The Nuclear Enterprise reviews completed last year showed that the triad is running at a $9 to $25 billion recapitalization and sustainment deficit—not including bombers and ballistic missile submarines—a shortfall that will take “years” to fix, a top National Nuclear Security Administration official told Senators yesterday. “We did not evaluate any of the replacement programs themselves other than to note that it will be years before the new systems are fielded, and in the meantime, the existing systems must be maintained,” NNSA Principal Deputy Administrator Madelyn Creedon stated in written testimony to the Senate Armed Services Strategic Forces Committee. Creedon headed up a review while in a previous position at the Pentagon, and she added that the reviews did not include NNSA warhead life extension and sustainment efforts.
During the hearing, subcommittee Chairman Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) said Congressional funding wouldn’t be a "blank check," yet added that his subcommittee would closely examine the additional $5.6 billion the Air Force has programmed across the Future Years’ Defense Program for the Nuclear Enterprise. “We’re going to have to find some more money,” he said.
Creedon testified alongside Lt. Gen. Stephen Wilson, commander of Air Force Global Strike Command; Maj. Gen. Garrett Harencak, Air Force Assistant Chief of Staff for Strategic Deterrence and Nuclear Integration; Vice Adm. Terry Benedict, commander of Navy Strategic Systems Programs; and Dr. Yisroel Bruner, Director of Strategic, Defensive and Space Programs for the Office of the Secretary of Defense’s Cost Assessment and Program Evaluation division. Sessions was joined by subcommittee Ranking Member Sen. Joe Donnelly (D-Ind.), Sen. Angus King (I-Maine) and Sen. Martin Heinrich (D-N.M.).
