The House Armed Services Committee defense authorization bill contains language that would repeal language creating the RRW program in favor of a “stockpile management program.”
I notice that the term of art is management, not modernization, although I wouldn’t object to latter word if the effort was confined to the purposes established in the language:
Section 3112—Stockpile Management Program
This section would strike section 4204a of the Atomic Energy Defense Act (50 U.S.C. 2524), which codifies the Reliable Replacement Warhead program. This section would also amend section 4204, which establishes the Stockpile Life Extension Program, with a new provision establishing a Stockpile Management Program. This section would establish that the objectives of the Stockpile Management Program are to: increase the reliability, safety, and security of the United States’ nuclear weapons stockpile; further reduce the likelihood of the resumption of underground nuclear weapons testing; achieve reductions in the future size of the nuclear weapons stockpile; reduce the risk of accidental detonation; and reduce the risk that an element of the stockpile could ever be used by a person or entity hostile to the United States, its vital interests, or allies.
This section would also provide guidelines for stockpile management, requiring that changes may only be made to the stockpile in pursuit of these identified objectives. This section would further require that any changes must be consistent with basic design parameters, and must use components that are well understood or are certifiable without the need to resume underground nuclear weapons testing. Additionally, this section would provide that any such changes shall adhere to the design, certification, and production expertise resident in the nuclear security complex to fulfill current mission requirements of the existing stockpile.
The Stockpile Management Program would support and complement
the science-based Stockpile Stewardship Program, which focuses on sustaining the scientific and technical expertise and the experimental tools and capabilities needed to ensure that the nuclear stockpile is safe, secure, and reliable without nuclear testing. The Stockpile Management Program, in turn, would provide a framework for the activities associated with actual work on the weapons that comprise the stockpile, including limitations on any changes to the stockpile.
It seems to me that this is a pretty sensible approach — consistent with my preference that the Congress ought to dispose of RRW on the very narrow grounds that WR1 is not the most cost effective or technically appropriate (ie lowest risk of testing) option to maintain (or manage) the capability provided by the W76. (And not on the more sweeping grounds that it is “new” or “modernized.”)
In case you are curious, here is the actual language.