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Senate Joins House in Call for Nuclear Review By Jon Fox WASHINGTON — The U.S. Senate Appropriations Committee yesterday approved a spending plan that calls for a bipartisan commission to evaluate the role of U.S. nuclear weapons while providing limited funding for a plan to create a next-generation warhead (see GSN, June 14). With the Senate appropriations bill, all four committees involved in setting funding levels for the Bush administration’s controversial Reliable Replacement Warhead program have called for some sort of re-evaluation of the role of The House Armed Services Committee’s fiscal 2008 defense authorization bill trimmed $20 million from the president’s RRW request and redirected the money toward a one-year, bipartisan panel that would independently evaluate plans for U.S. nuclear forces (see GSN, May 3). In the Senate Appropriations Committee’s report on the draft energy and water spending bill, lawmakers called for a similar bipartisan commission created by Congress to make recommendations on the “That commission should engage the administration, the Congress and the best minds in the public and private sectors to evaluate the future role of nuclear weapons as a part of our defense and strategic policies,” they wrote. “That commission report can form the basis of information and advice from which the president and the Congress can make decision about the future of RRW and other weapons programs.” The Senate appropriations bill cut nearly $23 million from the president’s $88.8 million request for the Reliable Replacement Warhead (see GSN, June 28). Unlike the House authorization bill, the Senate committee report does not redirect the reduction in funding toward financing the commission. While proposed Senate funding represents a cut from the president’s request it remains a huge leap from the House version of the legislation, which eliminates all money for the program in the next fiscal year. If lawmakers approve the preliminary funding levels set by each chamber, the stage would be set for a debate over the program when the competing bills go to conference committee to be reconciled. The Reliable Replacement Warhead is intended to be easier to produce and maintain and less likely to fail than Cold-War era bombs that were engineered to have the greatest explosive power relative to their weight, administration officials say. The $66 million funding level would provide for engineering research and design work on the warhead but no actual production of new weapons in the coming fiscal year. “We need to decide the type and size of our future inventory of nuclear weapons,” the Senate Appropriations Committee wrote, noting that it was divided on the RRW program but unified on a desire to take a hard look at the role of nuclear weapons in a “post-Cold War and post-Sept. 11th world.” The House Appropriations Committee early this month approved a bill calling for the Bush administration to “develop a comprehensive nuclear defense strategy that defines the future mission, global threats, and the specific characteristics of the The Senate Armed Service Committee’s version of the fiscal 2008 defense authorization bill calls for the defense secretary in conjunction with the secretaries of state and energy to conduct a nuclear posture review of the The demand for a posture review, which is different from the House authorization call for a panel and will be debated when the bills go to conference committee, outlines a re-examination of the size of the U.S. stockpile, deterrence policy and current targeting strategy.
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