US needs more nuclear subs, mobile ICBMs and tactical nukes: Heritage report

WASHINGTON — The United States should diversify its arsenal of nuclear weapons with additional Columbia-class ballistic missile submarines and a road-mobile variant of the forthcoming Sentinel ICBM, the conservative Heritage Foundation argues in a new report out today.

Those changes to the US nuclear posture, as well as others laid out in the report, could expand spending on nuclear weapons — already about six percent of the defense budget due to ongoing programs to build new stealth bombers, ICBMs and ballistic missile submarines — by another one or two percent, the report states.

“That brings you to about $8 [billion] to $16 billion. And if you look at reprogramming or recoloring certain dollars within the DoD budget, you can get there,” Robert Peters, the Heritage fellow for nuclear deterrence who authored the report, said during a rollout event today.

The report posits that those “modest” expansions in strategic nuclear weapons — as well as larger investments in nonstrategic ones — are needed to deter the twin threats of China and Russia, which are heavily investing in their own nuclear inventories with the intent of achieving parity “and very possibly advantage” over US capabilities.

The report may be notable less for its ideas than for who is putting it out. The Heritage Foundation has established itself as the policy center for a potential next Trump administration, particularly through its work on Project 2025, a conservative blueprint for the next president helmed by former Trump administration officials.

The think tank doesn’t shy away from those ties, billing the report as “a draft Nuclear Posture Review (NPR) for a 2025 presidential administration,” though it does not call out Trump or any other candidate by name. It typically takes a new administration more than a year to write and release a NPR, with the latest two reports having been published in 2022 and 2018. The Heritage report recommends speeding up that timeline significantly, urging the next administration to require a draft NPR 12 weeks after the 2025 presidential inauguration.

“Given the urgency of the issues at hand and the need to field a credible deterrent in light of the deteriorating security environment, the next Administration will not have the luxury of spending almost a year writing an NPR,” the report states.

New Delivery Systems, New Locations

Overall, the report seeks a number of new nuclear weapons and delivery systems, to be more geographically dispersed than the traditional nuclear triad.

Specifically, the report calls for a list of changes, many of which are aimed at increasing the US military’s ability to respond to theater-level nuclear engagements without having to resort to using higher-yield weapons, which Heritage said increases the risk of escalation that could lead to a nuclear attack on US soil.

Among the biggest recommended alterations to current plans would be boosting the Columbia-class ballistic submarine program of record from 12 to 16 boats. In addition, the report also proposes that all Columbia-class hulls from seven onward be modified to carry eight additional missiles.

“This programmatic expansion is necessary not only to hedge against an uncertain 21st century future and maintain a credible deterrence posture against a single nuclear peer—the driving construct that led the U.S. Navy to program for 12 Columbia SSBNs in 2010—but also to deter two nuclear peers in the 2030s,” the report states.

Another major change is the proposed fielding of road-mobile Sentinel intercontinental ballistic missiles as a hedge against any technological advances in coming decades that could make Columbia-class submarines vulnerable to detection.

The report calls for the road-mobile Sentinel force to be small in number, be permanently stationed on existing bases, and operate in US territory along preapproved routes in relatively unpopulated areas.

“The Air Force will design and field vertical erector launchers that can be attached to heavy trucks that are capable of holding and launching either the Sentinel ICBM or modified Sentinel ICBMs as may be required,” with each Sentinel armed with up to three warheads, the report recommends.

In addition to those larger changes, the report also recommends fielding a more diverse range of tactical nuclear weapons, including nuclear-capable hypersonic weapons, anti-ship nuclear weapons and ground-based intermediate-range nuclear weapons that could be forward deployed in Europe and the Indo-Pacific.

“As part of this effort, the United States and its allies will discuss updating America’s force posture, to include potentially forward stationing additional American nuclear weapons in Europe and introducing them to the Western Pacific and potentially to include new or long-established allies flying dual-capable aircraft (DCA) loaded with American NSNW [non strategic nuclear weapons],” the report states.

During comments at the roll out event, Nebraska Sen. Deb Fischer, the top Republican on the Senate Armed Services’ strategic forces subcommittee, called the aging nuclear enterprise an “existential issue.”

Although Fischer did not comment on the posture changes recommended by the report, she said the United States must keep on its path for nuclear modernization and that she would continue to press the Defense Department to move faster.

“What we all need to keep in mind is that times have changed. Times have changed and we don’t have just one peer adversary. Now we have two, and that number will grow,” she said.