Angus King Sounds Alarms On Staffing Reductions Hindering United States’ Nuclear Triad Development

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At a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing prior to the Congressional recess, Sen. Angus King (I-ME) spoke about the United States’ nuclear power development.

Transcript

00:00Senator King, you are recognized for any remarks. Thank you, Madam Chair. I think

00:06it's important to emphasize at the beginning of this hearing why nuclear

00:11weapons. Why is it that we have this focus on your production of nuclear

00:17weapons and also on our strategic delivery platforms? It's because of

00:22deterrence. The whole idea of nuclear weapons is to never have to use them,

00:27and they will never have to be used as long as our adversaries are convinced

00:34that if they use nuclear weapons first they will pay a terrible and unacceptable

00:38price. So I think it's important that we remember the fundamental purpose of this

00:44whole enterprise, which is to make this country safer and to avoid the use of

00:51these unthinkable weapons. Every year or every probably every 12 months or so

00:57I speak at the launch of a new destroyer at Bath Iron Works in Maine, and my

01:02remarks always have a similar theme, which is we're building these ships in the

01:06hopes that they will never have to be used in conflict, because having them

01:10there, having the capability that you're responsible for developing, is what keeps

01:15this country safe and avoids the unthinkable, which is a nuclear

01:20confrontation. I am concerned, and I'm sure we'll examine these questions during the

01:26course of the hearing with issues of staffing, whether it's at Hanford or at

01:32the National Labs or in NSA generally, because we can't solve these problems. We

01:40can't meet the demands that are being placed upon you without the people, and I'm

01:45worried that we've lost in the past few months some pretty important people, some

01:50very capable people, and I want to be sure that the expertise that those

01:54people carried with them is being transferred to new staff coming on, and that we're

02:02adequately staffing various departments and bureaus in order to be sure that we

02:09can meet the demands. We're now well into the modernization of the nuclear triad with

02:15missiles, with the bomber, with the new Columbia-class submarine, but they have to

02:22have the weapons in order to make them the effective deterrent, and that's where

02:25NSA comes in. So I'm looking forward to the hearing, and I hope you will address

02:30issues of staffing and adequacy of staffing, because I am concerned that that

02:35could hobble our ability to meet the very high level of demand that we have in the

02:41nuclear modernization project. Thank you. Thank you, Madam Chair.

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