Subs again carry low-yield nukes
Warheads part of Pentagon’s ‘escalate to de-escalate’ plan
The Pentagon announced Tuesday that low-yield nuclear warheads had been put into operation on American submarines, marking the first time the U.S. military has armed underwater vessels with warheads of such yield since the George H.W. Bush administration.
In a statement, Undersecretary of Defense for Policy John Rood confirmed that the W76-2 low-yield warhead had been fielded on submarine-launch ballistic missiles. As a rationale, Rood cited the need to counter potential adversaries such as Russia that maintain similarly small warheads and could seek to use them in a limited nuclear attack to gain an advantage over the United States.
The move comes over the objections of top Democrats and anti-nuclear advocates who have called it dangerous.
Rood said the W762 strengthens deterrence against adversaries and gives the United States a low-yield option that is more survivable in the event of a nuclear war. The U.S. military already possesses a low-yield option in the B61 gravity bomb, but that warhead and its variants can be launched only from aircraft, which the Pentagon believes could be stymied by sophisticated Russian air defenses.
The introduction of the W76-2 on American submarines, planned since the beginning of the Trump administration, “demonstrates to potential adversaries that there is no advantage to limited nuclear employment because the United States can credibly and decisively respond to any threat scenario,” Rood added.
In a review of nuclear policy overseen by former Defense Secretary Jim Mattis, the Pentagon determined that there was a gap in U.S. nuclear capabilities vis-a-vis Russia.
Officials argued that Russia could employ one of its many small nuclear weapons in a limited attack against an American ally, potentially forcing the United States to choose between responding with a high-yield strategic nuclear warhead, all but guaranteeing full-scale nuclear war, or returning fire with a conventional weapon, risking embarrassment or defeat. The Pentagon refers to this strategy, which it has attributed to Russia, as “escalate to de-escalate” or “escalate to win.”
Top Russian officials have denied such a strategy exists. They have said Russian nuclear doctrine calls for the use of nuclear weapons only when one is used first by an adversary against Russia or its allies, or when the use of conventional weapons against Russia puts the state at risk. Russian President Vladimir Putin has said Russia doesn’t envision conducting a preemptive strike with nuclear weapons.
Current and former U.S. officials, however, argue that Russian writings on nuclear doctrine and exercises demonstrate the existence of an “escalate to de-escalate” strategy, which could back the United States into a corner if the U.S. military lacks weaponry to respond in a like-forlike manner.
“It’s necessary to have this capability to close a gap in the credibility of our deterrence, because you have to put yourself in the mind not of some nuclear disarmament advocate but of a Russian general or the Kremlin,” said Tim Morrison, a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute and former senior director for weapons of mass destruction on the National Security Council under President Donald Trump.
Official U.S. nuclear-warhead yields remain classified, but experts estimate that the new W76-2 would explode with a yield of about 6.5 kilotons, whereas the full-size W76-1 explodes with a yield of roughly 90 kilotons. By comparison, the warheads the U.S. military used on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan, in 1945 exploded with about 15 and 20 kilotons of force, respectively.
Critics have said the introduction of the low-yield warhead on submarines could potentially confuse an adversary, who in the event of a launch might think it’s a high-yield attack.
“Mixing these indistinguishable low-yield weapons alongside high-yield warheads creates ambiguity and could lead to a massive escalation,” said Andy Weber, former assistant secretary of defense for nuclear, chemical and biological defense during the Obama administration.