Global Security Newswire

WASHINGTON -- A Senate Appropriations Committee panel on defense spending has slashed $43 million in fiscal 2009 U.S. Navy funds from a multiservice "prompt global strike" account, according to unreleased congressional documents (see GSN, Sept. 9).

The Defense Department is developing conventional technologies capable of hitting targets anywhere around the globe with just one hour's notice.  Pentagon officials say the new capabilities are necessary for attacking fleeting targets at a great distance, such as terrorist leaders discovered at a safe house or a rogue nation's weapon of mass destruction being readied for launch.

The only weapons that currently boast the speed and range necessary to hit such urgent targets are nuclear-armed missiles, a feature that some Pentagon leaders have acknowledged makes them less usable (see GSN, May 28).

Defense officials had previously proposed that a small number of the Navy's nuclear-armed, Trident submarine-based D-5 missiles be modified to carry a conventional warhead.  However, Congress last year zeroed that effort, with lawmakers saying they could not support a conventional missile whose launch could be mistaken for a nuclear strike (see GSN, Nov. 7, 2007).  Capitol Hill is concerned that such launches could elicit an atomic weapons response from Russia or China.

The top U.S. commander for strategic combat, Gen. Kevin Chilton, recently took stock of congressional concerns by shifting the primary responsibility for prompt global strike weapons development to the Air Force (see GSN, Sept. 3).

Consistent with that shift, the Senate Appropriations defense subcommittee eliminated $40 million from the fiscal 2009 budget request for an "alternative re-entry system" that the Pentagon wanted to develop for prompt global strike, according to a draft markup report obtained by Global Security Newswire (see GSN, April 3). 

Officials said these funds were to be spent on a Navy concept for a Medium-Lift Re-entry Body that would have been a scaled-up version of designs for the controversial Trident modification program (see GSN, March 20).  Critics said funding this alternative submarine-delivered weapon would have prolonged concerns about launch "ambiguity."

The Senate panel also zeroed $3 million in requested funding for a related Navy "Life Extension Test Bed-2" flight demonstration in 2009.

The subcommittee moves, if approved by the full Senate Appropriations Committee and ultimately enacted, would leave the multiservice account for prompt global strike funded at $74.6 million.  The Bush administration had requested $117.6 for the pan-service funding pot.

In a separate account, Senate defense appropriators recommended adding an unrequested $2 million to prepare for an Army demonstration of the Advanced Hypersonic Weapon, a futuristic, fast-flying missile that also might eventually be used for prompt global strike. 

The subcommittee's House counterpart earlier provided a $3 million increase for the same Army effort.  House lawmakers also offered another $6 million funding boost for Air Force prompt global strike weapons development programs, bringing that panel's overall funding for the mission to more than $126 million (see GSN, Sept. 9).

Like the House defense appropriators, the Senate subcommittee denied the entire $23.3 million in Navy funds for the Reliable Replacement Warhead, according to the draft text.  The first version of the weapon was to replace warheads on the Navy's Trident D-5 missiles, offering increased safety, security, reliability and maintainability.

After initially requesting funds for the new warhead effort in the Navy's fiscal 2009 budget, the administration said the money would not be used for the RRW program.  The change reflected lawmaker action to eliminate fiscal 2008 funds for the new warhead in the Energy Department budget, officials said.

"Funding for the Reliable Replacement Warhead was rejected by Congress last year, and the committee recommends a reduction of all funds related to this program," according to the draft fiscal 2009 report text issued by the Senate defense appropriators.

The subcommittee did approve shifting $14 million of that money into an account unrelated to RRW work, namely for an effort to improve the "arming, fusing and firing system" of the existing fleet of Mark 5 re-entry vehicles on the Trident D-5 nuclear weapon.