Turner, GOP colleagues seek modernization funds for U.S. nuclear, missile defense

U.S. Rep. Mike Turner (R-OH) recently led a Republican contingent of lawmakers in urging the Biden administration to support modernization of the United States’ nuclear deterrent and homeland missile defense in the nation’s fiscal year 2022 budget.

“The U.S. nuclear triad is the bedrock of our national defense and our allies and partners rely on our nuclear deterrent to maintain peace and order. It would be a fatal and strategic mistake for us to lose or degrade that capability,” Rep. Turner and his colleagues wrote in a March 23 letter sent to President Joe Biden. 

The members urged Biden to fully execute and fund the nation’s nuclear modernization program that the Future Years Defense Program and Future Years National Nuclear Security Program laid out for the 2021-25 budget requests. Among the members who joined Rep. Turner in signing the letter were U.S. Reps. Sam Graves (R-MO) and Don Bacon (R-NE).

Rep. Turner and the lawmakers pointed out that U.S. nuclear weapons for decades have deterred nuclear and strategic non-nuclear aggression, including chemical, biological, and large-scale conventional attacks, and proactively prevented any adversary from escalating to the brink of nuclear conflict.

However, the U.S. has “regrettably allowed much of our nuclear deterrent to atrophy,” they wrote, and most U.S. nuclear delivery systems have been extended far beyond their originally planned service lives and cannot be sustained beyond the 2025 to 2035 timeframe. 

“Now is the time to prioritize long-overdue investments required for the Department of Defense and the National Nuclear Security Administration,” wrote Rep. Turner and his colleagues.

New investments in nuclear infrastructure, weapons stockpiles, and weapon modernization activities would support all three legs of the nuclear triad, according to their letter, as well as investments in the nuclear command, control and communication (NC3) capabilities that underpin them.

“We are at a critical juncture to ensure that DOD and NNSA [the National Nuclear Security Administration] nuclear programs are maintained and executed on time,” wrote Rep. Turner and the GOP lawmakers. “Our nation’s security and the security of our allies and partners depend on it.”