Todd Jacobson
NS&D Monitor
2/14/2014
As the Air Force considers extending the life of the Minuteman III intercontinental ballistic missile, it should strongly look at keeping the ICBM in service past 2030 through incremental upgrades, according to a recently released study authored by the RAND Corp. The study, titled “The Future of the U.S. Intercontinental Ballistic Missile Force,” notes that previous incremental upgrades have already proven able to extend the service life, and would serve as a “relatively inexpensive” way to retain current ICBM capabilities and a solid alternative to an all-new ICBM system that it suggests could cost twice or three times as much as incremental modernization. The Air Force is slated to soon undertake an Analysis of Alternatives for a new ICBM. “The only viable argument for developing and fielding an alternative would therefore have to be requirements-driven,” the report said. “Options would be relevant only insofar as warfighting and deterrence demands push ICBM requirements beyond what an incrementally modernized Minuteman III can offer.”
According to the report, estimates of the 39-year lifecycle costs for an incrementally modernized Minuteman III would be $60-$90 billion, while a new ICBM would range from $84-$125 billion. Rail-mobile or road-mobile versions of the ICBM would cost between $124 billion and $219 billion, the study suggests. The lower cost option, however, is likely to be the most palatable. “In a period of budgetary austerity, the U.S. Air Force’s ability to modernize strategic forces at low cost and low program risk is an important consideration for future decisions,” the report said.
The Benefits of Safely Delaying Decisions
Former National Nuclear Security Administration chief Linton Brooks offered another reason for not moving quickly toward a new ICBM—other than cost. Speaking at the Sixth Annual Nuclear Deterrence Summit this week, Brooks suggested that pushing back major decisions like building a new ICBM should be done considering uncertainty about the structure of the U.S. nuclear stockpile and geopolitics several decades from now. “If you can safely delay decisions you should do that,” Brooks said, adding: “The fact that it’s the least cost option is a non-trivial reason for paying attention to that but another reason might be that we really don’t quite know what kind of land-based deterrent we are going to want in 2040. If we can stretch out the time we have to make irrevocable decisions that tend to last a long time, that may be in our interest.”
