WASHINGTON -- A senior U.S. defense official last week cast doubt on the national security value of proposed conventional weapons capable of hitting targets anywhere around the world on short notice (see GSN, Nov. 7).
(Nov. 26) -
U.S. Undersecretary of Defense for Acquisition John Young has expressed concerns about Bush administration plans for "prompt global strike" weapons (Defense Department photo).
"When you start escalating up that [procurement] ladder and buying long-range delivery systems that cost tens -- approaching a hundred million dollars for one weapon, those are national decisions that need to be taken carefully," said John Young, the undersecretary of defense for acquisition, technology and logistics.
Though no official cost estimates have been released for "prompt global strike" arms, their price tags are anticipated to be fairly steep. For example, it could take roughly $600 million for the Army to develop and build 16 Advanced Hypersonic Weapons by 2013 (see GSN, Dec. 21, 2007).
The Defense Department is investing nearly $82 million this fiscal year to explore Air Force and Army technologies for weapons that could launch like ballistic missiles and then glide at hypersonic speeds to far-flung endpoints thousands of miles away.
Top Pentagon officials argue the capability is necessary for hitting fleeting targets like terrorist leaders or rogue nations, without having to resort to long-range nuclear arms.
"It's a very important capability to give future presidents additional options for this prompt global strike requirement that we don't have today for terrorists transferring nuclear material, a ballistic missile launch, or perhaps a space-control [antisatellite] launcher," Rear Adm. Stephen Johnson, director of Navy Strategic Systems Programs, said at a Senate hearing in March.
Defense Secretary Robert Gates alluded broadly to the conventional prompt global strike concept in a speech last month, saying his department seeks "to reduce our emphasis on nuclear weapons for deterrence and provide the president more non-nuclear deterrence options and responses to potential crises."
However, speaking at a Nov. 20 breakfast session with reporters, Young questioned whether the price tag for the new weapons would justify their benefits.
"There are a lot of people who think we ought to have this in our arsenal," he said at the event, sponsored by the Center for Media and Security. "I'm not sure I want to argue all day with them. But I do think it is a very expensive capability that I'm not sure all the rest of the elements of our structure are prepared to support."
Young specifically questioned whether a U.S. president would have enough confidence in the intelligence available to support such an attack. Critics have said the use of a future prompt-strike missile, potentially based on sketchy information about a target, could lead to unintended deaths and harm to U.S. interests abroad (see GSN, May 28).
The defense acquisition chief also doubted whether the military chain of command could act quickly enough to disable or destroy an ephemeral target. Pentagon leaders have said the weapons should be able to launch within an hour of an attack order, and flight times would be measured in minutes.
"You have to convince yourself you have all the elements to support that," Young said, noting this confidence would be necessary even if just a small number of such weapons were built. "Do you have a command authority; and a chain of command; and quality and timeliness of intelligence to let you target that and all those things?"
The Pentagon initially proposed equipping 24 Trident D-5 missiles with conventional warheads, and fielding the weapons aboard the same stealthy submarines that carry look-alike nuclear missiles.
Congress has rejected that idea on the basis that it could introduce a dangerous level of international "ambiguity" between conventional and nuclear strikes. Lawmakers argued that Russia or other nuclear powers might mistake the conventional Trident's launch as a nuclear salvo and unleash a devastating response (see GSN, Dec. 13, 2007).
Though Congress has attempted to kill the so-called Conventional Trident Modification program, Young said he would never consider any initiative truly "dead" because industry or service advocates would continue to push for them.
"My experience in the Pentagon is ideas never die, they just get new labels or different things like that," he said. "To the extent that there's an advocacy that has a voice, that voice will find its way as far as it can. So I wouldn't tell you it's dead."
This year, Pentagon advocates of the conventional Trident technology have repackaged plans for continued research, development and flight testing under a variety of other program names (see GSN, July 17 and April 3). However, in the Fiscal 2009 Defense Appropriations Act, Congress zeroed all funds related to submarine-launched, conventional missile concepts.
In August, top strategic combat commander Gen. Kevin Chilton assigned the Air Force to coordinate all the Pentagon's prompt global strike technology development efforts (see GSN, Sept. 3). The move is widely expected to make that service's concept for the mission, the Conventional Strike Missile, a leading candidate for the first conventional prompt global strike weapon to be fielded.
Chilton hopes to get an initial missile on alert, with two spares available, in 2012. This fiscal year, the Air Force and the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency are expected to conduct two initial flight tests of developmental technology for Conventional Strike Missile.
Ultimately the weapon is expected to pair space boosters with a hypersonic "payload delivery vehicle" capable of dispensing a kinetic energy projectile against a target. Upon nearing its endpoint, the projectile would break up into dozens of lethal fragments, according to defense officials.
Young said his skepticism about cost-benefit trade-offs applies to all technology concepts proposed for prompt global strike.
The weapon options under consideration, he said, are "probably going to end up being as or more expensive" than conventional Trident, which was estimated to cost approximately $503 million. "If I had to spend that much money on even a small number of weapons, I ought to convince myself I have all the command and control authority and intelligence apparatus to exercise that way," Young said.