The National Nuclear Security Administration’s latest Stockpile Stewardship and Management Plan, released Monday, fuzzed up delivery dates for distant, future nuclear weapons that, as recently as a year ago, had at least placeholder dates.
Specially, three weapons, ground-, sea- and air-based warheads, now have “To Be Determined” first-production-unit delivery dates instead of the mid- to late-2030s dates penciled into the 2022 Stockpile Stewardship and Management Plan: an annual, unclassified National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) progress report that this year ranges nearly 250 pages.
The Future Strategic Land-Based Warhead, which would replace the W87 now carried by Minuteman III silo-launched intercontinental ballistic missiles, was previously to arrive between 2036 and 2038, according to the 2022 plan. A W87 variant, called the W87-0, is scheduled to tip the Sentinel missiles that will replace Minuteman beginning in 2030 or so.
The Future Strategic Sea-Based Warhead, which would replace the submarine-launched W88 now getting a fresh lead of conventional explosives as part of what NNSA calls a major alteration, was previously to arrive between 2037 and 2039, as was a Future Air Delivered Warhead, according to the 2022 stockpile plan.
Ohio-class submarines carry all current U.S. sea-based nuclear-weapons, which today all launch on Trident II-D5 intercontinental ballistic missiles. Columbia-class boats will replace the Ohio fleet beginning in 2031 or so, the Navy has said.
None of these three nuclear weapons would even enter the NNSA production queue until after the W93 submarine-launched ballistic missile finishes production sometime in the 2030s.
The latest Stockpile Stewardship and Management Plan figures the W93 team to turn out a first production unit in the “Mid 2030s,” less specific than the range of between 2034 and 2036 that the agency provided in last year’s plan.
First production units are proof-of-concept articles that are dismantled and examined by experts who judge whether a design meets the military’s destructive specifications and is ready for mass production at NNSA’s Pantex Plant in Amarillo, Texas.
