Why nuclear command and control can’t be separated from JADC2

WASHINGTON: While the Pentagon is working towards its concept of conventional Joint All Domain and Control, or JADC2, the department has also been focused on updating the structure that underpins America’s nuclear arsenal, known as Nuclear Command and Control, or NC3.

Speaking before Congress today, Gen. Chas Richard, the head of US Strategic Command, emphasized that the investments in NC3 are vital. But, he noted, they can’t be divorced from the wider Pentagon effort.

“I am very familiar with what JADC2 is doing in conventional command and control. And in fact, was very pleased that a subset of what JADC2 is doing is for nuclear command and control,” he told the Senate Armed Services Committee. “The two systems have to be overlapped to a great extent so that we can have integration. And so we are headed in the right path to make sure we take full advantage of the investments we’re making in conventional command and control while recognizing that certain portions of nuclear command and control have to serve at a higher standard than we ask regular command and control and making sure we identify those and meet those requirements.”

Noting that “we will never be able to achieve” a true split between NC3 and JADC2, Richard said that “Strategic platforms are still platforms; They have to interoperate with other platforms to accomplish their mission, even for simple deconfliction purposes.

“We have to be able to tell an airplane where the other airplanes are, even if they’re not on a similar mission. So you have to have some overlap to do that, too,” he said. “It is to our benefit, where appropriate, to use our conventional command and control to add redundancy and resiliency to our nuclear command and control. You couldn’t afford to build two completely separate systems if we tried to achieve that in the real world.”

The joint hearing with US Space Command head Gen. James Dickinson was technically a budget posture hearing for the fiscal 2023 budget request, but as that document has yet to be unveiled, the hearing was more of a catch-all for nuclear and space issues. However both men deferred heavily to a classified session that would follow the open hearing.

One tease that Richard did offer was on cybersecurity for NC3, stating that “because of the, I would call it ‘apprehension and valid concern’ over the security of our nuclear command and control, particularly the cybersecurity, is our nation’s nuclear command and control has never been in a stronger, more protected, more resilient lineup than it is today, based on some very good work operationally done over the last six to eight months.”

No more information was forthcoming, though Richard noted, as he did many times through the hearing, that he would be happy to give more details in the classified setting about what occurred in the last eight months.

A few other notable comments from the hearing:

Russia And China Teaming Up: One of the emerging concerns about Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is if it will further drive Moscow and Beijing to work together. Given that the two nations represent the two major nuclear powers of concern for the US, a question about nuclear cooperation was raised.

Richard said, “I’m not going to tell you that I’m not concerned about that. I’m very concerned about what opportunistic aggression looks like. I’m worried about what cooperative aggression looks like. I have to deter all of them all of the time, which means every day we’re thinking about their decision calculus, and what we have to do to influence so that basically they say ‘Not today.’”

Dickinson noted that, like with STRATCOM, a constant threat analysis goes on in his office. He called out specifically both Russia’s Nudol ASAT test in late 2021 and the test of China’s SJ-21, which was shown to be able to maneuver other satellites in orbit, as concerns for him.

80 Pits A Year Won’t Happen: For several years, STRATCOM and the National Nuclear Security Administration has been fending off concerns that a national target for producing 80 plutonium pits a year, needed to keep America’s nuclear warheads up to date, was unlikely to happen. Richard in his testimony closed the door completely.

“We have crossed one of those points of no return that I referred to previously, in that we now know we will not get 80 pits per year by 2030, as is statutorily required, and even unlimited money at this point will not buy that back,” Richard said.

“So there is active work underway inside the Nuclear Weapons Council to understand exactly how much of a delay we are going to have, how much of it can be addressed by funding,” he said. “We’re not mitigating this problem. We have shot all the mitigation to get us to this point, the fourth time the nation has tried to recapitalize its production infrastructure. Now the question becomes, how much damage have we done? And what are the consequences of that? And we’re working to better understand that.”

Consulting On KC-Y: As the Air Force works towards a potential new tanker aircraft, Richard said he has been involved in early discussions around how much EMP hardening is needed for the refuelers.

“I’m one of the customers of the tanker fleet. And in that I have certain requirements, EMP protection, electromagnetic pulse being one of those,” he said, before noting there are two specific things he can do in relation to the tanker fleet.

The first, to “clearly articulate the requirements” STRATCOM needs for the nuclear-capable fleet. The second is to find ways to “reduce that demand signal” for his mission on the tankers. As an example, he pointed to putting new engines on the aging B-52 bombers.

“The engines on those date back to the 60s, they burn a lot of gas,” he said. “Re-engine, less fuel required, less tanker demand. “