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DOE Bunker-Buster Study Said Dead, DOD May Continue By David Ruppe WASHINGTON — A senior Bush administration official and the House Appropriations Committee this week declared the Energy Department’s controversial Robust Nuclear Earth Penetrator study dead, following a congressional decision not to fund the program (see GSN, Nov. 4). The nuclear “bunker-buster” study could continue, however, through Defense Department funding, as some lawmakers have proposed. House and Senate conferees on the fiscal 2006 energy and water appropriations bill on Monday announced that they had rejected the Bush administration’s $4 million request to continue the study at the Energy Department’s National Nuclear Security Administration. A report by the conferees said the bill provides “no funds” for the study. A fact sheet released by the House Appropriations Committee said further that “the bill terminates” the program. Asked by Global Security Newswire yesterday whether he believed the program was being canceled, NNSA Administrator Linton Brooks said, “Yep, that’s the way I read the bill.” On whether the study of the nuclear capability would continue with the Air Force, he said, “You’d have to ask the DOD.” The Pentagon had not responded by publication time today to a request for comments. The study, intended to assess the feasibility of developing a reliable, deeper-penetrating nuclear weapon than currently in the arsenal has been the subject of domestic and international criticism. Proponents say it is needed to threaten hardened and deeply buried targets. Critics say it could cause mass civilian destruction if used, might be deemed a more “usable” weapon, and undermines global nonproliferation efforts. Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), a member of the Senate Appropriations Energy and Water Subcommittee, described the conferees’ decision as an important blow to the administration’s pursuit of an improved nuclear penetrator. “The fact that all funding for this program has been eliminated is a tacit acknowledgment that this is the wrong policy at the wrong time,” she said in a press release yesterday. Government documents and statements in recent months have suggested the administration could transfer control of the program to the Defense Department, rename it, and increase focus on conventional penetrator options while continuing the nuclear study. A House Armed Services Committee report released in May accompanying its fiscal 2006 defense authorization bill said the Robust Nuclear Earth Penetrator program should be shifted from Energy to Defense. The committee authorized $4 million for the military to continue the study. Since planned testing under the program could provide information on “various options” for defeating hardened and deeply buried targets, it said, “The committee believes that this study is more appropriately conducted under a program element within the Department of Defense.” Committee Chairman Duncan Hunter (R-Calif.) said in a May statement that that money would support “nuclear penetrator” as well as conventional options (see GSN, May 23). The Senate version of the defense authorization bill, currently under Senate floor consideration, authorizes funding only for the NNSA study. However, actual money for the project has now been stripped away. A letter from the National Nuclear Security Administration to Congress last month indicated the agency wanted to see the study continue, particularly a planned impact test of the penetrator needed for assessing its feasibility (see GSN, Nov. 4). Arms Control Association Executive Director Daryl Kimball said that with congressional authorization this year for continuing the nuclear study at the Defense Department, the Pentagon could obtain money for the project through a supplemental appropriation or a funding reprogramming request. He said, though, that Congress would probably then cut funding for the study again next year. “The Robust Nuclear Earth Penetrator has been rejected by Congress twice and the administration should understand that Congress’s intent is that we should not continue this costly and provocative weapons program,” Kimball said. “If the Defense Department were to attempt to revive this program as a Defense Department program, I would predict a similar fate in 2006,” he said.
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