C. Todd Lopez
"U.S. strategy is at a critical inflection point," said Robert Kadlec, assistant secretary of war for nuclear deterrence, chemical and biological defense policy and programs, while testifying before the House Armed Services Committee's strategic forces subcommittee.
China's strategic nuclear "breakout," Kadlec said — an unprecedented, major increase in bolstering their nuclear capability — means that the U.S. nuclear arsenal must deter both China and Russia.
Compounding that problem, he said, are the budgetary, industrial and programmatic strains of modernizing all three legs of the nuclear triad at once — land, sea and air. An additional factor is that the New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty with Russia expired in February. That treaty limited the number of strategic warheads for both the U.S. and Russia.
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