A Nuclear Dyad? Arms Control Groups Call For an End to ICBMs

By Kris Osborn, President, Center for Military Modernization

Throughout the course of human history, weapons have been thought of as instruments of death and destruction … But what if a weapon had the opposite effect of actually saving, preserving and assuring life by preventing conflict?

This contradiction is the foundation of the Pentagon nuclear deterrence land-air-and-undersea triad, yet some arms control groups are again questioning whether all three air-sea-and-land legs are necessary. The argument now again being presented by several arms control groups, supported at times by some members of Congress, is simply that the US can ensure nuclear retaliation and deterrence without land-based ICBMs. The question, which has lingered for years, is now gaining attention due to concerns that the Pentagon’s new Sentinel ICBM might experience slight delays. The Pentagon has for years been clear that replacing the 1960s-era Minuteman III ICBMs is crucial to US national security, and Northrop Grumman developers continue to make breakthrough progress with construction, testing and preparations for the Sentinel, a next-generation ICBM expected to arrive by the end of the decade.

The Pentagon’s aging Minuteman III, a 1960s-era weapon, has been approaching obsolescence for many years now and ..despite literally decades of upgrades, a recent study from the RAND Corporation finds that the 1960s & 1970s-era Minuteman III ICBM simply cannot effectively counter new missile defense technologies being developed by great-power adversaries.

The Sentinel ICBMs are slated to replace the 400 Minuteman III ICBMs currently in service for more than 50 years in Air Force missile fields at F.E. Warren Air Force Base (AFB), Wyoming; Malmstrom AFB, Montana; and Minot AFB, North Dakota, a report from the Air Force Nuclear Weapons Center says.

Minuteman III is Obsolete

Although U.S. defense officials emphasize that the Minuteman III is able to fulfill its mission, the system is anticipated to have “increasing difficulty penetrating future adversary defenses,”according to the 2018 NPR (Nuclear Posture Review), the RAND report, “Modernizing the U.S. Nuclear Triad: The Rationale for a New Intercontinental Ballistic Missile | RAND” says.

“Senior military officials have made clear that a comprehensive overhaul of the U.S. ICBM force is needed to increase targeting flexibility; to mitigate improvements in adversary missile defenses; and to strengthen defenses against cyberattacks that could undermine the system’s responsiveness and degrade communication in a crisis,” the Rand study says.