America’s nuclear arsenal was built to counter only one international adversary during the Cold War, but as new nuclear powers emerge and global conflict increases, some argue for a revamped system.
Sen. Deb Fischer told a crowd of defense industry officials last week the U.S. nuclear program was built for a world that no longer exists. The Nebraska Republican said China’s emergence as a nuclear power, along with Russia’s aggression, requires massive investment.
“China is building new missile silos, increasing its warhead stockpile, and rapidly developing the full range of nuclear delivery systems. This is not the strategic environment that we planned for,” she said. “The current force structure, which again was set forth in a very different geopolitical environment, is not sufficient. We must size our forces to meet tomorrow’s threats and not just yesterday’s assumptions.”
Ms. Fischer made the comments at “IndoPac 2026 | Naval Dominance: Shipbuilding, Autonomy & C2,” a major forum hosted by the Washington Times’ Threat Status national security team and held at the U.S. Navy Memorial in downtown Washington last week.
The Pentagon’s triad of nuclear options — intercontinental ballistic missiles, submarine-launched missiles and strategic bombers — was constructed and sized to deal with Russia during the Cold War. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, U.S. military planners saw China’s small, silo-based missiles as a lower-tier strategic threat.
But China’s nuclear expansion over the past several years has rendered that U.S. intelligence obsolete. The Pentagon’s 2024 China Military Power Report found that Beijing possesses over 600 operational warheads and is on track to surpass 1,000 by 2030.
That’s a marked increase from the 200 warheads China possessed in 2020, according to the Pentagon report from that year.
Ms. Fischer argued that the U.S. needs to rapidly scale its triad of nuclear options to respond to the growing threat posed by China’s atomic ambitions.
“One hundred bombers are not enough. We need at least 200 to meet those current demands,” she said.
She added that the U.S. faces significant challenges in meeting its nuclear strategic goals.
A deficit of skilled workers and bloated costs have led to serious production shortfalls on Columbia and Virginia-class submarines.
“We need more welders and machinists and pipefitters and engineers and technicians. And we need to treat this workforce development with the same strategic urgency that the weapons design is met with,” Ms. Fischer said. “The Strategic Posture Commission was clear that the nuclear industrial base is a national security vulnerability.”
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