WASHINGTON (AP) — The new Sentinel nuclear warhead program is 81% over budget and is now estimated to cost nearly $141 billion, but the Pentagon is moving forward with the program, saying that given the threats from China and Russia it does not have a choice.
The Northrop Grumman Sentinel program is the first major upgrade to the ground-based component of the nuclear triad in more than 60 years and will replace the aging Minuteman III intercontinental ballistic missile.
It involves not only building a new missile but the modernization of 450 silos across five states, their launch control centers, three nuclear missile bases and several other testing facilities.
The expansiveness of the program previously raised questions from government watchdogs as to whether the Pentagon could manage it all.
Military budget officials on Monday said when they set the program’s estimated costs their full knowledge of the modernization needed “was insufficient in hindsight to have a high-quality cost estimate,” Bill LaPlante, under secretary of defense for acquisition and sustainment, told reporters on a call.
The high cost overrun triggered what is known as a Nunn-McCurdy breach, which occurs if the cost of developing a new program increases by 25% or more. By statute, the under secretary of defense for acquisition then must **undertake a rigorous review of the program to determine if it should continue; otherwise the program must be terminated. **
No. But the next guy might be. And we can’t just nip down to the store and pick up some nukes on a moment’s notice.
With this logic the whole world should arm themselves with nukes, like yesterday. We don’t know if the U.S.’ “next guy” won’t be Trump.
Nobody’s going to nuke anyone, and I’ll take this to my grave. The only worry would be extreme religious cultists getting nukes, like al queda or taliban who would actually use it, but they’ll never be even close to getting them or I’ll eat my shoe. Real powers will never let them.
All of the people that control the nukes are at the topmost rungs of society, with families and the most luxuries. They have the most to lose, no matter what.
Also, nobody has a big red button. There’s a massive chain of command that has to go along with it. The chain of command is not some 19yr old army grunt following orders. I’m talking the high up chain of command, many people, that have to go along with a launch for it to happen. These people are also high up, and know that their luxurious way of life, and families, are over forever in a nuclear war. They don’t want to survive in a bunker for a few years then die of starvation or cancer slowly.
I dont know for sure obviously, but I feel that the people who control the nukes are the ones with the most to lose. I have zero fear of a true nuclear war. Zero.
Conveniently for you, that’d happen whether you were right or wrong.
All it takes is one mad king who thinks he can get away with just one to win something.
A mad king who wants Ukraine, or Taiwan, or South Korea.
As soon as one launches, they all launch, other nuclear powers won’t believe they have a choice.
It takes 30 minutes or less for an ICBM to reach anywhere in America, really the world, from Russia, china, or North Korea. How much can you get done in 30 minutes? Could you organize a meeting in different time zones, and convince another person to stop being a lunatic? Could you convince another president, who is about to have one of his cities burnt to the ground, that he should just let it happen.
That’s a hell of an elevator pitch you’d have to pull.
It takes less time than a good pizza delivery for the world to end.