As the Air Force restructures the program for the future intercontinental ballistic missile, it wants to solidify requirements for the missile silos and launch centers before possibly recertifying the program for engineering and manufacturing development (EMD) in 2027.
In an interview, run by Exchange Monitor affiliate Defense Daily in September at the Air and Space Forces Association’s annual Air, Space & Cyber conference, Air Force Brig. Gen. William Rogers, the program executive officer for intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs), suggested the Air Force lacks a detailed knowledge of such requirements.
“Previously, based on the need for speed, we kinda took the risk and said, ‘We’re gonna derive the requirements to this level, but go forward and start designing the silo and the launch center,” Rogers said. “It didn’t work the way we had hoped so now we have to go back under the restructure and really make sure those requirements are locked in.”
All the LGM-35A Sentinel silos are to be new rather than refurbished, 1960s-era Minuteman silos as the Air Force had planned. The new silos are required, in part, because of the larger Northrop Grumman Sentinel, but also because of environmental conditions in the Minuteman silos, including asbestos, lead paint, and tilting in a small number of silos due to variations in their concrete thickness.
This year, the Air Force used a former ICBM silo, Launch Facility 04, at Vandenberg Space Force Base, Calif., to inform its analysis and conclusion on the need for new silos for Sentinel. The service has also received data from a mock Minuteman III silo built in 2021 by Northrop Grumman in Promontory, Utah.
In addition to the new silos and launch centers, the Air Force has planned to start laying 5,000 miles of fiber optic cable in 2027 to replace Minuteman III’s copper-wired Hardened Intersite Cable System.