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04/16/2006:

"U.S. Prepares to Overhaul Arsenal of Nuclear Warheads"

By the end of the year, the government plans to select the design of a new generation of nuclear warheads that would be more dependable and possibly able to be disarmed in the event they fell into terrorist hands, according to the head of the National Nuclear Security Administration.

The new warheads would be based on nuclear technology that has already been tested, which means they could be produced more than a decade from now to gradually replace at lower numbers the existing U.S. stockpile of about 6,000 warheads without additional underground testing, said Linton F. Brooks, administrator of the NNSA, which oversees the U.S. nuclear weapons complex, and other government officials.

The warhead redesign is part of a larger, multibillion-dollar program to refurbish the nation's nuclear-weapons stockpile and to consolidate nuclear plants and facilities in nearly a dozen states, including California, Florida, Texas, Tennessee and New Mexico. The next-generation warheads will be larger and more stable than the existing ones but slightly less powerful, according to government officials. They might contain "use controls" that would enable the military to disable the weapons by remote control if they are stolen by terrorists.

Brooks said in an interview Thursday that, by November, his agency will choose between two competing designs submitted by teams at the Los Alamos and Lawrence Livermore national laboratories. Brooks said the November timetable for the submission of the design plans would give his agency time to develop preliminary cost estimates that could be included in the administration's fiscal 2008 budget, to be submitted to Congress early next year.

The Reliable Replacement Warhead Program, as it is called, was first proposed two years ago by Rep. David L. Hobson (R-Ohio). It has been adopted as part of a major restructuring of the U.S. nuclear weapons complex being proposed by the Bush administration in light of the findings of its 2002 Nuclear Posture Review.
washingtonpost.com