NTU Joins Broad Coalition In Support of Quigley Amendment to Energy and Water Appropriations Bill

Dear Representative,

We are writing to urge your support of the Quigley Amendment to the Fiscal Year 2016 Energy and Water Appropriations Act, H.R. 2028. This amendment would save taxpayers $167 million by maintaining the acquisition schedule for the nuclear-armed cruise missile nuclear warhead at the Fiscal Year 2015 request. The savings would go toward deficit reduction.

There is a great deal of uncertainty about whether the nuclear-armed cruise missile warhead life extension program is affordable, executable and necessary. Given this, it does not make sense to rush acquisition.

This year’s proposed budget request speeds up the new nuclear cruise missile by two years to FY2025 (from FY2027) even though the existing missile will be maintained until FY2030 and beyond. This unnecessary acceleration is being used to justify an enormous increase in funding from $9 million in FY15 to $195 million in FY16. The Quigley amendment would maintain the FY15 timetable, which would have funded the nuclear warhead at $28 million in FY16.  

Underscoring affordability concerns, the Energy and Water Appropriations Subcommittee Report accompanying H.R. 2028 states that this life extension program will “require funding peaks that will compete with other planned major multi-year programs and projects,” such as the $10 billion B61 (gravity bomb) life extension program.

Between 2000 and 2005, NNSA spent $300 million on nuclear-armed cruise missile warhead refurbishment before abandoning the project because the Pentagon’s requirements changed. In addition, this agency has a history of inaccurate cost estimates. For instance, the B61 life extension, once estimated at $4 billion, is now expected to cost approximately $10 billion.

The cruise missile is just part of a growing list of nuclear modernization projects, including strategic submarines, nuclear-armed bombers, and intercontinental ballistic missiles, that together could cost up to $1 trillion over the next 30 years. The Pentagon has said these plans are unaffordable unless it gets an additional $10 billion to $12 billion annually beginning in 2021, on top of its full budget request.

Finally, it is unclear whether the United States needs a new nuclear-armed cruise missile. Even without the cruise missile, U.S. nuclear weapons can be delivered by air, sea, and land and the latter two options provide standoff capability. Yet, whether or not the nation moves forward with this weapon, it should only do so after ensuring that alternatives have been thoroughly examined. The Quigley amendment would avoid spending money on a program whose mission and affordability have not been fully justified.

Sincerely,

National Orgs

Kingston Reif, Director for Disarmament and Threat Reduction Policy

Arms Control Association

 

Angela Canterbury, Executive Director

Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation & Council for a Livable World  

 

Jonathan Bydlak, President

Coalition to Reduce Spending

 

David Culp, Legislative Representative

Friends Committee on National Legislation (Quakers)

 

Robert Naiman, Policy Director

Just Foreign Policy

 

Pete Sepp, President

National Taxpayers Union

 

Paul Kawika Martin, Policy Director

Peace Action
 

Danielle Brian, Executive Director

Project on Government Oversight
 

Catherine Thomasson, MD, Executive Director

Physicians for Social Responsibility

 

Ryan Alexander, Executive Director

Taxpayers for Common Sense

 

David Williams, President

Taxpayers Protection Alliance

 

Lisbeth Gronlund, Co-Director, Global Security Program

Union of Concerned Scientists

 

Stephen Miles, Advocacy Director

Win Without War

 

Susan Shaer, Executive Director

Women’s Action for New Directions

 

Regional Orgs

Becky Rafter, Executive Director

Georgia Women’s Action for New Directions

 

Jay Coghlan, Executive Director

Nuclear Watch New Mexico

 

Judith Mohling

Rocky Mountain Peace and Justice Center

 

Jon Rainwater, Executive Director

Peace Action West

 

Jerry Stein, Coordinator

The Peace Farm (Amarillo, Texas)

 

Richard Gibson

Physicians for Social Responsibility of Greater Kansas City (KS and MO)

 

Denise Duffield
Associate Director
Physicians for Social Responsibility-Los Angeles

 

Marylia Kelley, Executive Director

Tri-Valley CAREs, Livermore, CA