2: Nuclear Security
Ensuring America’s nuclear security Other Information:
In 2000, the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) was established as a new element within the Department in response
to a Congressional mandate to reinvigorate the security posture throughout the nuclear weapons program and to reaffirm the
Nation’s commitment to maintaining the nuclear deterrence capabilities of the United States. NNSA was chartered to better
focus management attention on enhanced security, proactive management practices, and mission focus within the Department’s
national defense and nonproliferation programs. The Department performs its national security mission involving nuclear weapons
and nuclear materials and technology through the NNSA. Over the next six years, the Department will apply advanced science,
engineering, and nuclear technology to help ensure that it meets its national nuclear security strategic goals. National Nuclear
Security Challenges -- As NNSA continues to drawdown the nuclear weapons stockpile to the lowest levels since the Eisenhower
Administration, we must consider the long-term effects of aging and the implications of successive warhead refurbishments
which take us further away from the tested designs of the Cold War stockpile. The current nuclear weapons complex is not sufficiently
responsive to fix technical problems in the stockpile or to react to potential adverse geopolitical change. Therefore, the
nuclear weapons stockpile and the supporting infrastructure must be transformed. The Department is working closely with the
Department of Defense to transform the nuclear deterrent to ensure that it can meet the changing technical, geopolitical,
and military needs of the future. A second challenge deals with the ever increasing threat of terrorism. The mere acquisition
by terrorists or rogue regimes of nuclear and radiological materials which could be used in weapons of mass destruction or
in a "dirty bomb" represents a threat to the United States and to international peace and security. Lastly, increasing national
security demands necessitate the development of next-generation naval nuclear propulsion technology.
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