Reforms Needed to Aid U.S. Nuclear Enterprise.

• Author: Smith, Christopher
• Position: NDIA Policy Points

President Donald Trump's proposed fiscal year 2020 budget expresses commitment to a strong nuclear deterrent, promoting modernization programs necessary to sustain future U.S. strategic forces. However, securing the future of America's atomic arsenal also requires reforms that encourage a healthy partnership between the National Nuclear Security Administration and its supplier base. To realize the objectives of the administration's budget blueprint, policymakers should seek out policy reforms that advance shared interests in better contract management, effective procurement policy and workforce development.

The president's budget proposes increasing funding for the National Nuclear Security Administration by 8 percent. It would fund the NNSA at $16.5 billion, its highest levels ever. Investment in nuclear weapons-related activities would receive a bump of 11 percent, up to $12.4 billion. If adopted by Congress, this proposal would continue the growth trend that has increased NNSA's nuclear weapons funding by 77 percent over the past decade. Adjusting for inflation, current U.S. nuclear weapons funding levels far exceed those reached during the Cold War, which between 1948 and 1989 averaged $5.6 billion.

The president's budget helps to clarify the future of nuclear weapons in U.S. national defense strategy. Nuclear weapons policy over the past several years has reflected contradictory messages, rhetorically open to greater American disarmament, while expanding nuclear weapons program budgets. The 2020 budget proposal eliminates policy ambivalence and enhances the United States' commitment to dominant deterrent capabilities.

Active programs by peer competitors, Russia and China, to upgrade and expand their nuclear weapons systems add urgency to U.S. modernization efforts. The president's budget aims to counter these threats by funding critical existing and new nuclear modernization programs. According to NNSA spokesman Dov Schwartz, the agency is focusing its efforts on a weapons production enterprise that "has suffered the effects of aging and underfunding," and whose recapitalization "is essential for the United States to maintain an effective, responsive and resilient" nuclear security infrastructure.

The budget blueprint supports programs to sustain and enhance capabilities, readiness and safety of five existing nuclear weapons systems. It makes investments to upgrade critical nuclear production and material processing facilities...