US Strategic Command chief Gen. Kevin Chilton believes that the nation is best served by maintaining a nuclear triad of land- and sea-based missiles and long-range bombers for the indefinite future. He rejects the idea that the nation is headed for a “Dyad” of land- and sea-launched ballistic missiles alone, as some defense analysts recently projected. “Each leg has its own unique strength and overlapping strengths,” Chilton said at a Washington, D.C., conference Wednesday, and the bombers especially have flexibility for non-nuclear missions. That resonates with USAF’s new mantra that, with few exceptions, all systems need to have application across many missions. The new long-range strike platform can be outfitted with nuclear hardening for a marginal increase in cost and should be, he said. “You get a lot for that kind of investment,” he said. And, he added, “There’s still a need for a gravity-type weapons approach.”
If the Air Force is in line for a big budget bump from President Donald Trump’s proposed $1.5 trillion defense budget in 2027, the head of Air Combat Command said he would make aircraft spare parts his top spending priority—but cautioned that more money to buy parts won’t equal a…
