately, Pres. Putin has clearly explained that all this money has been wasted as with one-tenth of the spending, Russian expertise has manged to bring to maturity real defensive weapons which make the US systems obsolete. The Pentagon knows, the poor politicians have no clue.
Here is something I do not understand. All other countries tend to be specific about the use of nuclear power, be thst new applicatikns or on-going existing maintenance costs. But we just use word “modernization”, which means nothing. Are they addressing defensive capabilities, and how. Or is this for new, offensive arsenals, and how do they stack up against the key adversry capabilities. And what is the purpose of investing in offensive capabilities, f our continental defence is not clear. How much is the new, yet to be researched eesponry, vs. refurbishing the current arsenal? And similar questions. I have not heard a meaningfull discussion on our investment in defence,
When they say “credible” they are concerned that a few missiles might not launch successfully, and the explosive yield might be 10% less than planned as it obliterates each Russian city a little more slowly. “Modernization” really means smaller, more usable nuclear weapons, which really does nothing to reduce the tremendous risks involved, except deceive ourselves about those risks more effectively.