Wednesday, March 22, 2017

Don’t Look Now, But We’re Shrinking Our Nuclear Arsenal Despite Trump’s Position

It’s been something of an article of faith for President Trump that the United States needs to beef up and expand its arsenal of nuclear weapons in order to keep up with the Russians. This is an idea which has met stiff resistance among Trump’s opponents for reasons of both cost and a reluctance to inflame tensions between the two nations. Still, the president sounded determined to move forward with just such a plan. That makes it rather curious to see a headline this week from the Associated Press indicating that the Air Force is currently in the process of knocking down our stockpile of one type of ICBMs to the lowest levels seen in decades.
The Air Force is quietly shrinking its deployed force of land-based nuclear missiles as part of a holdover Obama administration plan to comply with an arms control treaty with Russia. The reductions are nearing completion despite President Donald Trump’s argument that the treaty gives Moscow an unfair advantage in nuclear firepower.
The reduction to 400 missiles from 450 is the first for the intercontinental ballistic missile, or ICBM, force in a decade — when the arsenal came down from 500 such weapons. The Air Force says the latest cut in Minuteman 3 missiles will be completed in April, leaving the deployed ICBM arsenal at its smallest size since the early 1960s…
It’s unclear how Trump intends to conduct a nuclear expansion, which critics call unnecessary and a potential drain on funds needed for non-nuclear forces. A long-term plan to replace and modernize the current nuclear force is already underway and will end up costing hundreds of billions of dollars
Read the rest from Jazz Shaw HERE and follow a link to a related story below:

While Trump Talks Tough, US Quietly Cutting Nuclear Force

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