![A technician looks at a B61 bomb.](https://sites.breakingmedia.com/uploads/sites/3/2023/10/231027_b61_nuclear_bomb_SANDIA-e1698436341726.jpg)
In a 2015 photograph, Tyler Keil, Sandia’s lead engineer for a sequence of influence assessments with Sandia’s Davis pistol, performs a ultimate diagnostic test on an influence check knowledge recorder on the nostril construction of a mock B61-12, mounted on an aluminum tube to to duplicate the bomb’s physique. (Picture by Randy Montoya from the archives)
WASHINGTON – The Biden administration immediately introduced its intention to create a brand new variant of America’s nuclear gravity bomb, referred to as the B61-13.
The choice is a direct results of findings from the 2022 Nuclear Posture Evaluation and is meant to offer the US “further choices in opposition to sure more durable and larger-scale navy targets,” in keeping with a Pentagon reality sheet. [PDF] that accompanied the announcement.
In an announcement, John Plumb, Assistant Secretary of Protection for House Coverage, stated the choice “displays a altering safety setting and the rising risk from potential adversaries. America has a duty to proceed to evaluate and deploy the capabilities we have to credibly deter and, if obligatory, reply to strategic assaults and reassure our allies.”
Whereas the Division of Protection oversees nuclear weapons supply methods, all warhead modernization is managed by the Nationwide Nuclear Safety Administration (NNSA), a semi-independent division of the Division of Power.
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The brand new design will construct on the continued B61-12 life extension program, which has its roots within the Obama administration. That effort consolidates the older B61-3, -4, -7 and -10 variants whereas updating them with newer applied sciences. The primary manufacturing unit of the B61-12 was rolled out in November 2021, with manufacturing deliberate by the tip of fiscal 12 months 2025. This system is estimated to price $9.6 billion in FY22 {dollars} over its lifetime, though a lot of these prices have already been spent. That is evident from an annual authorities accounting of nuclear warheads [PDF].
Technically, neither the B61-12 nor the -13 are “new” stockpile-expanding nuclear weapons, as a result of they take the warheads from the older bombs and place them in new casings. (The DoD reality sheet notes that the variety of B61-12s scheduled for manufacturing “will probably be lowered by the identical quantity because the variety of B61-13s produced.”)
In keeping with the very fact sheet, the B61-13 “could have a yield corresponding to the B61-7, and better than that of the B61-12. The B61-13 will embody the fashionable security, safety and accuracy options of the B61-12.” In keeping with analysts Hans Kristensen and Matt Korda, the B61-7 can produce a 360-kiloton explosion, which might symbolize a serious step ahead over the 50-kiloton B61-12.
“Whereas administration officers keep that the B61-13 plan shouldn’t be pushed by new developments in hostile international locations or a brand new navy focusing on requirement, growing the accuracy of a high-yield bomb clearly has focusing on implications,” the 2 wrote Friday. “Detonating the weapon nearer to the goal will increase the chance of destroying the goal, and a really exhausting facility might hypothetically be destroyed with one B61-13 as a substitute of two B61-12s.”
It is unclear what the brand new design will price, however primarily based on the discharge, manufacturing of the B61-13 might observe an identical plan to when the Trump administration created the W76-2, a variant of the already in-production W76- 1 with a decrease yield. If the one change between the -12 and -13 variants is elevated yield, it must be pretty simple to activate the manufacturing line and get out into the sphere.
“For the reason that bombers will now carry each B61-12 and B61-13 bombs (along with the brand new [Long Range Stand Off] cruise missiles), and since the precise variety of targets requiring a high-yield gravity bomb is probably going small, it appears possible that the variety of B61-13 bombs to be produced may be very restricted – maybe on the order of fifty weapons – and that manufacturing will happen on the finish of the B61-12 schedule in 2025,” Kristensen and Korda wrote.
In 2020, the F-15E turned the primary US jet to be licensed to hold the B61-12, however the bomb is anticipated to be licensed to be used by the F-35, F-15, F-16 and B-2. in addition to Twister plane in Europe. Nevertheless, Kristensen and Korda state that the B61-7 shouldn’t be designed for fighter use, and indicated that they believe the B61-13 can even be restricted to bombers: the B-2 and ultimately the B-21.
In an announcement, the highest two Republicans on the Armed Providers Committees — Rep. Mike Rogers of Alabama, chairman of the Home Armed Providers Committee, and Sen. Roger Wicker of Mississippi, the rating member of the Senate Armed Providers Committee — stated they “welcome” the transfer, however warned that it’s “solely a modest step in the proper path”.
“The B61-13 shouldn’t be a long-term resolution, however will present our commanders, particularly in INDOPACOM and EUCOM, with better flexibility in opposition to these aims,” the 2 males wrote. “Dramatic transformation of our deterrent posture – not incremental or piecemeal modifications – is required to handle this risk.” (The assertion didn’t specify what else lawmakers want to see occur.)
Jon Wolfsthal, a former Obama-era nuclear official who’s now director of worldwide threat on the Federation of American Scientists, informed Breaking Protection that the announcement may very well be a method to section out the bigger B83 nuclear bomb.
“We tried to retire a lot of the B83s beneath Obama as a result of the navy stated they weren’t wanted,” Wolfsthal stated, a transfer that was later reversed beneath the Trump administration. “Now we’re nonetheless caught with it, and it is costly to keep up and never that protected. So I see this transfer for a brand new B-61 variant as a method to persuade the Hill that we will eliminate the B83.