U.S. To Cut Nuclear Launchers Under Treaty With Russia - Officials -- Reuters
(Reuters) - The United States will scale back its nuclear bombers, submarine launchers and ballistic missiles in the first cuts to its leftover cold war nuclear arsenal since ratifying a landmark treaty with Russia in 2011, officials said on Tuesday.
Under the treaty, known as New Start, the U.S. military will disable four missile launch tubes on each of the 14 U.S. nuclear submarines, convert 30 B-52 nuclear bombers to conventional use and empty 50 intercontinental ballistic missile silos, senior administration officials said.
The Pentagon, however, will not retire a missile squadron as some lawmakers had expected.
The treaty caps deployed strategic nuclear warheads, those meant to travel long distances, in Russia and the United States at 1,550 each by 2018, down from the previous ceiling of 2,200. It also resumes inspections of U.S. and Russian nuclear-weapons facilities that ended in 2009 when the original Start lapsed.
Read more ....
Update #1: U.S. Planning Cuts to Nuclear Forces Under Pact With Russia -- Wall Street Journal
Update #2: Land-Based Nukes Escape Drastic Cuts Under New START Treaty -- Defense One/Global Security Newswire
Update #3: US will cut deployed nuke missile force by 50 -- AP
My Comment: With the Ukraine crisis ongoing .... is this the right to cut nuclear forces? I guess for this U.S. administration it is.
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