Dr. Williams, thank you very much for that introduction and for inviting me to join you at CSIS today. I am delighted to be here.
I have been honored to serve as the Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense and then Acting Assistant Secretary of Defense for Space Policy for the past two and a half years. These have been some of the most challenging years for U.S. nuclear policy this century – and some of my most professionally fulfilling.
The key message I'd like to leave you with today is sobering but necessary. While the Administration has long sought to strike a balance between deterrence and arms control, we now find ourselves in nothing short of a new nuclear age—an unprecedented mix of multiple revisionist nuclear challengers who are uninterested in arms control or risk reduction efforts, each rapidly modernizing and expanding their nuclear arsenals, and openly threatening to employ nuclear weapons to achieve their aims.
These challengers' actions have forced us to shift to a more competitive approach.
This more competitive approach is founded on three pillars. First, we must continue to field a modern nuclear deterrent with the numbers AND the attributes necessary to deter strategic attack, assure our allies and partners, and meet our objectives if deterrence fails. Our current nuclear force posture and planned modernization program is necessary but may well be insufficient in the coming years to support this need. Second, we must continue to strengthen our network of allies and partners and our extended deterrence efforts in NATO and the Indo-Pacific because these are our asymmetric advantage over our adversaries. And third, we must invest in building the next generation of talent—the next generation of leaders to guide our strategic thinking and shape our future infrastructure and capabilities in this era of competition.
Let me be clear: competition is not a foregone conclusion—if our adversaries make different choices, so will we. But so far, they have not, and show no interest in doing so. So, if our adversaries continue down their current paths, the United States – alongside our allies and partners – is ready, willing, and able to confront the challenges of a new nuclear age.
When I first came into this position in March 2022, the Nuclear Posture Review (NPR) had just been completed. It arrived at a unique moment. The administration recognized that the world had become more dangerous and sought to restore diplomacy's proper place in national security, rebuilding and strengthening U.S. standing in the world, and reinvigorating long-standing alliances and partnerships.
We immediately extended the New START treaty and put processes in place to develop a follow-on agreement.
We hoped that the People's Republic of China would engage responsibly, both bilaterally and in international fora, on nuclear issues including transparency and risk reduction, and we repeatedly raised these issues in our engagements with Beijing.
We were encouraged when the five declared Nuclear Weapons States – including Russia and China – affirmed that a nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought. Advancing these efforts was critical to demonstrating President Biden's commitment to reduce the salience of nuclear weapons globally.
But in February of 2022 Russia invaded Ukraine. Illegally and without provocation. Almost immediately, Russia began making irresponsible nuclear threats designed to deter and dissuade support for Ukraine. Russia recklessly brandished its nuclear weapons, particularly its growing stockpile of lower yield treaty unrestricted nuclear weapons. Russia continued rattling the nuclear saber while it brutalized Ukraine's population and attacked its cities. These provocations took place under a thick cloud of misinformation and outright lies: Even while Russian diplomats in Geneva were speaking solemnly about the need to avoid nuclear threats and nuclear war, Moscow was courting nuclear risk and threatening escalation.
Meanwhile, we learned that Russia is developing a new satellite designed to carry a nuclear weapon on orbit – an anti-satellite capability which, if detonated, could potentially wipe out an entire orbit of assets crucial not just to the United States, but the entire world. All of us should be concerned with the prospect of Russia putting a nuclear weapon in space, posing a threat to satellites operated by countries and companies around the globe, as well as to the vital communications, scientific, meteorological, agricultural, commercial, and national security services upon which we all depend. Make no mistake, even if detonating a nuclear weapon in space does not directly kill people, the indirect impact could be catastrophic to the entire world.
Russia's dangerous invasion of Ukraine came after a year of intense discussion about the trajectory of another nuclear power: the People's Republic of China. In 2021, non-governmental researchers announced their discovery of hundreds of new ICBM silos under construction in Western China. Later that year, the Intelligence Community revealed that the PRC had accelerated its nuclear expansion, finding that the PRC would likely field over 1000 operational warheads by 2030. Today, we assess that the PRC has likely completed silo construction and has begun loading them with missiles. This expansion is being fueled by Russia—literally—as Moscow supplies China with Highly Enriched Uranium reactor fuel, which supports the production of weapons-grade plutonium. The growth in, and diversification of, the Chinese nuclear force—something we neither anticipated nor accounted for when we crafted the nuclear modernization program over a decade ago—will be a defining feature of this new nuclear age.
And we can't sleep on North Korea which also continues to expand, diversify, and improve its nuclear, ballistic missile, and non-nuclear capabilities. While not a major power rival like the PRC and Russia, North Korea's continued improvement and diversification of its nuclear and ballistic missile capabilities present deterrence dilemmas for the United States and regional allies. Conflict on the Korean Peninsula risks escalation and the involvement of multiple regional nuclear-armed actors. What's more, the growing DPRK-Russia strategic partnership, which violates several U.N. Security Council resolutions, is concerning, and illustrates the real possibility of collaboration and even collusion between our nuclear armed adversaries. These developments occur even though the Biden administration has consistently reached out to the DPRK to offer talks with no preconditions, in an effort to seek a diplomatic resolution to Pyongyang's advancing nuclear arsenal. Those calls have gone unanswered.
This emerging security environment is unprecedented. The now-common phrase "two peer nuclear problem" understates the complexity of the challenge we face. I prefer to characterize the environment as the "multiple nuclear challenger problem" because each adversary presents different challenges for U.S. strategists.
For example, although Russia is a nuclear peer, it is not a peer in any other domain, or sense of the word. However, as a conventionally weaker power with revisionist regional ambitions, Russia poses an acute threat of nuclear employment and a brazen willingness to flout international norms for its own benefit. Meanwhile, the PRC is not YET a nuclear peer, but the growth in its nuclear arsenal's size and diversity – accompanied by posture changes from regional employment to launch on warning – places it on a trajectory to soon become one. Unlike Russia, China will be a peer to the United States in virtually every relevant military and economic domain.
The DPRK is not a peer in any domain, but it brandishes its nuclear capabilities against two close U.S. allies – South Korea and Japan – and increasingly the United States.
Any one of these nuclear challenges would be daunting by itself, but the simultaneity, and growing collaboration and evidence of collusion between them is unprecedented, forcing us to think in new and careful ways about challenges such as escalation dynamics and deterring opportunistic aggression in this new nuclear age.
All of this is to say that the United States did not choose to create additional risks in the nuclear domain. It is our adversaries' choices that have made the world more dangerous.
Recall that Russia was a "partner" to NATO only a decade ago. With Putin's invasion of Ukraine, Russia is again an adversary.
We wanted to stay in the INF Treaty. Russia violated it.
We wanted to keep the Conventional Armed Forces in Europe Treaty. Russia withdrew.
We want to not only adhere to New START, but to negotiate a follow-on treaty to maintain agreed-upon limits on strategic nuclear weapons. Instead, Russia illegally and illegitimately suspended its participation in New START and shows no interest in a follow-on treaty.
We have made it clear to the PRC that we are willing to have substantive risk reduction talks. The PRC has said no.
We offered dialogue on denuclearization without preconditions to North Korea. The DPRK has shown no interest.
We have made sincere and good faith efforts to develop very different nuclear relationships with all our nuclear-armed adversaries. But they chose a more dangerous path. And it would be irresponsible for the United States Government to not confront and address this new reality, a reality foisted on us despite our best efforts to establish a different one.
I want to be clear—our initial efforts at the start of this administration were not in vain. We have demonstrated to the international community that the United States is not, and will not, be the impediment to progress in risk reduction and arms control. We have also demonstrated to the American people that we are committed to using all tools of national power for our defense.
We will continue to seek opportunities for dialogue, transparency, arms control, and risk reduction. The strategic deterrence community's interests in arms control are perhaps best explained by the Commander of U.S. Strategic Command, General Cotton, who views "arms control as a complementary effort, seeking the same objective [as deterrence] by reducing the number of threats and enabling strategic stability dialogues with potential adversaries." But arms control requires willing partners that are committed to reducing risks, rather than increasing them. So instead, we find ourselves today in a more fraught and dangerous environment – one that the NPR foresaw as a possibility but which is now a reality.
As a result, we have been prudently preparing for today's realities and the world we anticipate tomorrow. Since 2021, the administration has prioritized upgrading the "hardware" of nuclear deterrence – capabilities, posture, and operations – as well as the "software" – our strategic concepts, plans, and the engagements with allies on extended deterrence that make our deterrent more credible and robust.
With respect to hardware, for over a year, my team and I have led a strategy-driven review of the implications of the new security environment for strategic deterrence and U.S. nuclear posture. This process is overseen at very senior levels of government and includes interagency stakeholders. We began with the principal question: what capabilities and posture do we need to credibly deter attack on the U.S. homeland as well as our allies and vital regional interests not just today, but tomorrow? If adjustments to our hardware and software are necessary, how do we prioritize them? How do we avoid additional risk to our existing plans and the nuclear production complex? As part of this review, we are taking a fresh look at U.S. nuclear modernization, including examining the underlying assumptions of the modernization program, which was conceived at a time when we assumed we would only have to deter a New START-compliant Russia.
Some things became clear to us early on.
First, as others, including the independent and bipartisan Congressional Strategic Posture Commission concurred: the program of record described in the 2022 NPR is necessary but may well be insufficient to meet the deterrence challenges of the future and to mitigate risks that could arise during the transition to a modernized nuclear triad.
Second, given the complexity and the long lead times required to adjust our forces and posture, we must lay the groundwork now so national leaders have options to quickly and responsively adjust the future nuclear force if needed. Let there be no doubt: we are confident in our current forces and posture today. We will also abide by the central limits of New START for the duration of the Treaty, as long as we assess that Russia continues to do so. But in an uncertain world, preserving the option to change course tomorrow requires that we make necessary decisions and investments today.
Third, while we plan for the future, there are steps we have already taken to reduce risk to the modernization program and enhance deterrence. For example, last year, we announced that we are pursuing a modern variant of the B61 gravity bomb – the B61-13. The B61-13 takes advantage of an existing qualified production line for the B61-12. It will strengthen deterrence and assurance by providing the President with additional options against certain harder and large-area military targets while not increasing the overall numbers of weapons in the U.S. stockpile, or stressing other weapon modernization efforts. It also demonstrates that we can use our existing production capabilities flexibly and creatively.
We are also taking steps to extend the availability of current-generation OHIO-class SSBNs so they can operate longer if necessary during the transition to modern systems.
We are complying with Congressional direction to develop and field a nuclear-armed sea-launched cruise missile. The 2022 NPR canceled the program because, at the time, the Administration assessed it was unnecessary and could distract from other priorities. Today the world is different. Put clearly: the Department is proceeding with a SLCM-N and we're working closely with Congress to ensure we are meeting our shared goals of getting the most deterrence value for the least risk to the modernization program, the nuclear weapons complex, and the Joint Force.
We are also reviewing and prioritizing other ways we might adjust U.S. posture. We have begun exploring options to increase future launcher capacity or additional deployed warheads – on the land, sea, and air legs – that could offer national leadership increased flexibility if executed.
As this audience knows, the land-leg is undergoing a large and complex modernization effort through the Sentinel program, which will upgrade and replace the long-serving Minuteman III. In July, following a comprehensive review of the costs of the program, the Department certified to Congress that a modified Sentinel ICBM program remains essential to national security and that there are no alternatives to the program that would provide acceptable capability at less cost. We undertook a rigorous review of a range of alternatives—from sustaining Minuteman III, to road mobile missiles, to fielding Trident missiles on land. None of these alternatives provided the capability we need at less cost than a modified Sentinel program—and each introduced risk that eroded the credibility and efficacy of the land leg, and of the triad as a whole. While Sentinel is in development, we will continue to sustain the Minuteman III as long as necessary.
Importantly, the Sentinel program review re-validated our established policy of maintaining a nuclear triad because the national security requirement for a robust land-leg is more important than ever in the evolving security environment. Multiple administrations have concluded that all legs of the triad have mutually supporting attributes which, taken together, best maintain strategic stability. The way the United States has conceived of and implemented ground-based ICBMs complicates adversary decision making by placing a prompt and responsive strategic capability in the United States. In so doing, the land-leg makes the other legs of the triad more effective. The U.S. nuclear triad is greater than the sum of its parts, so we concluded that the modernized Sentinel system—more capable than Minuteman III—is essential to national security.
We also continue to seek ways to integrate non-nuclear capabilities to enable and augment strategic deterrence. But, make no mistake, for the foreseeable future, nuclear weapons will provide unique deterrent effects that no other element of U.S. military power can replace. They remain the ultimate backstop to deter strategic attacks against the United States, our allies, and partners.
Beyond the triad, the Department is also focused on modernizing nuclear command, control, and communications (NC3) so that the President of the United States can continue to command and control U.S. nuclear forces under all circumstances, including during and following nuclear or non-nuclear strategic attack. We are modernizing legacy NC3 systems through programs that retain survivability, resiliency, and redundancy. We are focused on all relevant NC3 components – satellites, aircraft, and communications technology – to allow crisis communication and continuity of government operations should circumstances require.
Sustained support for these initiatives is critical given the deteriorating security landscape, the irresponsible behavior of U.S. competitors, and the need to maintain a safe, secure, and effective nuclear deterrent, as well as credible extended deterrence to allies and partners. As National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said last year at the Arms Control Association, we do not need to numerically pace our competitors warhead-for-warhead or outnumber their combined total forces to deter them. In fact, just the opposite: we are committed to fielding only what is required to credibly deter adversaries and protect the American people and our allies and partners.
But, as NSC Senior Director Pranay Vaddi noted early this year, this idea cuts both ways: Absent a change in the nuclear trajectories of the PRC, Russia, and North Korea, we may reach a point where a change in the size or posture of our current deployed forces is necessary. There is no need to grow the stockpile yet, but adjustments to the number of deployed capabilities may be necessary IF our adversaries continue down their current paths.
Only the President can make that decision. If that point comes, it will be because he or she has concluded that such changes are needed to deter adversaries, defend the United States, and meet our commitments to our allies and partners. We seek a smart and flexible posture, not an unlimited one, but achieving it may require deploying more and/or different capabilities than we field today.
Part of a smart and flexible posture is making sure we have the deterrence "software" to make the most of our hardware. Over the past two years, we have refined the strategic concepts and plans that we will need to make deterrence credible in this new nuclear age. The President recently issued updated nuclear weapons employment guidance to account for multiple nuclear-armed adversaries, and, in particular, the significant increase in the size and diversity of the PRC's nuclear arsenal. My office has begun to provide the Department and the Joint Force updated implementation guidance on how to plan and posture our forces in this new environment.
Thankfully, the United States does not face this new reality alone. Our network of allies and partners in the Euro-Atlantic and the Indo-Pacific is an asymmetric strategic advantage that our adversaries can never hope to match. We have made tremendous advances in the last three years to strengthen allied assurance and upgrade our extended deterrence "software."
I have been privileged to lead U.S. bilateral and multilateral efforts with all the allies to whom we formally extend nuclear deterrence. Over the past three years, we have convened dozens of meetings on four continents. These efforts enhance deterrence by presenting U.S. adversaries with a unified front, and they assure allies by demonstrating our resolve to defend them with the full range of U.S. capabilities, including nuclear.
In Europe, the United States and our NATO allies have stood united against Russia's brutal war of aggression in Ukraine and its reckless nuclear rhetoric. NATO has renewed its commitment to nuclear deterrence, reaffirming clearly that so long as nuclear weapons exist, NATO will remain a nuclear alliance. In my time at the Pentagon, we have made significant strides to make NATO nuclear deterrence not just "fit for purpose" but "fitter for purpose."
We broadened allied participation and support for the nuclear mission. We are completing the modernization of NATO nuclear capabilities through the transition to the fifth generation F-35 and the B61-12, which are bolstering the military effectiveness and credibility of the deterrent. This year, we completed the operational certification of Dutch F-35As for the Dual Capable Aircraft mission, making them the second NATO ally (after the United States) to do so. In 2022, Germany joined the F-35A program, explicitly citing the need to continue their support for NATO's nuclear burden sharing arrangements. Because of Russia's behavior, we welcomed Finland and Sweden to the Alliance—a major strategic gain—both of whom publicly committed to supporting NATO nuclear deterrence through their conventional forces and participating in consultative bodies.
NATO has also made historic progress in adapting its operational planning processes to meet the Russian threat. As we announced in the Washington Summit declaration in July, NATO has a new generation of multi-domain defense plans to allow NATO to credibly defend allied territory with non-nuclear means. NATO has also stood up a parallel effort for nuclear planning to improve our readiness for a range of potential contingencies.
The nuclear forces of the United States are the supreme guarantor of NATO's security, supported by the United Kingdom's, which are explicitly contributed to the defense of NATO, and France's whose nuclear forces are independent, but which have always had a European dimension. With respect to France, independent doesn't mean uncoordinated, and the P3 have improved their coordination on strategic activities, deterrence messaging, and shared threat assessments, all while strengthening our commitment to burden-sharing. So even with our closest nuclear-armed allies, the United Kingdom and France, consultations are deepening, both bilaterally and trilaterally, as we work together to strengthen deterrence against potential opportunistic aggression from multiple nuclear challengers.
I have been encouraged by the rapidly growing interest and engagement in nuclear issues from my counterparts in Allied capitals, as evidenced by the intense and productive discussions we have had in the NATO High Level Group, which I chair. Discussions on nuclear issues in the Alliance have grown more frequent and much more sophisticated over time.
These developments represent a major strategic shift in NATO, and we continue to assess the opportunities to further enhance the credibility and efficacy of the deterrent mission, given the new geometry of the Alliance.
While we have accomplished a great deal, there is more work to do. NATO must continue planning efforts for both conventional and nuclear crises. These efforts must be integrated and "coherent." We must work to sustain support in the alliance and in allied capitals for nuclear modernization. The likelihood of a persistent nuclear threat from Russia demands a whole-of-NATO strategic approach. All of this rests on vigorous American leadership. If we continue to lead, I am confident that NATO will continue to take the steps necessary to sustain and enhance nuclear deterrence.
In the Indo-Pacific, we committed to working with our allies toward an effective mix of capabilities, concepts, deployments, exercises, and tailored options to deter, and if necessary, respond to coercion and aggression. This commitment called for stronger extended deterrence consultations with a more cooperative approach to decision-making related to nuclear deterrence policy, strategic messaging, and activities to reinforce collective security.
We have delivered on this commitment. Our Indo-Pacific allies are partners in extended deterrence, not just passive beneficiaries. Our tailored dialogues with the Republic of Korea (ROK), Japan, and Australia have become deeper and broader – including work on conventional-nuclear integration, crisis consultation, and efforts to strengthen allied understanding of U.S. nuclear deterrence posture and capabilities.
We have also elevated the level of senior-leader engagement across all the dialogues – adding new working groups with Japan, expanding defense discussions with Australia, and, perhaps most visibly, establishing the Nuclear Consultative Group (NCG) with the ROK at the Assistant Secretary of Defense level. The NCG has delivered on President Biden and President Yoon's vision in the April 2023 Washington Declaration to strengthen the U.S.-ROK extended nuclear deterrence relationship. Their vision has become reality: we have signed a Guidelines document charting a path ahead, begun work to facilitate integration across the alliance, and now stand as equal partners strengthening deterrence against nuclear and other forms of strategic attack from North Korea.
The United States also recognizes that trilateral and multilateral cooperation will only strengthen our efforts to respond to regional challenges. Trilateral partnership between the United States, the ROK, and Japan is stronger than ever following last year's Camp David Summit. We activated a data sharing mechanism to exchange real-time missile warning information to detect and assess ballistic missiles launched by North Korea. This June we hosted the first iteration of FREEDOM EDGE, a new multi-domain trilateral exercise that allowed our countries to train in new and novel ways. We will continue to build on these efforts for trilateral and multilateral approaches to meet emerging challenges together.
Across all our regional partnerships, more frequent and more wide-ranging senior-level discussions allow us to coordinate our deterrence policies, strategic messaging, and activities that reinforce regional security, including promoting better synchronization and interoperability. Together, we will continue to tailor responsive extended deterrence and assurance policies that leverage all tools of national power. Credible deterrence hardware and software presents a unified front to adversaries and continues to assure our allies that relying on the U.S. for nuclear deterrence is the best approach for their security and ours.
At the beginning of this administration, we laid out a comprehensive and balanced approach to defending our vital national security interests while reducing nuclear risks. This continues to be our approach. But the context has changed. We were hopeful that our adversaries would join us in an effort to reduce nuclear dangers. We were, and are, prepared to meet this new reality while adhering to our principles as a responsible nuclear power. We remain committed to arms control and risk reduction measures with our nuclear-armed competitors, should circumstances permit and responsible partners emerge. We are dedicated to preserving and strengthening the nuclear non-proliferation regime and reaffirm our commitment to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. We will uphold the global norm against nuclear explosive testing and support the entry into force of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty. But make no mistake, unilateral cuts by the United States are not an effective approach to reducing nuclear risks.
We should continue to try to persuade our adversaries that managing rivalry through arms control is preferable to unrestrained nuclear competition. But our nuclear competitors have repeatedly chosen competition—and sometimes outright conflict—over cooperation. We are now entering a new and dangerous era that demands we adapt. Maintaining balance requires that we shift our footing to a more competitive approach.
It is our responsibility to see the world as it is, not as we hoped or wished it would be. It is possible that we will one day look back and see the quarter century after the Cold War as "nuclear intermission." The first act was the Cold War competition between the Soviet Union and the United States. Though intense, that competition was not bereft of cooperation and arms control, even at its most fraught moments. Today's unfolding second act is one in which Russia sees nuclear saber rattling as a way to reshape the international order; in which Russia modernizes and expands its arsenal unfettered by arms control; and in which Russia continues to design and deploy destabilizing novel systems. This is also a world in which the PRC is wary of substantive cooperation and continues to expand and diversify its arsenal without transparency on its doctrine and intentions. This is a world in which North Korea continues to threaten its neighbors while providing the ammunition for Russia's war on Ukraine.
Intermission is over, and we are clearly in the next act. We have an obligation to continually assess our policies and capabilities and consider whether we are doing enough to protect the United States and our allies and partners. We must prepare for a world where constraints on nuclear weapons arsenals disappear entirely. Modernizing U.S. nuclear capabilities today and preparing for future posture adjustments may help incentivize our adversaries to engage in strategic arms control discussions. However, if our adversaries continue to make choices that make them and the world less safe, the United States is prepared to do what is necessary to successfully compete—to deter aggression and assure our allies—in this new nuclear age.
As we confront these generational challenges, programs like PONI will be essential to mentoring the next generations of policy, technical, and operational nuclear experts. The diverse talent pool PONI has and will continue to build will serve the United States well. It is a premier example of the reinvestment we must make in our talent – to build a flexible and responsive nuclear infrastructure and talent pool to tackle the unprecedented strategic and policy challenges we are likely to confront in the coming decades.
I want to close by thanking the professionals across the Department of Defense and the interagency—my colleagues in the Joint Staff, the office of Nuclear Matters, STRATCOM, the services, the NSC, NNSA, and the State Department—that have supported our collective efforts to adapt to a novel and more dangerous security environment. I want to give a special thanks to my OSD Policy team—from the top to the bottom—but especially the incredibly smart and dedicated action officers who toil in the cubicles and work tirelessly to actually get this work done. It has been an honor to serve in this role for this President and this Administration. As I depart from government in the coming weeks and head back to MIT, I look forward to continuing the work from the outside to the extent I can, to help make U.S. nuclear policy and posture "fitter for purpose" in this new competitive nuclear age.
Thank you.