EternalVigil
Banned Idiot
U.S. Warhead Redesign Plan to Result in New Generation of Nuclear Weapons, NNSA Chief Says
The Reliable Replacement Warhead program is expected to result in a U.S. arsenal of heavier and slightly larger nuclear warheads, the San Francisco Chronicle reported Sunday (see GSN, April 4, 2005).
“I don’t want to mislead you,” National Nuclear Security Administration chief Linton Brooks said last week. “I will personally be very surprised if we can get the advantages we want without redesigning the physics package.”
The physics package refers to the components that actually cause a nuclear reaction, especially the plutonium pit, according to the Chronicle.
The warheads “will require new pits. ... We are going to need to melt them down and recast them,” Brooks said.
Congress last year appropriated $25 million to allow design work to begin. The effort was expected to focus on non-nuclear components of the warheads.
“This is about tinkering at the margins of the existing weapons systems, nothing more,” Representative Ellen Tauscher (D-Calif.), a member of the House Appropriations Energy and Water Subcommittee, said at the time.
However, the program as envisioned by Brooks could cost billions of dollars and last several decades, the Chronicle reported. Brooks said the Lawrence Livermore and Los Alamos national laboratories are already engaged in a design competition involving new nuclear pits.
After the Cold War, the United States adopted the multibillion-dollar stockpile stewardship program to study and maintain the country’s existing nuclear weapons arsenal.
“I don’t want to suggest … that I think (stockpile stewardship) is somehow obsolete,” Brooks said. “It’s entirely possible that we could go on for some considerable length of time just the way we are.”
Asked why, then, new warheads and a new production complex were needed, Brooks cited lack of information on warhead aging.
“I know this sounds evasive, and it really isn’t, it’s just a reflection on the inherent limitations on human knowledge,” he said. “I don’t know everything I need to know about plutonium aging.”
He said the new generation of heavier warheads might avoid such uncertainties (James Sterngold, San Francisco Chronicle, Jan. 15
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In other words, we're not replacing stockpiled nukes--we're adding new and bigger nukes to the inventory.Sounds good to me.
The Reliable Replacement Warhead program is expected to result in a U.S. arsenal of heavier and slightly larger nuclear warheads, the San Francisco Chronicle reported Sunday (see GSN, April 4, 2005).
“I don’t want to mislead you,” National Nuclear Security Administration chief Linton Brooks said last week. “I will personally be very surprised if we can get the advantages we want without redesigning the physics package.”
The physics package refers to the components that actually cause a nuclear reaction, especially the plutonium pit, according to the Chronicle.
The warheads “will require new pits. ... We are going to need to melt them down and recast them,” Brooks said.
Congress last year appropriated $25 million to allow design work to begin. The effort was expected to focus on non-nuclear components of the warheads.
“This is about tinkering at the margins of the existing weapons systems, nothing more,” Representative Ellen Tauscher (D-Calif.), a member of the House Appropriations Energy and Water Subcommittee, said at the time.
However, the program as envisioned by Brooks could cost billions of dollars and last several decades, the Chronicle reported. Brooks said the Lawrence Livermore and Los Alamos national laboratories are already engaged in a design competition involving new nuclear pits.
After the Cold War, the United States adopted the multibillion-dollar stockpile stewardship program to study and maintain the country’s existing nuclear weapons arsenal.
“I don’t want to suggest … that I think (stockpile stewardship) is somehow obsolete,” Brooks said. “It’s entirely possible that we could go on for some considerable length of time just the way we are.”
Asked why, then, new warheads and a new production complex were needed, Brooks cited lack of information on warhead aging.
“I know this sounds evasive, and it really isn’t, it’s just a reflection on the inherent limitations on human knowledge,” he said. “I don’t know everything I need to know about plutonium aging.”
He said the new generation of heavier warheads might avoid such uncertainties (James Sterngold, San Francisco Chronicle, Jan. 15
------------------------------------------------------------------------
In other words, we're not replacing stockpiled nukes--we're adding new and bigger nukes to the inventory.Sounds good to me.