http://www.familysecuritymatters.org/publications/detail/seeking-nuclear-roadmaps?f=puball
For more than the past two decades, the United States has adopted a conventional wisdom that our nuclear deterrent enterprise was not as important as it was during the Cold War. As USAF General Garret Harencak has correctly argued, we went on both a procurement and philosophical holiday after the breakup of the Soviet Union. We failed to replace and sustain key elements in our nuclear deterrent force, and we neglected to put together a coherent and well thought out framework for going forward with our nuclear deterrent in a different but still challenging world.
Some former high ranking defense officials argued nuclear deterrence no longer mattered. Others said we could substitute conventional weaponry for our nuclear deterrent, while others argued to slash spending for our deterrent way below levels needed to sustain even minimum force levels. We did what Washington excels at-we kicked the can down the road year after year.
Particularly troubling has been the problems facing the National Nuclear Security Administration which handles the nation’s nuclear labs, our warhead and nuclear material production facilities and the dismantlement of weapons and their storage and safety.
Although nominated in September 2013, the chosen new Director of NNSA, Lt Gen Frank Klotz (Ret) has not been approved by the full Senate and thus NNSA does not have the long term leadership it needs to get its work done correctly. NNSA has been left without its top two administrators for far too long. In addition, retirements are growing (warned about since at least the Chiles Commission report) yet no serious recruiting has been undertaken at the lower ranks. At some point this becomes unsustainable.