US needs to modernize its nuclear forces: Officials

Top US military officials are warning that the country should no longer delay modernizing its decades-old nuclear forces.

The commander of the US Strategic Command, Adm. Cecil Haney, and other Pentagon officials contend that the US will risk eroding its credibility as a deterrent to attack by others if it does not start the modernization process now.

“Modernization now is not an option, it must happen. We have to realize we can’t extend things forever. We’re at the brick wall stage,” Haney said on Friday.

The US stockpile of nuclear warheads is now the oldest, he added.

The US deputy secretary of defense, Robert Work, has said the Pentagon will need almost $18 billion a year between 2021 and 2035 in order to modernize the three "legs" of the country’s nuclear triad, weapons which can be launched from land, sea and air.

"We need to replace these," Work said. "We can't delay this anymore."

However, critics argue that full-scale modernization is unnecessary and unaffordable with analysts estimating the costs to be tens of billions of dollars.

The officials’ remarks came after North Korea conducted a nuclear test on January 6, triggering a diplomatic row.

Following the test, North Korea said it would stop its nuclear tests if the United States signed a peace treaty with Pyongyang and stopped its joint annual military maneuvers with South Korea.

“Still valid are all proposals for preserving peace and stability on the [Korean] Peninsula and in Northeast Asia, including the ones for ceasing our nuclear test and the conclusion of a peace treaty in return for US halt to joint military exercises,” an unnamed spokesman for North Korea’s Foreign Ministry said on January 16.

North Korea is irked by the joint military maneuvers conducted by Seoul and Washington and views them as direct threats against its security. The United States has some 28,500 troops in South Korea.

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