{
  "id": "97-945",
  "type": "CRS Report",
  "typeId": "REPORTS",
  "number": "97-945",
  "active": false,
  "source": "EveryCRSReport.com",
  "versions": [
    {
      "source": "EveryCRSReport.com",
      "id": 105028,
      "date": "1998-06-24",
      "retrieved": "2016-05-24T20:53:52.933941",
      "title": "Nuclear Weapons Production Capability Issues: Summary of Findings, and Choices",
      "summary": "The United States shows every intention of retaining nuclear weapons for the foreseeable future,\nthus\ncommitting itself to maintaining their safety, reliability, and performance. Maintenance requires\nR&D and production. While the former requirement is well understood, the latter is not. This\nreport\nprovides information on production and associated investment, people, and technology issues.\n  Production is done for many reasons. Problems with existing warheads have historically\nemerged over time and seem likely to do so in the future. Warhead maintenance requires\nmodifications, life extension programs, replacement of defective components, disassembly and\nreassembly for surveillance, and similar activities. Plants and labs make complementary\ncontributions to production. It appears that all five nuclear weapon states perform maintenance, and\nthat all but the United States produce weapons of new or existing design.\n  Production, as any industrial process, requires ongoing investment. In planning budgets for the\nplants, DOE attaches highest priority to production operations because they are fundamental to its\nability to support the stockpile. This priority, though, has led DOE to defer some longer-term\ninvestment in such areas as maintenance, facility upgrades, infrastructure, and equipment; such\ndeferral impedes work at the plants. At the same time, DOE is investing in some technology and\nother programs to aid the plants.\n  Production depends on people. There are adverse demographic trends among scientists and\nengineers at the plants. Trends for skilled trades personnel are potentially more serious; negligible\nhiring of new personnel and the initial hiring of most current personnel between 1977 and 1981 raise\nthe prospect of mass retirements in a decade or so. While the plants' mission is weapons work,\nnonweapons work helps them retain staff members and maintain and develop their skills.\n  The labs and plants are developing vast amounts of weapons-related technologies. The plants'\nfocus is on evolutionary advances in products and processes; that of the labs, on revolutionary\nadvances. This technology has a profound impact. Two examples: software is changing how\nnuclear weapon components are designed, engineered, and produced, with computer models\nbecoming the medium for conducting and linking these steps; and new technologies and declining\nwork\nvolume are changing the skill mix needed for production, often requiring trades workers to increase\nskills. New technology holds differing implications for different groups.\n  The United States has signed the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty. Some who would abolish\nnuclear weapons support the treaty and reject all but an interim, low-level weapons maintenance\neffort. Others, believing that this nation can obtain the confidence it needs in weapons only through\nnuclear testing, would reject the treaty, support more effort on weapons maintenance, and resume\ntesting. There appears to be a confluence of interest between many who favor the treaty and many\nwho would increase effort on weapons maintenance, as the two are arguably complementary.",
      "type": "CRS Report",
      "typeId": "REPORTS",
      "active": false,
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          "url": "http://www.crs.gov/Reports/pdf/97-945",
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      "topics": []
    }
  ],
  "topics": [
    "Foreign Affairs",
    "Intelligence and National Security",
    "National Defense"
  ]
}