The Congressional Commission on the Strategic Posture of the United States issued its final report in October 2023. Because of the ongoing wars in the Middle East and Ukraine, it did not receive the attention it should have given the critical role of nuclear weapons in our security. The report contends that, although the fundamentals of the U.S. deterrence strategy remain sound, the application of that strategy must change significantly to address the 2027-2035 threat environment. According to the report, the U.S.-led international order and the values it upholds “are at risk from the Chinese and Russian authoritarian regimes,” and the risk of military conflict with those major powers has grown and “carries the potential for nuclear war.” As the Commission argues:

Today the United States is on the cusp of having not one, but two nuclear peer adversaries, each with ambitions to change the international status quo, by force if necessary, a situation which the United States did not anticipate and for which it is not prepared. While the risk of a major nuclear conflict remains low, the risk of a military conflict with either or both Russia and China, while not inevitable, has grown, and with it the risk of nuclear use, possibly against the U.S. homeland.

To meet this and other foreseeable national security challenges, the Commission recommends an ambitious program of nuclear and conventional force modernization, a more resilient space architecture with offensive and defensive elements, an expansion of the U.S. defense industrial base, improved nuclear infrastructure, and, where appropriate, nuclear arms control and-or measures of nuclear risk reduction. In addition, it argues that the United States should ensure that it is on the cutting edge of emerging technologies related to security and defense, including big data analytics, quantum computing, and artificial intelligence (AI). 

Included in the Commission’s recommendations is the completion of existing plans for the modernization of the U.S. strategic nuclear triad of intercontinental land-based, sea-based, and airborne nuclear delivery systems and warheads. This program more or less tracks the consensus of the Obama, Trump, and Biden administrations, although the Commission recommends possible increases in the hitherto projected numbers of sea-based and airborne nuclear launch systems. According to the Commission, U.S nuclear strategy should be based on six fundamental tenets: (1) assured second strike; (2) flexible response to achieve national objectives; (3) tailored deterrence; (4) extended deterrence and assurance; (5) calculated ambiguity in declaratory policy; and (6) hedge against risk. 

It contends that flexible response should provide a credible range of resilient response options to restore nuclear deterrence and promote conflict termination by “convincing an adversary’s leadership it has seriously miscalculated, that further use of nuclear weapons will not achieve its objectives, and that it will incur costs that far exceed any benefits it can achieve should it escalate further.”

Although the Commission includes both conventional and limited nuclear options in its recommended tool kit for deterrence and assurance, it is clear that it views current U.S. non-strategic weapons as insufficient for probable future deterrence stress tests. In this view, it is not alone. The Nuclear Posture Reviews (NPRs) of the Obama, Trump, and Biden administrations largely agreed about the size and composition of U.S. strategic nuclear forces. On the other hand, their perspectives on lower-yield or non-strategic nuclear weapons differed. The Obama administration deemphasized non-strategic nuclear weapons, but the Trump administration proposed two new weapons to offset perceived deficiencies in U.S. flexible nuclear response: a low-yield version of the W76 warhead for the Navy’s Trident D-5 submarine-launched ballistic missile (SLBM); and a new nuclear-capable submarine-launched cruise missile (SLCM-N). The Biden administration chose to retain the low-yield D-5, but its 2022 NPR excluded any plans to develop the SLCM-N. In accessing the Commission’s recommendations, it is important to keep in mind the perspectives of several experts and other factors. 

Keith B. Payne and David J. Trachtenberg, both former high-ranking defense department officials, have noted that Russia and China continue to build additional non-strategic nuclear weapons (NSNW) and that Russia’s stockpile of deployed NSNW maybe ten times or more the number of a similar American weapon. The result of disparities in NSNW between the U.S. and Russia or China could be gaps in the spectrum of deterrence and assurance. According to Payne and Trachtenberg,

In the near-absence of proportional, regional U.S. nuclear capabilities, deterrence could fail because Russia and China understandably question whether the United States would be willing to turn a regional conflict into a potentially suicidal nuclear war, and thus calculate that they are in greater freedom to engage in regional, limited nuclear threats or employment.

Mark B. Schneider, a senior career Pentagon and State Department official, also points to potential deterrence vulnerabilities in the larger Russian numbers of non-strategic nuclear weapons compared to those available to U.S. forces:

There are very large numbers of potential targets for low yield/low collateral damage battlefield nuclear weapons. If the United States seeks to keep a conflict limited by refraining from strategic weapons use, it will clearly be at a significant disadvantage in non-strategic nuclear force numbers. Indeed, the more the United States seeks to keep the nuclear conflict limited by creating a firebreak between non-strategic and strategic nuclear weapons, the more significant the Russian nuclear advantage will become.

As far back as 2019, Lt. Gen. Robert P. Ashley, then head of the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA,) noted that Russia possesses about 2,000 non-strategic nuclear warheads and added that its stockpile was likely to grow over the next decade:

Russia is adding new military capabilities to its existing stockpile of nonstrategic nuclear weapons, including those employable by ships, aircraft and ground forces. These nuclear warheads include theater- and tactical-range systems that Russia relies on to deter and defeat NATO or China in a conflict. Russia’s stockpile of non-strategic nuclear weapons (is) already large and diverse and is being modernized with an eye towards greater accuracy, longer ranges, and lower yields to suit their potential warfighting role.

General Ashley also noted, however, that due to Russia’s lack of transparency and the dual nature of delivery systems—incorporating conventional or nuclear weapons—estimates of Russia’s actual numbers of NSNW stockpiled or deployed are imperfect. As a 2020 report by the U.S. Congressional Research Service, which was updated in April 2022, it is unclear why Russia retains and may expand its stockpile of non-strategic nuclear weapons. Some contend that a larger and more diverse inventory of non-strategic nuclear weapons is Russia’s compensation for conventional forces that are inferior to those of the U.S. and NATO. Others see Russia’s non-strategic nuclear weapons modernization as contributing to an “escalate to de-escalate” nuclear doctrine that would require a wider spectrum of NSNW for coercive bargaining and war termination on terms favorable to Russia.

The Biden administration’s recently released Nuclear Posture Review also addresses the significance of non-strategic nuclear capabilities in U.S. and allied defense planning. In order to deter nuclear coercion and theater attacks, they plan to strengthen regional deterrence with capabilities such as the F-35A dual-capable fighter aircraft (DCA) equipped with the B-61-12 bomb; the W-76-2 warhead (low yield submarine launched ballistic missile warhead); and the Long-Range Standoff (LRSO) weapon. According to the NPR:

These flexible, tailorable capabilities are key to ensuring that Russia’s leadership does not miscalculate regarding the consequences of nuclear use on any scale, thereby reducing their confidence in both initiating conventional war against NATO and considering the employment of non-strategic nuclear weapons in such a conflict.

Despite this apparent consensus about the need to bolster U.S. and allied deterrence with additional non-strategic nuclear weapons, the place of NSNW in Russian strategy is more complex than the actual number of weapons available.

As scholar and military theorist Dmitri Adamsky points out, in terms of Russia’s ongoing war against Ukraine, its nuclear rhetoric is part of a “cross-domain coercion cocktail” intended as a means of strategic persuasion short of nuclear first use. Nuclear first use, if it occurs, is likely to have been preceded by muscle-flexing in the form of various “strategic gestures” (coercive signaling for deterrence and compellence) with nuclear forces to communicate the capability and resolve to climb the ladder of escalation. As he explains:

These “gestures” will be decisive enough to communicate credibility, but slow enough to allow the West to take notice of them, digest the information, and adjust accordingly. The Kremlin is unlikely to skip up the escalation stairs, but will advance through this phase incrementally to generate maximum effectiveness.

On the other hand, some experts rightfully caution that not every capability gap necessarily leads to a gap in deterrence or assurance. RAND Corporation analyst Edward Geist suggests that the resolve of U.S. decisionmakers prior to or during a crisis may be more important for deterring adversaries than the numbers and kinds of weapons available. According to Geist:

Not every deterrence or assurance gap can be remedied by acquiring more or better nuclear weapons. If adversary leaders scoff at the resolve of U.S. decisionmakers, even huge U.S. advantages in the number and quality of the United States’ nuclear weapons might not deter these leaders. Exaggerated rhetoric about ostensible adversary nuclear advantages could greatly enhance the danger of this outcome. 

In addition to the opinions of these experts, it should also be noted that the U.S. Enduring Stockpile includes warheads of variable yield for ALCMs (air-launched cruise missiles), SLCMs (sea-launched cruise missiles), and SLBMs (submarine-launched ballistic missiles) with options as low as five kilotons. For “messaging” purposes, the yield of the weapon may be less important than the choice of target to attack. For example, the demonstrative use of a nuclear weapon to create an electromagnetic pulse (EMP) that fries electronic circuits over a wide area might be impressive without causing an immediate loss of life or mass destruction of property. Using a low-yield NSNW at sea might threaten naval vessels and their crews without collateral damage to civilians or facilities ashore. 

Nuclear messaging could even occur without actually firing a weapon. Weapons might be moved from their peacetime storage sites to locations nearer to their assigned launchers and in ways that were obviously visible to enemy intelligence. Bombers and other aircraft that are nuclear capable can be placed on higher alert, relocated, or sent aloft on trajectories that indicate growing seriousness about ongoing events. Military “exercises” can involve more nonroutine activities and visible preparations for attack. 

Paradoxically, signals of resolve for either conventional or nuclear deterrence can also be sent by showing apparent stoicism and self-control in the face of adversary efforts to upset the applecart. Threats of nuclear escalation by provocateurs can be met by treating them as bombastic overkill and by reassuring all audiences that the United States has contingency plans already in place for almost every situation and that it will continue to conduct real-time rehearsals with allies and partners for future challenges. The U.S. president and national security apparatus should, as John F. Kennedy once recommended, “never negotiate out of fear, but never fear to negotiate.”

The precise numbers and kinds of weapons that the United States will need to offset the rise of China as a nuclear peer competitor and modernization of Russia’s nuclear arsenal are not estimated in the commission report. But the apparent costs for modernization of nuclear forces and infrastructure, including nuclear command, control and communications (NC3), delivery systems, warheads, cyber and space supports, and improved U.S. missile and air defenses, plus advanced hypersonic offensive weapons and other means of offsetting enemy integrated air and missile defenses (IAMD), should involve considerable sticker shock. More importantly, the question of U.S. strategy and understanding of Russian and Chinese military strategy (and vice versa), including that for nuclear deterrence or use, looms largely in the background.  

Imagine a four-dimensional chess game of perceptions management taking into account the following: U.S. Perceptions of Russian and Chinese Strategy, Russian and Chinese Perceptions of U.S. Strategy, Russian and Chinese Perceptions of U.S. Perceptions of Russian and Chinese Strategy, and U.S. Perceptions of Russian and Chinese Perceptions of U.S. Strategy. Each of these four dimensions interacts with all the others, exerting some influence and receiving feedback. 

In addition, it will be important to know how closely Russian and Chinese military-strategic planning is coordinated with respect to nuclear deterrence, first use or first strike. Presidents Xi and Putin have made demonstrations of political affinity, and the two states regularly conduct shared military exercises. However, this does not necessarily mean that Beijing and Moscow are totally transparent with respect to their nuclear force holdings or their actual war plans. Chinese and Russian leadership share hostility to what they regard as American global hegemony, but the relationship between that and future force planning remains uncertain. 

Arms control could offer a forum for increasing consultation between China and Russia, in addition to their expectations about the United States. Even if, for example, China builds its strategic nuclear forces to a maximum of 1,500 operationally deployed warheads on 700 or fewer intercontinental launchers, the PLA would still remain within the New START limits for deployed weapons and launchers currently accepted by the United States and Russia (although Russia has temporarily withdrawn from participation in New START formal negotiations, it has indicated its willingness to remain within New START limits unless or until otherwise indicated). 

Some understandable skepticism exists about whether China would agree to take part in strategic arms control talks as they have been conducted in the past by the United States and Russia. China would have to accept a degree of transparency not previously permitted with respect to its deployed (and perhaps non-deployed) nuclear weapons and launchers. However, China’s position on transparency may evolve as its strategic nuclear force deployments increase in number and move into the same neighborhood as those of the United States and Russia. Even then, arms control will be a qualitative as well as a quantitative challenge, assuming a tripartite participation by the three great powers. China and Russia will depend more on land-based missiles than the United States, with the lion’s share of its weapons deployed on submarines and bombers. Although both Russia and China are improving their deployed SSBN and bomber forces, the United States will remain at the forefront of ballistic missile submarine and strategic bomber-related technologies for the foreseeable future.

Additional difficulties in seeing “through a glass darkly” are presented in attempts to forecast how the dominant technologies of the future, including AI, quantum computing, nanotechnology, autonomous weapons systems, directed energy weapons, and hypersonics, among others, will influence decisions about nuclear force planning and “how much is enough” for deterrence. More nuclear weapons do not necessarily mean greater security, and a trade-off between next-generation conventional and nuclear weapons is almost inevitable unless defense budgets are completely open-ended. U.S. defense planners, including those dealing with decisions about nuclear weapons, will need games and studies that maximize uncertainty, include scenarios with nonlinear events, and force different strategic mindsets into close-quarter combat. Keeping all these factors in mind will ensure that we do not overreact to the Commission’s recommendations and that they are implemented in a manner that bolsters our national security. 

Lawrence J. Korb is a senior fellow at the Center for American Progress. Previously, Dr. Korb served as assistant secretary of defense (manpower, reserve affairs, installations, and logistics) from 1981 through 1985.

Stephen J. Cimbala is a Distinguished Professor of Political Science at Penn State Brandywine, an American Studies faculty member, and the author of numerous books and articles in the fields of international security studies, defense policy, nuclear weapons and arms control, intelligence, and other fields.

Image: Shutterstock.com.