Foundation Forum
General Eugene E. Habiger
CINC STRATCOM
Orlando AFA Symposium '98
Feb. 27, 1998
"Strategic Deterrence in the 21st
Century"
It is an honor for me to stand before this group. I have several
messages that I'd like to pass on to you and I certainly appreciate the
opportunity.
The role of strategic command in making the global engagement vision
a reality can seem vague and on the periphery. But trust me, exactly the
opposite is true. Our mission was essential in the past and I would
submit, is crucial today as we embrace the global engagement concept.
Nuclear deterrence is at the core of American national security
strategy. Joint Vision 2010 defines the primary task of our Armed Forces
to deter conflict, but should deterrence fail, to fight and to win. This
is what we do at Strategic Command: deterrence. It is what we do each
and every day, 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.
A basic issue that I want to talk to you about has to do with why we
are still in the deterrence business? The Cold War has ended. Why do we
still need a deterrent force? When the Cold War ended, it didn't end
with parades and banner headlines. It ended with a fizzle. Ladies and
gentlemen, I would submit that the loser really didn't lose in the
traditional sense. When the Cold War ended, the loser retained its
arsenal, including several thousands of nuclear warheads on alert.
Because the Cold War ended in such an ambiguous manner, it has been hard
to make our message heard--our message is that we still need to be
around. I am going to talk a lot more about that later because I feel
very strongly about this. When we fought World War II, 18 months after
Pearl Harbor General Marshall had a group in the War Department looking
at a post-World War II world. I would submit the end of the Cold War
snuck up on us and we've been paying the price ever since.
Clearly the world has changed a great deal in the last decade. It is
a safer world. Through all this change, one thing remains constant and
that is our unwavering emphasis and focus on deterrence. Although there
are a wide-variety of threats to our national interests, only one threat
can bring us to our knees and that is the nuclear threat. Obviously, a
remote, and I emphasize, a remote possibility, but one that exists and
must be considered.
These same threats also exist for our allies. Through extended
deterrence, which extends our nuclear deterrent umbrella to all of those
allies, and assures them protection, we help ensure global stability. As
a result of our allies confidence in our capabilities, those nations
forego the development of nuclear weapons. This results in the enhanced
security of our allies, which in turn enhances global stability. At the
same time, another important national security objective is supported
and that is halting the proliferation of nuclear weapons which began
during the Cold War.
Because of the threats that remain today, our strategic forces remain
the corner stone of our national security strategy, our ultimate
insurance policy. And, by the way, the premium on that insurance policy
is a bargain. That premium is about 4% of the entire annual DoD budget.
I tell a lot of people that we are a low-maintenance command and I
really mean that. That is a good news-bad news story. Because of some
wise decisions made in the 70s, 80s, and early 90s, we have a force that
should serve us well for the next 20 years or so. I know you are not
interested in submarines much in this group, but let me tell you that
the Navy just upgraded the service life of their Ohio-class ballistic
missile submarines from 20 years to over 40 years. That will save us
many dollars in the future. As to our bomber force, I cannot be more
pleased with the B-2. It came into our warplan on 1 April of last year.
The B-1--and a lot of people are not aware of this--went out of the
nuclear business on 1 October of last year.
Now let me talk to you a little about the B-52. We use the B-52 today
very differently then the way we used it during the heart of the Cold
War. When I first started pulling alert on the B-52, we had four gravity
weapons and the mission, if called upon, was to go screaming across the
Soviet Union at 300 feet. We don't do that anymore. We use the B-52 as a
truck. We load it up with 20 cruise missiles and, outside of harm's way,
we launch those cruise missiles. I will tell you, ladies and gentlemen,
those airplanes came off the assembly lines in the 1961 time frame. It
looks like a 1961 Oldsmobile. It drives like a 1961 Oldsmobile. And, it
smells like a 1961 Oldsmobile. But it still does the job and it does it
very, very well. Let me put this in perspective for you. We tend to
think of airplanes like the Boeing 757 and the Boeing 767 as pretty new
airplanes. The average number of hours on the Boeing 757 flying
commercially today is 26,000 hours. The average number of hours in the
Boeing 767 today is 20,000 hours. The average number of hours on those
B-52s today is about 14,500 hours. What we have is a 1961 Oldsmobile
that was driven by a little old lady.
Another thing you need to understand--because this is a big deal and
a lot of people haven't thought much about it--is that I get beat up a
lot about not being a bomber advocate. In 1993, for a number of reasons,
and I am not complaining, combatant command of all bombers went to the
Commander in Chief of Atlantic Command. I have no operational control
over those airplanes until they CHOP (Change of Operational Control) to
me at the appropriate time. I will also tell you that thanks to the good
work and his articulate way of telling the story, General Dick Hawley,
at Air Combat Command, has been the bomber advocate. I can pound the
table and tell the nuclear side of the story, but only General Hawley
can pound the table and tell both the nuclear and conventional side. He
is doing an absolutely superb job.
Let me just briefly talk about the KC-135s. I require a little over
200 of those KC-135s to do my job. Eighty percent of those 200 airplanes
come out of the Air Force Reserve and Air Guard. I could not be more
pleased with the support I get out of that total Air Force team.
Finally, our intercontinental ballistic missiles. The Peacekeeper
will go away under Start II. The Minuteman III is fully funded. We are
going to upgrade the guidance system, and we are replacing the
propellant in all three stages. Those missiles should be good until
about the year 2020, or so. What we are going to need to do in about the
2010 period is start looking at budgeting for follow-on systems. We have
already started talking with the Air Force about this.
I will also tell you that while we are not doing very much of
anything except maintaining our forces, the Russians, on the other hand,
are continuing to put lots of resources into the modernization of their
strategic forces. They have four major weapon systems that they are
pursuing. First, is a new intercontinental ballistic missile, the SS-27
(Topol-M). Marshal Sergeyev, the Minister of Defense, and General
Yakavlov, the Commander in Chief of the rocket forces, went out on
Christmas Eve of last year to declare that system operational. The
Russians laid the keel in late 1996 for a new Borey (Arctic Wind) class
ballistic missile submarine. We expect to see that submarine by about
2005. The Russians are also very actively pursuing a new sea launched
ballistic missile to go on that new submarine. We expect to see that go
operational about the same time. Lastly, to upgrade the third leg of the
triad, they are investing quite a bit of money in a new air-launched
cruise missile that will modernize their bomber capability. My point to
you is, the Russians are out there. They are continuing to modernize
their forces and they are pursuing that with a great deal of
aggressiveness.
The downside of what I've just told you is that because we are not
developing any new systems at this time, we have put our industrial base
at risk. We must ensure that the expertise and the capacity to sustain
these systems and to develop follow-on systems at the appropriate time
is not lost. We are watching this very closely.
As we enter the 21st century and leave the Cold War behind
us, a number of things will remain constant. The nuclear threat, at
least for the time being, will remain. Although we have developed a
professional relationship with Russia and their military members, they
retain more than enough nuclear fire power to destroy our nation. The
proliferation of weapons of mass destruction has not decreased. In fact,
it has increased. As more and more countries seek to acquire these
deadly arsenals, the threat of regional conflict with the inherent risk
of escalation into the use of weapons of mass destruction remains a
serious concern.
Let us not forget China. At this point, they are not an enemy; they
are not a foe. But with one quarter of the world's population and the
fourth largest economy, they are something that we need to keep on our
radar scope. They are modernizing their strategic forces and they have
the potential to become a global peer competitor early next century.
Although the threats from the past and the present will shadow us
into the 21st century, there is some good news. We no longer
have bombers on alert, loaded with nuclear weapons. Our intercontinental
ballistic missiles, as well as the Russians', are no longer targeted at
each other on a day-to-day basis. While this action is reversible, and
not verifiable, it shows how far we've come over the past several years.
We now have a very successful military-to-military contact program with
our Russian counterparts. They have come to the United States and we
have visited Russia on many occasions. Just another significant step as
we build closer ties and improve confidence.
My thanks to the Air Force Association's last issue of the Air Force
Magazine--at the end of it there was a reprint of a press conference I
gave in November of last year talking about my very unique
experience--being the first non-Soviet, non-Russian ever to visit a
Russian nuclear weapon storage site. I will tell you--and I only went to
this one base--but, if what I saw was representative of what they do
with their nuclear weapons, the Russians are indeed very serious about
the safety and security of their nuclear weapons.
During that visit, I had several hours of discussions with General
Yakovlev, who is their ICBM commander. We agreed on the spot that he
would send some of his security people to visit our nuclear weapon
storage sites to see how we apply technology--they are very manpower
intensive in the way they do business. That will occur in the first
couple weeks in May. We also agreed to a shadow program where we will
exchange the equivalent of a wing commander, group commander, squadron
commander, flight commander and a missile crew member. The first visit
of a Russian team to come and shadow their counterparts for one week
will take place in early April.
Cooperative threat reduction, otherwise known as the Nunn-Lugar Act,
is another home run. It allows the Secretary of Defense to allocate
resources to help the Russians dismantle their nuclear weapons,
civilianize their nuclear weapons programs, and improve security of
nuclear weapons and components. Earlier this month, I had the
opportunity to accompany Secretary Cohen to a Russian cooperative threat
reduction training facility 40 miles outside of Moscow. It was a most
impressive display of the technologies we are providing the Russians to
ensure the safe and secure downsizing of their nuclear forces.
Let me talk for a few minutes about arms control. It took us 8 years
to negotiate START I, which brings us down to 6,000 accountable
strategic nuclear warheads. It took us 8 months to negotiate START II.
The United States has signed and ratified START II. The Russians have
signed the treaty, but the Duma, their parliamentary house, has not yet
ratified this treaty. I am convinced that this treaty, which will bring
us down to 3,000-3,500 strategic warheads will be ratified by the Duma
sooner rather than later. I also think (looking into my crystal ball,
which is not nearly as clear as it may appear by my comments here), the
Russians will immediately want to go to START III, which will bring us
down to the 2,000-2,500 level. That is good news for them, for us, for
everyone. In my view, START IV will take much longer because, if you
just do the math, it is clear that the Russians will want to bring in
the British, the French and the Chinese. When you go from bilateral to
multi-lateral negotiations of this type, it is going to take a long,
long time.
With all these positive things happening, one might think it is time
to get rid of nuclear weapons. I talk about this issue a great deal, but
because it is not sensational news, I don't get nearly the media
coverage as many of the vocal anti-nuclear advocates get. Let me make a
few points. There is this group that advocates the total elimination of
nuclear weapons--they've been doing this for over two years, and they
have received a lot of attention. If you remember nothing else of what I
say this morning, remember this. THIS AIN'T NEW NEWS. The official
policy of the United States of America for the past 30 years has been
the total elimination of nuclear weapons. We were one of the first
nations, in 1968, to sign the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. Article
VI of that treaty says that the ultimate goal of the treaty is the total
elimination of nuclear weapons on planet Earth. Then you have to read
the fine print. The fine print says, given the proper preconditions.
That is the hang up: Given the proper preconditions. I will tell
you--and I am not a zealot for having nuclear weapons on board
forever--I think it is going to be difficult, if not impossible, to ever
get that genie back into the bottle. We are on a stable, rational,
verifiable glide path to get down to lower and lower nuclear weapon
stockpiles. That is the right thing to do.
Next, we have a group that advocates de-alerting our nuclear weapon
arsenal. Again, I have a little bit of a problem with this because we
are on the right glide path--it is stable, rational and verifiable.
During the Cold War, each side had about 5,000 nuclear weapons on alert
staring each other in the face. We have about 2,300 today. With START
III, I predict we will have less than 700 weapons on alert. There have
been a number of individuals very actively involved in de-alerting. I
invited three of them to spend a full day with me and it was a good
visit. Some of the things I determined were that, first of all, they
were not fully informed and some of the information that they were
passing out to the media was wrong. For example, the day that they came
in mid-January, the New York Times published an editorial pushing for
all of the ICBMs to be taken off alert; similar to what the United
States had done in 1991 when we took all of Minuteman II off alert. The
editorial said that the Russians reciprocated our action by taking a
segment of their missiles off alert. But, our act in 1991 to take those
450 Minuteman II off alert was a unilateral act. Gorbachev said in a
press conference that they would take an equal number off of alert. He
went back to Moscow; he was slam-dunked by his military folks, and those
missiles never came off alert. That was a unilateral action on behalf of
the United States.
As we draw down our nuclear forces, the character of our remaining
forces will be more important than the actual numbers of warheads. We
must remember that deterrence is much more than just a bean counting
exercise. It is a package of capabilities. Deterrence, simply stated, is
the potential for a massive, unambiguous and totally devastating
"gut shot" provided by a diversified, dispersed and survivable
force. As I said earlier, the fundamental purpose of nuclear weapons is
to deter the use of weapons of mass destruction. They are also to act as
a hedge against the overwhelming conventional capability that may loom
in the future. This does not mean that we will necessarily use nuclear
weapons in response to a conventional attack. It does mean that we
require flexibility in the range of options we have available. In
support of this, we are evolving into a more flexible and diverse
command. We support regional CINCs by providing theater nuclear support
and counter proliferation planning.
How does all this tie back to global engagement? Global engagement is
based on a new understanding of what aerospace power means to our nation
-- the ability to hit an adversary's strategic centers of gravity
directly as well as prevail at the operational and tactical levels of
warfare. Like the eight other unified commands, we shape, respond and
prepare. We actively shape the world through programs such as our
military-to-military activities. We will continue to shape our world
through counter-proliferation efforts, arms control initiatives and
expanded military-to-military contact programs reaching out to include
the Chinese. We respond by providing theater nuclear support and
counter-proliferation planning to our regional CINCs. As the needs of
our regional CINCs change, we adapt and respond, always ensuring our
deterrence is viable. Finally, we prepare for the future very well so
that we are always ready, so that any potential enemy never doubts our
abilities and so we do not have to respond with our military might. This
is the deterrence that has proved so effective for over 50 years. This
is the deterrent force that is downsizing on a stable, verifiable glide
path.
With fewer numbers of weapons in an increasingly complex world, we
must ensure that the readiness of our deterrence force is not an issue
and never doubted by those who would test us. We do this by ensuring our
systems are maintained, modernized and tested--within treaty limits--not
only so they are ready for use, but so they will never have to be used.
Thank you for the opportunity to speak to you today and a special
thanks to the Air Force Association for what you are doing, not only for
us in this unified command but for the Air Force. Your work in getting
the word out to the public, Congress and within our own ranks concerning
the importance of aerospace issues is instrumental as we pursue our
national security interests. Never forget, ladies and gentlemen, peace
is still our profession.
Gen. Shaud: General Habiger, dealing with nuclear
weapons is all about command and control, when you recently visited
Russia did you note any diminishing in the effective of Russian command
and control?
Gen. Habiger: None at all and that is a good
question. The Russians were very open. They took me from the national
level command centers down to the numbered air force level, to the wing
level, to the regiment level, out to the field mobile command center. I
was impressed with what I saw. The thing that impressed me was the fact
that any individual in that chain can cut out the launch order; that is,
disable the launch sequence. They are concerned about the control of the
nuclear weapons. It is a very serious matter for them. I saw nothing
that would give me pause or concern.
The only thing that I saw that gave me a little bit of concern was in
Vladimir Yakovlev's command center in Moscow. He had a big briefing
board he was briefing me on and he had a laser pointer. The laser
pointer was about two inches in diameter and about 14 inches long. It
had a big cord that went back to a power supply box and when he punched
the button, there was a big red spot and the lights went down from the
voltage drain; then there was a hum. I just prayed that he wouldn't
accidentally shine it in my eyes and blind me (laughter).
Gen. Shaud: The next question has to do with
strategic modernization. It begins with an assertion that there doesn't
seem to be much support for strategic modernization to include the
nuclear side. What is on the books when current systems end their useful
service life?
Gen. Habiger: Again, another good question. Because
of some very wise investments and because we are realistic, we are a
low-maintenance command. What we have, like the advanced cruise missile
-- we have 360 of those -- are good, stealthy, accurate and reliable. As
I said the B-52s are a 1961 Oldsmobile. It is very capable to serve us
as a truck. For me to be talking about follow-on systems at this point
is somewhat counterproductive. But the point I would make to you and the
point I make on the Hill and when I talk to groups, is that we need to
start thinking about a wedge in about 2008, 2010, perhaps a little
sooner, for some funding. We need to start thinking outside the box.
General Estes at Space Command has done a lot of thinking about space. I
am not saying we are going to put weapons in space, but we need to start
thinking about other technologies because if you just look at the
advancements that we've made over the last 20 years, 20 years into the
future we may have new technologies to fall back on.
en. Shaud: We have a couple questions about
negotiations. How will post-Start II negotiations affect ICBMs?
Gen. Habiger: I don't want to give away the farm by
discussing everything, but I would say that if you just look at the
START III numbers, which is 2,000-2,500, we are going to have to make
some trade-offs. At this point, I am not ready to tell you what that
force structure is going to be. I would submit that there is going to be
some decrement in at least two legs of the triad and it could very well
impact our ICBM force. At this particular point -- and again, one of the
things I am most proud of the folks at Strategic Command -- we are
looking at arms control and we are not just focusing on START III, we
are looking at START IV and START V. This is a chess game. Because in
the year 2015 we don't want to go, wow, why did we cut up those bombers
in 2002? We are trying to get as far out in front of this thing as we
can.
Gen. Shaud: The continued negotiations become
increasingly complex. Part of this complexity is the result of this
precision strike capability with conventional munitions. Will this play
in post-Start II negotiation?
Gen. Habiger: I hope not. I have briefly discussed
this with the senior Russian leadership. I will discuss it again. In
mid-March we have General Yakovlev coming over. I am going to show him a
lot. Also, we've made a break through, the commander of their bomber
force is coming, General Oparin. I hope with General Hawley's support,
and he is very supportive, we are going to take him to a B-52 base, a
B-1 base to show him that the B-1 is a conventional bomber only and also
to Whiteman to show him the B-2.
Gen. Shaud: The last question has to do with
motivating the troops. With a lot of latter day Bertrand Russells and
abolitionists talking about doing away with nuclear weapons, is this
having an effect on the morale of the crew force?
Gen. Habiger: It gets them fired up.
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