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Pentagon Leaders Put Support Contractors on Notice for Deep Cuts

June 12, 2013 Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel and his top budget deputy on Tuesday signaled they intend to make deep cuts in contractor personnel who help manage programs in almost every sector of the Pentagon bureaucracy. The Defense Department today employs an estimated 700,000 service contractors who, in many cases, work side-by-side with ...

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Nuclear Arsenal Subject to Pentagon Cuts, But New Subs May Escape Ax

May 24, 2013 The U.S. nuclear arsenal might be subject to cutbacks by a major budget review under way at the Defense Department, despite enjoying relative protection this year from largely across-the-board sequester spending reductions, a senior Defense official said on Thursday. “Every part of the program, including nuclear weapons, is being addressed,” ...

Former Defense Brass Object to ‘More Restrictive’ Nuclear Trade Policies

May 16, 2013 A half-dozen former U.S. national security leaders last month implored President Obama to avoid tightening restrictions on foreign nuclear cooperation in the interest of nonproliferation. “The U.S. civil nuclear industry is one of [Washington’s] most powerful tools for advancing its nuclear nonproliferation agenda,” according to an April 25 letter obtained ...

Pentagon Weighs Refurbishing or Replacing Ballistic Missiles

April 18, 2013 The U.S. Defense Department is weighing the feasibility of extending the service life of the nation’s aging Minuteman 3 intercontinental ballistic missiles versus replacing them in coming decades with brand new nuclear-armed ballistic missiles. The 450 Minuteman 3s are expected to last through 2030, but might be retained longer if ...

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Amid Deep Cuts, the Pentagon Labors to Keep Its Forces Ready for Korea

April 11, 2013 As tensions escalate on the Korean Peninsula, the U.S. military is striving to maintain peak readiness for forces assigned to the region, Defense Department leaders said on Wednesday. Deep cutbacks in training and preparedness accounts taken this year because of the so-called budget sequester are making the job more difficult. ...

U.S. Nuclear Lab Ready to Shelve Costly Facility Plan

February 22, 2013 The Los Alamos National Laboratory is proposing to shelve plans to build an expensive new plutonium research facility and instead permanently parcel out work to an array of smaller buildings, the institution’s director said on Thursday. “I’m concerned that in the current fiscal crisis, it may no longer be practical ...

Military could redefine global-strike weapons

January 24, 2013 The U.S. military is weighing a redefinition of what constitutes a “prompt global strike” weapon, and the result could be to expand the kinds of conventional arms available to hit targets on short notice virtually anywhere around the world, according to defense sources. These might include weapon systems with shorter ...

U.S. may land key Asian nuclear trade deals in 2013

January 11, 2013 U.S. envoys could seal as many as three important nuclear trade agreements with Asian nations this year, with at least one more key pact in the region on the diplomatic agenda for completion by 2015. The renewal of Washington’s existing atomic cooperation pacts with Taiwan and South Korea is under ...

Decision on proliferation assessments pending at nuclear agency

November 20, 2012 The Nuclear Regulatory Commission is poised to consider whether to begin requiring license applicants for emerging technologies to evaluate any associated proliferation risks, following the submission of a staff paper on the matter late last month, according to officials. The five NRC commissioners might debate the viability of a rule-making ...

Officials say U.S., Taiwan 'discussing assurances' on sensitive nuclear activities

November 20, 2012 The United States and Taiwan have begun “discussing assurances” that could result in the East Asian nation’s pledge to avoid sensitive nuclear activities as part of a bilateral atomic trade pact renewal, Taiwan government officials said. In a two-day “prenegotiation meeting” last month in Washington, U.S. and Taiwanese officials launched ...