U.S. Navy advances first new nuke since Cold War

The U.S. Navy has awarded JRC Integrated Systems a $47.4 million contract modification to provide engineering and technical support for the Nuclear-Armed Sea-Launched Cruise Missile, or SLCM-N, the service’s effort to field its first new nuclear weapon since the Cold War.

The modification adds to a contract Strategic Systems Programs, the Navy office overseeing the program, awarded earlier and covers work through Nov. 30, 2030. Tasks include systems engineering and integration, test and flight test engineering, modeling and simulation, oversight of prototype work, system design documentation, and configuration management. The contract also covers nuclear command, control and communications support and both executive and tactical subject matter expertise on nuclear weapons, along with broader program management and acquisition support.

The Navy is obligating $10.1 million in fiscal 2025 research funds now, with the rest tied to optional line items. The work was awarded without competition under a legal provision allowing sole-source nuclear weapons contracts, after being posted publicly on the government’s contract announcement portal.

Work will be split mostly between Washington, D.C., where 80 percent of the effort will take place, with 15 percent at Naval Base Kitsap-Bangor in Washington state, home to the Navy’s Trident submarine fleet, and the remaining 5 percent in Norfolk, Virginia.

The award follows a separate, larger contract The Defence Blog reported earlier, when the Navy gave General Dynamics Missions Systems $194.1 million for engineering support on SLCM-N’s Fire Control Subsystem, with work split between Pittsfield, Massachusetts, and Manassas, Virginia. Rear Adm. Randy Wolfe, director of Strategic Systems Programs, told Congress in May 2025 that the prior year had been spent defining the missile’s overall system architecture, spanning the missile itself, its fire control and launcher systems, platform and warhead integration, and support equipment and training materials.

The SLCM-N traces back to 2018, when the first Trump administration proposed it in that year’s Nuclear Posture Review as a way to restore a low-yield, sea-based nuclear cruise missile option the Navy had given up when it withdrew the nuclear-armed Tomahawk Land Attack Missile from service in 2010. The Biden administration tried to cancel the program in its 2022 Nuclear Posture Review, arguing it was redundant given the submarine-launched W76-2 warhead, but Congress overruled that decision in the fiscal 2024 defense policy act, establishing SLCM-N as a formal program of record. Wolfe has said the Navy expects to deliver the capability in 2034, and Sandia National Laboratories announced in January 2026 that the missile would use a new W80-5 warhead variant.

The program’s surface-ship role became clearer in December 2025, when President Trump announced approval to build an initial pair of nuclear-armed “Trump-class” battleships, with the Navy eventually aiming for a fleet of 20 to 25 of the roughly 30,000- to 40,000-ton ships. As The Defence Blog reported at the time, the design includes Conventional Prompt Strike hypersonic missile launchers, more than 100 vertical launch cells, and is expected to carry the SLCM-N, restoring a surface-based nuclear strike role the Navy has not fielded in decades. Navy Secretary John Phelan said the lead ship, the future USS Defiant, would serve as the Navy’s flagship.