A top U.S. military official last week branded as "facetious" congressional concerns that the launch of a proposed long-range conventional missile might be mistaken for a nuclear salvo.
The U.S. Defense Department is leaving open the possibility of developing a conventional long-range missile for deployment on submarines, despite stern congressional warnings against fielding anything that might be mistaken for a nuclear weapon during launch.
An independent panel recently provided a boost to a coolly received Pentagon initiative that would convert some long-range, submarine-launched ballistic missiles to deliver conventional warheads instead of nuclear ones.
The United States has made little progress in developing a conventional "prompt global strike" capability, leaving the military few options short of a nuclear attack in certain scenarios, according to the head of U.S. Strategic Command.
The U.S. Senate Appropriations Committee eliminated funding for a Bush administration plan to modify submarines carrying nuclear Trident ballistic missiles to deploy conventionally armed Tridents, judging it a potentially "provocative" capability.
The authors argue that a controversial plan to deploy conventionally-armed ICBMs on submarines would erode the global committment to reducing the proliferation of ballistic missiles.
The authors, two former U.S. Secretaries of Defense, argue that the U.S. needs prompt global strike capability to provide maximum flexibility for dealing with the threat of global terrorism. They wrote the article in support of a Pentagon proposal to replace the nuclear warheads on two of the Trident D5 missiles on every deployed strategic submarine with a new type of warhead incorporating four highly accurate, independently targetable, nonnuclear reentry bodies.
The author argues that the Pentagon's plan to arm Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles with conventional warheads as part of its 'Prompt Global Strike' mission, would be a strategic mistake.
The U.S. Strategic Command announced yesterday it had achieved an operational capability for rapidly striking targets around the globe using nuclear or conventional weapons, after last month testing its capacity for nuclear war against a fictional country believed to represent North Korea.
The commander of the Air Force Space Command denied yesterday that his 500 nuclear-armed Minuteman III intercontinental ballistic missiles are mere "Cold War icons" and said he is preparing alternative uses for the ICBMs, including arming them with conventional warheads to attack surface or deeply buried targets.