Navy Contemplates Next-Generation, Submarine-Launched Ballistic Missile
Posted: April 29, 2015
Navy leaders -- already publicly fretting about the affordability in the 2020s of both a new Ohio-class submarine replacement program and its conventional shipbuilding plan -- are beginning to contemplate yet another high-priority, big-ticket weapon system requirement that could significantly compound already daunting budget pressures: a next-generation, submarine-launched ballistic missile. Vice Adm. Terry Benedict, Navy strategic systems programs director, said the service -- in a previously unreported development -- is beginning to explore the need for arming the future Ohio Replacement Program fleet beyond 2042, the current service-life end date for the deployed nuclear-armed D-5 Trident II missile. Preliminary options being discussed span from further life-extension efforts for a missile first acquired in 1987 to a clean-sheet, new-design project, he said. "That's a discussion that I'm having with Navy leadership right now," Benedict told InsideDefense.com during a brief interview on April 13.
Between 1987 and 2012, the Navy acquired 533 D-5 Trident II ballistic missiles. The strategic weapon system is reaching its 25th year of deployment and has reached the initial design-life goal. The Navy is executing a plan to extend the service life of the weapon. To date, the Navy has spent $36.8 billion to develop, acquire and modify the current D-5 fleet. In March, the Pentagon sent Congress a report that indicates the Navy plans to spend a further $4.7 billion on the D-5 and begin winding down the acquisition portion of the program in the early 2020s. The Navy's fiscal year 2016 budget request includes $1.1 billion for modifications of the D-5 missile inventory, including $468 million to work on flight-test instrumentation, solid-rocket motors and the post-boost control system and $613 million for the life-extension program.
Benedict said the time has come to begin preparing for what comes after the end of the current D-5 program of record, which concludes in FY-42. "Is it another life-extension effort, where we go attack the systems, the sub-systems that are necessary for obsolescence or for refreshment, or is it the next-generation SLBM?" the three-star admiral posited, using the acronym for submarine-launched ballistic missile. "We haven't done that requirements set yet; we haven't done that decision spot yet," he continued. "In fact, that's an effort we're paying a lot of attention to right now. We know at some point we'll have to do something. We don't know the exact point." Because of the likely huge costs associated with a new-start program, Benedict he is "trying to push that as far right as I can," referring to delaying for as long as possible a new initiative that carries a substantial tab.
However, Benedict added that the Navy must contend with factors pressing for a decision sooner rather than later. "Physics and programmatics are trying to pull it in farther," he said. "Every missile I fly [in a test] is a missile that moves it to the left." "We're trying to strike that correct balance within the program," Benedict said. "We won't get to 2084 with the number of missiles that we have in the current configuration that we have," he said, referring to the projected service life of the Ohio Replacement Program submarine fleet. "So, we'll have to do something," he said.
What's the window for making a decision on what comes next? "That depends on whether someone would give me a requirement to build a next-generation capability, which would take longer, or someone would tell me, 'No, we want you to refresh the necessary components,' which would allow me to push that decision out some," Benedict said. Navy leaders have some space to contemplate a way forward. Benedict said the discussions he is having with top brass and civilian leaders are not intended to affect the FY-17 to FY-21 spending plan currently being developed. "It is a FY-20-ish type of decision," the vice admiral said. On April 2, the Navy sent Congress a new 30-year shipbuilding plan that calls for budget increases "commensurate with the funding required to procure" the $139 billion Ohio Replacement Program. The Navy is branding the new strategic deterrence submarine its highest modernization priority; telegraphing it will sacrifice other elements of its modernization plan if budget topline relief is not found.
Similarly, Pentagon acquisition executive Frank Kendall last month warned the requirement to modernize the entire portfolio of strategic weapons capabilities threatens to destabilize the Defense Department's budget in the next decade. "We have a problem with recapitalizing the strategic deterrent," Kendall said April 17. Kendall said the Pentagon needs an additional $10 billion to $12 billion annually beginning in FY-21 to modernize this basket of capabilities. In a January report on the projected costs of DOD's nuclear forces from 2015 to 2024, the Congressional Budget Office estimated that spending on bombers, ICBMs and submarines would jump to $18.2 billion in FY-21, $20.2 billion in FY-22, $17.7 billion in FY-23 and $18.6 billion in FY-24. Those estimates did not account for development of a next-generation SLBM. -- Jason Sherman
