Pete Domenici: “Note an important point in this story. The funding cuts are proposed now; a new strategic direction will be forged later…”

“Note an important point in this story. The funding cuts are proposed now; a new strategic direction will be forged later in this decade. Such an approach is absolutely backwards. We should forge the new direction, if one is believed appropriate in a world of increasing threats to our security, after great study. We should fund our present strategy, 20 years in the making, now. The House Bill and the Post story focus on the so-called RRW, the Reliable Replacement Warhead. The RRW is a proposed new element of administration policy. The intent of the RRW, to enable increased reliability and design simplification in weapons of comparable explosive yield is, in my view, a very appropriate consideration, which may well result in the ability to maintain still smaller future stockpiles supported by a still smaller future weapons complex. But, as other legislators have suggested and as I noted in the last paragraph, I agree that a study of the complete role of the RRW in the Nation's nuclear deterrent is appropriate. That study must involve far greater resources than those involved in the House report language. Furthermore, Congress will have many opportunities to review and finalize any decision for actual deployment of the RRW, but the funds proposed for investment in the RRW now should provide the detailed data to underpin any future congressional decision to shift portions of our deterrent to that design.”